Developer Wargaming already has a big success with its World of Tanks free-to-play online shooter. Now, it is opening up its aerial-combat followup, World of Warplanes, in open beta.
The new open test goes live in Russia and North America today. Wargaming will let European players in starting July 4.
This open beta follows a length closed testing period that had more than 2.7 million players register for the game.
“We thank every single World of Warplanes player out there, whether they’re just getting into the game during open beta or have been with us since the very start,” Wargaming chief executive Victor Kislyi said in a statement. “The game has grown and evolved tremendously since we first announced it and I’m confident virtual pilots are going to be extremely excited when they get behind the cockpits of the game’s truly amazing warbirds.”
World of Warplanes is a 30-player competitive multiplayer game. Teams of 15 face off against one another in iconic fighter planes from the 1930s through the 1950s. Wargaming is using the real aerial vehicles that the United States, the Soviet Union, Germany, and Japan used in World War II.
Wargaming is also working on World of Warships, which takes the Tanks and Warplanes model and applies it to sea-based combat. That game is still in its early testing phase.