World of Tanks Xbox 360 Edition open beta in 'relatively near future'
by
Jessica Conditt 
(8 hours ago)
7
World of Tanks Xbox 360 Edition will enter open beta in the "relatively near future," Wargaming General Manager Denny Thorley said during a demo at E3. The beta will begin in North America and Canada, and roll out to other countries later on. Beta registration is open now at the game's
website.
The beta will likely include four maps and a majority of the full game's 60 total tanks at first, Thorley said.
World of Tanks Xbox 360 Edition won't feature cross-play between PC and console. It supports online multiplayer for up to 30 players – 15 vs. 15 – with no single-player or local multiplayer content at launch. Wargaming may add single-player tutorials or other comparable content in the future.
It's free-to-play for Xbox Live Gold members, and all other Live users will get a free seven-day trial. The monetization strategy on XBLA will be slightly different than its PC predecessor, though Thorley said he couldn't go into detail about specific packages.
"I think you're going to find some similarities," Thorley said. "There are areas that may be slightly different."
The major differences between the PC and Xbox 360 versions of
World of Tanks will be the control scheme – surprise, the console edition uses a controller – and some user interface tweaks to better suit a couch perspective.
