War Thunder overall is an excellent idea that was implemented atrociously. The fact that you can play ground, air and sea battles all in one decently-sized game is a relief when compared to having to install three seperate World of _____ Games. However, the BR system is horribly broken and the grind is purposefully designed to be so difficult that you are either forced to spend money to progress at a reasonable pace or you will spend hours and hours grinding out one single vehicle, only for it to be basically unusable because you don't get either the modification parts(to repair your vehicle in combat) or FPE(to put out fires in your vehicle). Meaning, if you make even ONE mistake in your shiny new tonk, you will be punished extremely harshly.

I understand that the developer needs to make money, but frankly the level of unbalanced premiums and this terrible modification system makes the game very difficult to play. Someone did the math and estimated that it would take a player 7 years to get to top tier(as a new player) if they spent 8 hours a day, 7 days a week playing this game. Such a number is appalling and nobody has the time for that(ignore the fact that I have 2.5k hours in this game). The grind to top tier isn't even that rewarding, because lets say you put in the 7 years and got to Top Tier. Congratulations: Welcome to either ♥♥♥♥ players spending hundreds of dollars to buying High Tier Premiums and ruining your game, to extremely expensive mistakes and very limited/basically zero rewards(there is nothing left to grind).

Gaijin has something very good in their hands, but their lack of community engagement and terrible implementation of game mechanics and monetization of features that should be part and parcel of gameplay for F2P players ruins the game for new people. Players like me who have amassed a ton of skill who play at low tier often destroy enemy teams, and if those teams contained new players: they would be turned off from the game because the learning curve to compete would be too steep. The cost of merely taking your vehicles into battle is often too much in and of itself, not to mention that this game becomes a stressor and more of a chore rather than entertainment. You really have to think about this like it's real tank combat and if you are someone who hasn't played this game or similar games before? You will struggle.

As a tankophile and planeophile, this game is basically nonstop porn for me so I will continue to play it with my Tier I-III tanks. However, if you are not a fan of history, WWII or putting a significant amount of money and effort towards a game? This isn't for you. The level of detail you would have to memorize, from armor thickness, to weakspots, to your own angling, this is an extremely detail oriented game.