World of Warships launches with bombastic video

Have you ever wanted to be a boat? World of Warships launches today with 10 maps, four classes, dozens of ships but not a single pirate. This critical oversight is only exaggerated by the hectic cinematic launch trailer, which shows battleships dueling across islands with huge cannons.

Like Wargaming's World of Tanks, Warships is free to play, but you'll need to buy some in-game gold eventually to upgrade your ships at a sensible rate. If you want to try it you can sign up on the World of Warships site.

It will be interesting to see if Warships develops to reflect upcoming warship technology. Rail guns are due to be test-fired from some US ships next year. They use electromagnets to fling slugs at some 5,000 miles per hour. Laser weapons are in development. Supreme Commander is surely only a few steps away.

Part of the UK team, Tom was with PC Gamer at the very beginning of the website's launch—first as a news writer, and then as online editor until his departure in 2020. His specialties are strategy games, action RPGs, hack ‘n slash games, digital card games… basically anything that he can fit on a hard drive. His final boss form is Deckard Cain.