War Thunder Announces Night Vision Update for September

Coming in September to War Thunder, a new content update titled “Night Vision” will include the eighth playable nation. That’s right, China is coming to War Thunder, and the initial list of Chinese vehicles was used during World War II, or shortly after. This will outline just how turbulent the history of the country’s military was in the 20th century. Players will be able to use aircraft employed by foreign volunteers from the Flying Tigers regiment, that helped China fight Imperial Japan, as well as captured Japanese vehicles, and military imports from the USSR.

Each vehicle that will become a part of War Thunder’s initial Chinese vehicle tree was historically used by China at some point: The Henschel Hs 123A-1, for example, was imported by the Chinese Nationalist forces from Nazi Germany and was used against the Imperial Japanese Navy during battles at the Yangtze River. After the release of this update, all players will get access to a selection of Chinese ground vehicles and aircraft. A series of tasks will await, to see players gain access to the entire tech tree as fast as possible, or they can purchase one of the Chinese pre-order packs. These include a premium vehicle, in-game currency, premium account time and cosmetic items. One of the packs will grant access to the aircraft tech tree and the other one will unlock the ground vehicles tech tree.

Another important part of the new update and a significant expansion to the gameplay of War Thunder on higher ranks is the introduction of night vision devices and thermal sights. For the latter, the game will calculate the temperature of each component of a vehicle, i.e. the gun or tracks, and show their temperature accordingly. The hotter components get, the more visible – and thus more vulnerable to detection – the affected vehicles will become. On the other hand, tankers in War Thunder will then be able to turn off their engines to decrease their vehicle’s temperature, e.g. to prepare for ambushes. Night vision devices, which allow increased visibility in dimly lit conditions or darkness, will not only be available to tanks but helicopters as well – including the modern Eurocopter Tiger, which is also included in this update. Of course, this also means that there will be an increased chance for night time encounters in higher-ranked ground forces battles.