An Aging Man Yells at Clouds: A Gunner, Heat PC Review

 

Cutting to the Chase

Where to begin with this? I suppose I should spare any readers suspense on my ultimate view: you should not waste your hard-earned monies on Gunner, Heat PC. 

Unlike my caveat in my review of Sea Power (best summarized as, 'hold off  for quality of life, but buy now if you already have an understanding of the subject matter'), I have no caveats or asterisks to add to the above. I do not believe GHPC is worth your money, and the trajectory of the development suggests it never will be. Even if you are an ravenous, dying-for-more-games-like-this, tread head. 

What follows below in this post is based on my understanding of the dev team's current trajectory, monetary situation, and what that likely means for meaningful further development. What do I mean by 'meaningful' development? Shocking to say, it doesn't mean adding more vehicles, which I know will be a source of disagreement. What I mean by the phrase "meaningful development" is actual long-term gameplay. Basic routines for AI, optimization, long-term gameplay, and basic ability to command more than your immediate fire control system. 

The Good

Now that I've made myself perfectly clear I don't think GHPC is worth your money, I think it's only fair to discuss the obvious passion the developers have poured into their project, and what it does well. Make no mistake, there's quite a bit to praise here. 

The Roster

A T80 firing on a range, part of a 'showcase' scenario the game provides you.

GHPC has an impressive list of functional, playable vehicles, some of them so very obviously the result of painstaking research and, where data was lacking, reasonable deductions. The real standout is the amount of playable Soviet-bloc vehicles that are in game. I'm struggling to think of any tank sim that has attempted to model with accuracy the fire control systems of Soviet T80s or T64s. Not even Steel Beasts, the gold standard, has found time or inclination to do this. 

A Leopard 1 parades past two M60 variants in the showcase map. GHPC's roster of vehicles is impressive, but is it a case of wide as an ocean, deep as a puddle?

Even here, though, I must dampen my praise with a question. How necessary was it, really, to add about eighteen million (and I am only being slightly hyperbolic) variants of the T-64, only a handful of which ever saw service in the GSFG? I can't help but feel this was precious development resources wasted, or at least a skilled lead artist with too much time on their hands (despite the seemingly enormous list of things left 'to-do' on the list); effort that could've been better spent fleshing out the 'width' of gameplay. 

Three years ago, Radian Simulations LLC published a roadmap for early access. They are now on item seven, presumably, having skipped, to my knowledge, item five. The implementation of items one (so basic as to be forgettable), two (queued fire missions are nowhere to be seen, though I am happy to be corrected on this), and three (infantry move so unnaturally and with singlemindedness that it's like watching a murmuration of birds or a school of chum) suggests to me that they're galloping through with 'good enough' tick-boxing while hoping this keeps cash flowing in so they can limp to the next item on the checklist. 

Impact and Intensity

No one, I think, can deny with any seriousness that Radian has not at least grasped that the first step to designing an excellent game is tricking its players. A session in GHPC will undoubtedly lead to at least a few immersive moments. Whether it's an exasperated TC announcing "Fuck it, launch a sabot [at the infantry]" or a panicking loader going "He's gone!" on the infinitesimal chance you actually take effective return fire that causes a fatality, what GHPC does have in terms of immersive audio/visual presentation is excellent. It will fool you, if for a moment, that you are in an intense sim and fighting an intense battle. 

Again, passion and good research are evident in abundance. The firing point procedures for the four currently playable militaries are accurate, and accurately ignored, when the situation gets dire. The crumps of artillery impacts, both distant and near, are excellent. The dust kicked up from both travel and near hits, equally so. Watching an F-4 or F-104 burn in and lay a stick of bombs, even if awkwardly animated, is still much appreciated. Likewise, watching tank treads leave trails behind, marring the otherwise pristine agrarian set piece of central Germany, struck me right away. Even if it is only, upon closer inspection, a texture layer rather than true terrain deformation.

Even here, there's a lot to caveat with criticism. The façade begins to crack when you realise much of the scenery has no collision. It's particularly jarring in the small hamlets and villages that dot the maps, as you phase right through fences, stone walls and corners of houses as easily as you go through haybales like a phantom. 

The Combat

In broad strokes, nothing strikes me as absurd or beyond credulity. To paraphrase the words of Ssnake, the face of Steel Beasts, so much of what we know regarding post-WWII modern munitions is made up nonsense. We have very little empirical data about post-penetration effects of modern sabots, for example. It merely needs to be in line with what little we do know, in other words it merely must satisfy the requirement of being believable made up nonsense. 

Post-penetration effect of a sabot. GHPC has a rudimentary, but functional, AAR system that focuses its intentions almost entirely on hits, highlighting the lack of real tactical detail in the game.

I'm not so naïve as to the state of the genre, however, to understand how unique I may be in this belief. I have little doubt that the Official Discord is inundated with "bug reports" of individuals fighting tooth and nail for their version of reality following a penetration, or lack thereof, of their favourite pet vehicle. For the only time in this review, Radian has my genuine sympathies.

As to the business of actually servicing targets, I also have no complaints. It feels as good as it looks and sounds. The controls are passable, and can be rebound to something bespoke. The actual slewing of the turrets, lasing, leading, and firing are all what you'd expect. It's snappy and responsive. One could accuse it of being simplified and generalised, but I rather suspect that is what the studio was aiming for, and I think it was a wise choice given what they want to accomplish with the game. In the end, the only obstacle to unbridled enjoyment of the actual fight is the complete absence of anything approaching a challenge, but more on that shortly.

A burning T-64, it's turret tossed: an iconic form of destruction thankfully modelled well.

Easy Modularity

A trio of M1s lead a mechanized company team. In the original scenario, it's M60A3s.

Once a scenario has been completed, you are able to revise it through a series of plug-and-play lists to swap vehicles, ammunition and helicopters (if present). It's nothing flash, but it's appreciated, particularly in the absence of a scenario editor. It creates replay ability, which the game is in sore need of. 

The Bad (or The Absent)

Now to the thorny bits.

It is Utterly Braindead

I struggle to find a more articulate way to say this. The reality is that for all its bells and whistles, the core problem is that the game isn't much of one. The dozens of scenarios in game all use what are very obviously scripted AI plans. That's a good: pure "AI" is rarely effective, it is frankly usually a mess. I would much rather play a heavily scripted, or series of scripted, plans. However, pure scripting is equally bad, particularly in a tank-heavy sim. Watching units get absolutely plastered from the flank and carry on moving past you, oblivious to their pounding, is frankly absurd, and less than what you should settle for. Watching enemy units at their end of a series of waypoints sit on a forward slope as you plink away at them through keyholes also gets tiresome. 

I promised myself I would keep comparisons to Steel Beasts to a minimum, as I do think it is extremely unfair to GHPC. Nevertheless, I do think it's necessary here. The inability of AI to automatically jockey, find hull downs relative to a certain point, or shift left/right into line to engage an obvious flank threat, infantilizes the game. Make no mistake either, it's not in a fun or entertaining way. I enjoy a solid power fantasy as much as the next person, this goes beyond "you're the man, now" and right into ruining the hard work at immersing you the art and sound design attempts. I think in the ten hours of gameplay I've taken return fire about nine times, and effective return fire maybe four out of those nine times.

See for yourself. In the below video, playing one of the larger scenarios in the game, a motley collection of six MBT/PCs are tasked with stopping a reduced Pact battalion assault. Your section starts on the flank, and asides from an early threat from helicopters, the scenario rapidly descends into a shooting gallery as enemy platoon after enemy platoon parade past you, continually oblivious to flanking fire. I think in only two circumstances did I see enemy turrets slew towards us, and as far as I can see from the footage, only once do I take return fire, which lands somewhere in the upper atmosphere. Absurd and unrealistic? You decide. Boring and trite? Beyond doubt.

There's no Gameplay - Scenarios are short!

Fastest gun in the West (of Germany)

Contemporary mechanized warfare can be a frenetic affair. It can be an abattoir where units joust over the same stretch of ground for hours on end, in a cycle of stroke-counterstroke, or it could involve bounds of dozens of kilometres at a time, battles without fronts, and 'supply forward' units fighting gamely to penetrate an enemy line or displace from battle position to battle position. Individual engagements may only last minutes at a time, but the cycle of combat is truly 24/7, and a company-sized unit can find itself in more or less constant combat for hours on end, and often resupplying under fire. You will only experience the sharp individual engagement in GHPC. I don't think I have yet had even the most complex scenario last more than fifteen minutes. 

This is a problem that goes hand-in-hand with utterly absent tactical AI. Engagements that would be short and sharp even against an enemy that had rudimentary jockeying and hull-down logic are turned into what can only be described as live-fire shoots. I may as well play one handed and whisper to myself "Go! On!" as I engage target after target moving forward mindlessly like automatons. Much of the absent AI could be disguised by larger, longer and more complex scenarios. Instead of a two minute brawl, as above, to clear out a small combat patrol from a ridge, make it a matter of clearing out the CRP, conduct a reload and then establish a hasty defence to rubbish the main body of the forward security element that is following a short interval behind. It may make losses taken in a mindless melee matter. Nor do I think GHPCs obvious philosophy of creating an accessible sim lives in direct opposition to longer or more complex scenarios. None of that gets in the way of the fact you can jump into any tank with the control scheme and more or less have it figured out in a couple of shots. That leaves ample time to enjoy the experience. Now, if only the game would give us the time to actually enjoy it.

The problem, of course, is...

There's no Gameplay - Scenarios are tiny!

Scenarios rarely have you command more than a section of tanks, and cap out at a troop. You may be part of a larger force, scripted to move in conjunction with you (and here, so far as the praise goes, is where scenarios shine), but you'll rarely fight a force greatly larger than your own, and certainly there's a curious lack of Battalion (+) scenarios. The game clearly is incapable of handling it, given its high graphical fidelity.

This would not be a problem in and of itself, of course. Panzerelite, a downright ancient title kept alive via a dedicated modding community, never exceeds troop-level command. Yet, scenarios were often more complex, requiring several subsequent objectives and something approaching brain power to handle your unit without leaving your brother platoons twisting in the wind. Naturally, you had more tools as a platoon leader than GHPC gives you for handling your four or five tanks.

I would be perfectly content if the game kept itself as a troop-level command simulator. There's a lot of potential for nuance at that scale, and there's a certain challenge with having to fulfil intentions that are not entirely your own. Given how intensive the game can be for some PCs, it's probably best to not push the engine further, and there are sims that do larger scale armoured combat to compete with. GHPC may have, therefore, found a happy niche, now only if they flesh it out. There's room for challenge in being given a BP that is a bit too exposed, may not be the one you would have picked, but utterly vital for shooting the rest of the company onto an objective.

All of this, of course, would require the ability to actually command your units in a meaningful way, which is completely absent.

Infantile Command

This is as complex as it gets: I order my wingman to move to me after having him halt in cover. Once he is level with me, I order him to not follow. I reverse to restock, he begins to engage. Clunky, to say the least, versus a simple "go here" command from the cupola.

Platoon command has, essentially since release, consisted of being able to order formation changes and spacing, and the ability to order your subordinates to follow or halt. That about summarizes what you can do. Some nuance can be achieved by ordering a halt then manually placing units, but given most scenarios don't last longer than a visit to a public restroom, that's a moot point. I can count on one hand the amount of times I could really take advantage of the follow/halt mechanics. A troop level game lacking the ability to press 1-4 (or something similar) and clicking on a point in line of sight to travel to is frankly, absurd. Never mind the ability to command via map.

If you thought you'd be managing complex bounds of overwatch, think again. Section-level movement is not in game, and I note isn't on their early access roadmap. 

The reality is, that this hasn't been implemented yet, shows it's not a priority, or there is a lack of direction to do so. This is beyond a nonsense; it's a non-starter. The game will remain nothing less than an expensive pre-Alpha until some semblance of finite control and complexity can occur. I would, personally, make this a priority over stuff like a detailed commander/driver role or even improving the damage and penetration model. The fact that this wasn't the starting point of a tank sim strikes me as a massive misstep. The monies is obviously never going to flow in as strongly as it does at release, when you need the time and budget to do QA on the more complex systems like this. 

A Development Death-Spiral?

There will be claims that this is all still in development. That the game is in early access. This excuse, because that is precisely what it is, wears thin. My initial draft of this post began on the 25th of July, 2025. We are only a few weeks away from the game's third listed year for sale, to the day, on September 6, 2022. The game had been talked about at places like TheFewGoodMen and elsewhere since 2020. The game has, frankly, moved little past a series of vertical slices, sophisticated ones perhaps, but vertical slices nonetheless. I struggle to call it an alpha state. What they do display, is impressive. It is the lack of what is actually on display that should greatly worry you. 

That they are an independent development studio is also noted. Good on them, I understand the desire to remain independent. I question, however,  doing it past the point of financial viability. Scuttlebutt suggests they have rejected approaches by Micropose to be published. I don't necessarily doubt that specific wisdom, either, given the revived-Micropose seems to be very hit-and-miss with their new publications. Sea Power is definitely a shining star of what partnering with Micropose can accomplish, but many may view it as the exception that proves a rule. Radian Simulations LLC, the indie studio that has developed GHPC, maintains they have never been affiliated with a publisher, and remain admirably and professionally tight-lipped about the other publishers that have approached them.

Again, I understand their desire to retain creative control. Particularly early on, an indie dev is going to have little relative bargaining power and even more limited legal recourse to addressing impropriety from a publisher. They have a marketable product now, however, and I find it odd that they are maintaining the artisan approach and letting publishers come to them. They may have had some better luck putting a line in the water and seeing who bites on their terms. Particularly if, as I suspect, they are not getting as much monies flowing in as they expected.

This is where I speculate they're in a bit of a spiral. They need to keep attracting new buyers and shift units to continue to fund their development. This may seem like an obvious statement, I understand, but this is not a finished product where they are adding content injections: they are essentially hedging bets they can continue to attract new players with new, unpaid-for, content. That content is not going to be stuff like quality of life improvements (which retains players), it's going to be the gaming equivalent of plastic keys: new vehicles, new voices, the promise of new, rather than improved, experiences. Most other games would have made this a paid expansion or DLC later in the life cycle once they got core gameplay locked down. I will admit it smacks slightly of hypocrisy that I am suggesting they saved additional content for paid DLCs down the line, but given so many consumers are clearly willing to accept this business model, it was a choice they probably should've decided to make.

Diminishing returns: content additions bring players back (or in), but never as much as the last one.

 

Their last major update, on June 30, 2025, is a good example: the addition of the Marder 1 IFV for the Bundeswehr was well received, and common sense would suggests that it almost certainly drew in more players. Common sense, of course, doesn't always survive encounters with evidence, such as it is: 

The Marder early access runs (May 2025) saw a reasonable spike in players, which had all but evaporated by the time of it's full integration in the game, with a declining average entering into July. (Source: SteamDB)

Even had it been true that the latest content update drew in more players, and fresh buyers, how many of them stayed after they get twenty minutes of gameplay out of it, is another matter. New content is almost always a game of diminishing returns, too, particularly for an indie studio. It reaches less and less of an audience as it loses more and more of their original player base. Its marketing is naturally limited, because that costs monies, and often requires dedicated positions to really crack into the psychology of the consumer. Word of mouth is what matters in this case, and if people have said the same refrain for three years running ('what they have is very cool, just wish there was more gameplay') then you're not exactly going to hit high numbers. Then you must remind yourself that games like this are a niche within a niche. GHPC's peak player count was 981. 

Most people I think are eager to compare GHPC to Steel Beasts. There's a lot of temptation to, but they are trying to accomplish different things. Let's instead do something a bit unique, let's compare it to another early access simulator, one I've already reviewed and alluded to: Sea Power, from a development studio that also had indie roots and a small team. What a difference having a publisher, good marketing, and actual improvements both to gameplay and content can produce: 

These are impressive numbers for such a niche, and frankly infinitely more complex, game. Doubly so when you recall Sea Power had more than a few bumps and scrapes on way to early access release. Triassic's saving grace is that there's an actual game here, a good one. There's hours of entertainment in it already, and work on actual campaigns, real ones, are proceeding well. The release of a scenario editor also allowed the community to step into the fold. All of this hints at longevity for both Triassic Games and Sea Power. Yes, it follows the same peaks-and-valleys trend as GHPC (and really, any game), but the crests and troughs are less dramatic, and the mean player base suggests a dedicated community, and good publicity. Sea Power will exit early access at this point, I think my earlier fears have been assuaged here, and its suggested sales numbers have undoubtedly confirmed that. I cannot say the same for GHPC, despite it having been out for far, far longer: not a good sign.

There's a large market of tread heads, who all claim to be buckling under a barrage of free-to-play, games-as-service trite for tank simulators, and yet GHPC's numbers remain small and are dwindling. GHPC strikes me as simply not financially viable. I can't, in good conscience, recommend anyone spends any amount of money on an early access game where the trend suggests the Studio will not be around for a 1.0 release. I won't say the studio will fold, but I will say with some measure of confidence it is at a risk of it.