Send in the artillery: Tank Nation fires up on iPad

We've all played Worms and Angry Birds, so what comes next in the world of turn-based trajectory games?

US start-up Wormhole Games is hoping that it will be its debut title Tank Nation.

It's all about lots of short bouts of tank battles in a 2D steampunk-inspired world.

Depending on your type of tank set-up and commander, you have various tactical options to select between.

Of course, firing at the opposition is a main one - the game uses a trajectory pull-back gesture a little like Angry Birds - but you might want to move closer (or further away), not to mention deploy an offensive or defensive special move.

Each of these choices uses up some of your turn energy and then it's time for the enemy to make their own moves. Rinse and repeat until one of you has gone boom!

In the bigger scheme of things, you're fighting and winning these battles to level up and collect items and bolts so you can upgrade your tank(s) and progress to bigger and better battles.

Eventually, you'll want a garage full of specialist tanks to be able to fight in any environment.

Of course, this being a free-to-play game, there's the option to spend real cash to get better parts and speed up their time to equip.

When you complete the first set of missions, you'll also unlock the multiplayer mode, which provides you with Tank Tokens - very useful for making better parts for your tank.

You can check out the game now; it's available only for iPad.