Update 9.0 Hits World of Tanks with Big Changes

The updates continue to hit fast and hard for Wargaming’s free-to-play mammoth World of Tanks. This latest one packs enough in it to merit a version bump to 9.0 and its very own name: New Frontiers. We’ve listed the changes and included the fancy trailer below.

Visual upgrades

First thing you’re going to notice is that everything should look better. This update kicks off Wargaming’s “plans for a massive visual overhaul of World of Tanks throughout 2014” and they’re doing so with graphically enhanced battle arenas, tanks and in-game objects.

Ten iconic vehicles – such as the American Sherman M4, Soviet T-54 and German Tiger I – will also be getting some star treatment.  They’ll get high definition models and textures, and more excitingly, new physics functions.

Scored an ammo rack explosion? You’ll witness a flaming turret soar through the sky. On the other hand, if you’re driving one of these mechanical beauties then humps and bumps are going to feel different with the new “realistic suspension behavior”.

Historical Battles

The New Frontiers update also introduces Historical Battles. At last, forum users can have one less feature to clamor for.

It is what it says, pitting two teams in a recreation of some of World War II’s legendary tank encounters. Military history fans will be pleased to see historically-outfitted tanks on three famous battlefields: Operation Spring Awakening, the Battle of Kursk, and the Ardennes Breakthrough (links point to Wikipedia).

Of course, the question now is whether a future update will see a score of Shermans trying to rush down a few German tanks.

The fancy trailer

As promised:

It’s as flashy as their past videos though that part with the underwater assault really pushed it quite a bit. Honestly though, it wouldn’t be a World of Tanks trailer otherwise.