War Thunder: Real Places Behind the Ground Maps

The Volokolamsk tank map is a winter battlefield in the countryside about 130 km from Moscow. The developers describe the town as a place of fierce fighting in the early war years, where decisive battles helped seal the outcome of the Battle of Moscow, and they built the map around tactical manoeuvres, especially in snow storms. The real town was under German occupation from 27 October to 20 December 1941, when the 331st Rifle Division liberated it.

Location precision: The developers place the map near Volokolamsk but name no district; the pin marks the town.

The Stalingrad tank map is a copy of the factory district. Its makers worked from real photographs taken during the battle, and rebuilt the whole factory complex, the railroad and the surroundings. In the real city the Stalingrad Tractor Factory was one of three giant plants German forces faced in October 1942, together with the Red October Steel Factory and the Barrikady Arms Factory; 14 October is the day Chuikov considered the worst of the battle. The plant, opened in 1930, is today the Volgograd Tractor Plant.

The Novorossiysk map puts tanks around the freight railroad terminal of the Black Sea port. The artists worked from archive photographs, air photo intelligence and newsreels to rebuild the harbour, terminal, grain elevator, residential area and city park, though the developers slightly altered the combat zone for balance. In 1943 Soviet sailors held the Malaya Zemlya bridgehead for 225 days, until the city was liberated on 16 September.

Location precision: The developers do not name a landmark; the pin marks the port of Novorossiysk, not the map's exact centre.

The Hürtgen Forest map is a hilly beech forest with a damaged village, where the task is to drive entrenched German forces out of Vossenack. The developers call it a historical location reflecting the battle in western Germany. The real fight lasted 88 days in 1944, the longest battle on German ground in the war; US troops took Vossenack on 2 November.

Location precision: The map shows a generic forest battlefield; the pin marks the village of Vossenack, which the developers name.

The Ardennes map puts tanks on the outskirts of Bastogne, the first major stage of the Battle of the Bulge. The developers tried to recreate the early winter colours of the Ardennes and the old Belgian town, with hills where scouts and fire-support vehicles can take positions unseen. The real town sits on a ridge in the Ardennes, and the siege of December 1944 pitted American against German forces.

Location precision: The pin marks the town of Bastogne; the map recreates its outskirts and the mood of the area, not a surveyed plan.

Breslau is an urban combat map, with a more open northern area that suits nimble light vehicles. The developers say it is inspired by the siege of Breslau, today Wrocław in Poland, in the final months of the Second World War. In reality German troops in the city were besieged by Soviet forces from 13 February to 6 May 1945.

Location precision: The developers call the map inspired by the siege; they do not say it copies the city's streets.

The Advance to the Rhine map is built on the famous tank battle at the cathedral in Cologne. The developers say it is a generalized recreation of late-war German cities rather than an exact copy, yet players will recognize the Rhine and the cathedral. On 6 March 1945 an American Pershing destroyed a German Panther in the streets west of the cathedral, which stayed standing in a flattened city.

Location precision: The developers call the map a generalized recreation, not a copy of Cologne; the pin marks the cathedral.

The Berlin map is set in May 1945, when the Red Army has reached the Reichstag and the war is nearly over. The developers state it is based on the actual layout of the area during the Second World War, a layout they kept while rebuilding every building. The real Reichstag had stood in ruins since the fire of February 1933; the Soviet attack began on 30 April, and by 2 May 1945 the Red Army controlled the building entirely.

Darwin Hill came to the game with the Sky Odyssey update. The developers took inspiration from the real Falkland Islands location, with its grass plains, small houses and an airfield; the ground is open, but there are defilades to hide in. Darwin and Goose Green lie on a narrow isthmus, where British and Argentine forces fought the Battle of Goose Green on 28 and 29 May 1982.

Location precision: The developers say only that the map is inspired by the area around Darwin; the pin marks the settlement, not a mapped hill.

The Fulda Gap is a lowland in Hesse that planners saw as a route for a Soviet tank attack on West Germany, an attack that never came. The developers' Fulda scenario imagines it: on 25 July 1985 the USSR begins a large-scale border breakthrough towards Frankfurt am Main. War Thunder's Fulda is an alternate-history setting and a loose, inspired layout, not a historical battlefield.

Location precision: The attack was only hypothetical; the pin marks the Fulda Gap area on Wikipedia, and the map layout is only inspired by it.