History Main / HoverTank

* The obscure polygonal arcade[=/=]UsefulNotes/PlayStation game ''VideoGame/CyberSled'' is ''VideoGame/VirtualOn'' with hover tanks. The vehicles in the game (some of which take more generosity than others to call a 'tank') are extremely agile and can move in any direction (save vertically) with ease, and in spite of a reasonable array of textures on the vehicles, caterpillar treads are conspicuous with their absence.

* The UsefulNotes/AtariJaguar games ''VideoGame/HoverStrike'' and ''Hover Strike: Unconquered Lands'' has the player pilot a futuristic hovertank against enemy tanks and bases to rescue colonists from SpacePirates.

* ''VideoGame/SaintsRow4'' has an alien Hover Tank called "Destructor" that can be acquired early in the game. The Third Street Saints later get their own and [[TheSmartGuy Kinsie]] makes an upgraded on for the "Batteries Not Included" mission. Destructors are also used in the "Tank Mayhem" missions to cause as much property damage as possible in a set time limit.

* In ''Literature/{{Hardwired}}'',

* In ''Literature/{{Hardwired}}'', the main male character is a "Panzerboy" who drives/flies his hovertank "Pony Express" across the balkanized U.S.A., smuggling all sorts of contraband.

* The Panzers in ''Literature/{{Hardwired}}'' by Creator/WalterJonWilliams are a special kind of hover tank controlled by cybernetic linkup. Many veterans proceed to use them as tools to smuggle supplies across the DividedStatesOfAmerica.

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* In ''VideoGame/HomeworldDesertsOfKharak'' Kiith Gaalsien vehicles all hover using scavenged LostTechnology, including their carriers. Which makes them faster but less durable than the Northern Coalition's wheeled and treaded vehicles.
* ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'':
** In all games, the Covenant have the Wraith, a large, bulbous mortar tank that hovers close to the ground and fires massive blasts of plasma. While they have the ability to strafe and are well-armored, they have low clearance and move slowly due to the weight of their armor.
** ''VideoGame/HaloReach'' features the Covenant Revenant, similar in design to the Wraith except that it moves much faster at the cost of power and armor.
** ''VideoGame/HaloWars2'' features the Banished Marauder, which is sort of a Brute version of the Revenant.
* ''VideoGame/PlanetSide'' has the Vanu Sovereignty using the Magrider as their main battle tank. While it lacks the durability of the Prowler and Vanguard, its lack of treads allows the tank to strafe sideways, making them harder to hit at range.
* ''VideoGame/TerraTech'' allows the player to build these, although they are [[AwesomeButImpractical extremely hard to use]] due to lack of friction with the ground.
* In ''VideoGame/GreyGoo2015'', ''all'' of humanity's [[BreakOutTheMuseumPiece hastily recommissioned]] autonomous combat drones either float or fly. The twist here is that humans are the HigherTechSpecies and even these machines that haven't seen use in generations are still centuries more advanced than anything the alien [[RacialRemnant Beta]] have (they prefer the classic wheels, treads [[WalkingTank and legs]]).
* In ''VideoGame/EpicBattleFantasy5'', Lance's Valkyrie tank is upgraded into this, complete with TronLines.
* ''VideoGame/DoomEternal'' introduces the Doom Hunter, the top half of a heavily cyberized Agaddon hunter grafted onto a hovering "sled" outfitted with lock-on rockets, machine guns, and a shield generator for the fleshy bits. Since the sled itself is unshielded, it's something of a weak point that when destroyed will not only disable much of the Hunter's offensive capabilities but also its shield.
* The Raven of ''VideoGame/Stellar7'', is the most advanced fighting vehicle made by humanity. It's a hovertank that can turn invisible, so it's an extremely stealthy tank that can outrun and outmaneuver almost any vehicle the Arcturus empire throws at the Raven.
* Hovercrafts armed with machine-guns are available units to both NORAD and WOPR in ''VideoGame/WarGamesDefcon1'', capable of traversing swamps and rocky terrain, the downside being that they couldn't run over enemy infantries. A mission in Louisiana even made it a plot point where the player is given ''six'' hovercrafts, due to the swampy terrain being unavailable for using tanks or heavy vehicles.
* ''VideoGame/{{Brigador}}'': Agravs (short for anti-gravity units) are one of three vehicle types in the game. Unlike other types of vehicles that are bound to TankControls, agravs can strafe, giving them unique mobility.

* Vehicle of choice for Sgt. Hatred on ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBros''
* The WesternAnimation/SwatKats have the [=HoverKat=], which they only used once against a rogue AI named Zed; it was explicitly a jet-powered hovercraft.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]
* The vehicle trope is played with in ''Anime/SuperDimensionCavalrySouthernCross''/''Anime/{{Robotech}}: Southern Cross/The Robotech Masters'', where the VHT-1 Spartas is a hovertank, but only in its tank mode for the purposes of transportation. To use its maximum firepower, it must go into [[WalkingTank Guardian Mode]] to engage its heavy cannon, but at the cost of being highly restricted in movement. Finally, there's Battleloid Mode, which is more a [[RealRobot humanoid robot]] configuration is used when the pilot needs more maneuverability for combat.

* ''DesertPunk'' has the Fire Dragon Kong, a massive hover tank wandering around the desert and was almost completely unstoppable, being the most powerful weapon in the Kanto desert.
* The Electris Kataphrakt in ''Anime/AldnoahZero'' is one of these as it floats and lacks legs in contrast to all the other Kataphrakts in the series.

* ''[[Series/ThePhilSilversShow Sgt. Bilko]]'': Fort Baxter is supposed to be demonstrating a hover tank. The problem is while it can hover fine, it runs into that pesky Third Law of Motion when it tries to fire its cannon with nothing bracing it. When asked to demo this defective technology at the film's climax, they fake it.

* The ''[[Franchise/StarTrek Star Trek: New Worlds]]'' game has the player constructing a Federation, Romulan or Klingon colony on an alien world and features a wide variety of hovering vehicles, including tanks. Others include [[AwesomePersonnelCarrier APCs.]] unarmed scouts and science vehicles and photon torpedo-armed mobile artillery pieces.
* The Interplay-published game ''[[MeaningfulName Tank]]tics'' gives players [[DesignItYourselfEquipment D.I.Y.]] tanks that can ride on five types of propulsion. One of these propulsions is the aptly-named "hover base". They allow tanks to go over all terrain, though are balanced by being slow moving.
* The Hoverdynes from ''VideoGame/GroundControl'', which are faster but frailer than conventional tracked Terradynes.
** Hoverdynes also have a stronger punch, thanks to their energy weapons as opposed to conventional ballistic ammo of the Terradynes.
** In the sequel, the Hoverdynes make a comeback with some support from [[RealRobotGenre walkers]]. The alien Virons also have Centruroids, which are, effectively, Hoverdynes.
* ''VideoGame/{{Earth 2150}}'':
** The [[TheRepublic Lunar Corporation]]. Seriously, just take control of its forces and trust us, its army's ''nothing'' but hover tanks.
** The expansion pack gives them some tracked vehicles, playing this trope straight in that they're more mobile bunkers versus their usual swift and fragile hovering ones.
* ''VideoGame/SidMeiersAlphaCentauri'': Hovercrafts are amphibious {{Lightning Bruiser}}s, but their high cost makes them nearly AwesomeButImpractical.
** A [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKcEwUcVBHs video of one secret project]] shows a GreyGoo-like "pool" of nanotech consuming battlefield debris (including human remains) to make a shiny new hovertank in a matter of seconds, complete with MidairBobbing.

* The N64 game ''VideoGame/BattleTanx'' had hover tanks called [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin Hover Tanks]], which were basically Abrams with turbines and a flat bottom. Though a bit squirrely to control, they could strafe sideways while firing, float over mines without problems, and pick up an impressive amount of speed for ramming other players.
* ''Tanarus'' has the [=MagRider=], a hovertank similar to the one from ''VideoGame/Battlefield2142''. It is also the only tank with a turret that cannot be swivelled, with the turret swivel commands instead allowing the tank to strafe, while a built-in Dampener negates any damage from falling at height, making it a MechanicallyUnusualFighter.
* The Vanu Sovereignty in ''Videogame/PlanetSide'' gets these, in line with their super-futuristic and unconventional array of weaponry. In the original, the pilot had an anti-infantry plasma machine gun while the gunner had a turreted railgun, whereas in the sequel the pilot controls the main cannon while the gunner uses secondary AntiArmor, AntiInfantry, or AntiAir weaponry; it also gains a NitroBoost ability that lets it scale mountains.
* All vehicles in ''VideoGame/{{Battlezone|1998}}'' (except [[HumongousMecha the walkers]]) use vectored thrusters to hover. ''Battlezone 2'' included tracked vehicles [[SnipingTheCockpit which were immune to being sniped]] and had more armor, but could not strafe and were clumsy in low gravity. The vector wireframe vehicles in the [[Videogame/BattleZone1980 original 1980 arcade game]] might have been, but at that resolution who knows?
* ''[[{{VideoGame/XCOM}} X-COM]]'' has the Hovertank (in variants with Plasma and Fusion Launcher) like this. Of course, they are a crossbred of your basic [[AttackDrone tank drone]] with enough of scavenged FlyingSaucer tech [[http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Research_Popular_Sequences_and_Tips#Firestorm to build your own]].
* ''VideoGame/AceOnline'': The [[ReportingNames Anima Mortar]], or A-Gear is a fully flight-capable Hover Tank, armed with an awesome [[MoreDakka Siege Mode]] for its main gun.
* ''[[VideoGame/WingCommander Wing Commander IV]]'': Hover tanks make an appearance in {{cutscene}}s of the Circe mission branch. They're pretty much just CannonFodder for the good guys, though, and don't even get the dignity of counting in killscores.
* ''VideoGame/MassEffect2'': The Hammerhead, a replacement for the first game's Mako, which is used in the ''Firewalker'' and ''Overlord'' [=DLC=] missions. It's much faster than the Mako, but it's got [[FragileSpeedster wet tissue paper for armor]].
* Both sides in ''VideoGame/DarkReign'' use hovertanks for their heavy tanks, with the Imperium using hover technology for ''all'' their vehicles.
* Both ''[[VideoGame/{{Civilization}} Civilization: Call to Power]]'' and ''Call to Power 2'' have Fusion Tanks, which fill a similar in game role as modern day tanks, and can also travel over shallow water.
* The Diamondback was one in ''VideoGame/StarCraftII'' for a while, but it got [[DummiedOut dropped]] (from the normal lineup at least) later. It remains as a campaign-only unit in ''Wings of Liberty'', featuring a pair of anti-armor [[MagneticWeapons railguns]] and the unique ability [[DoNotRunWithAGun to fire while moving]].
* In ''VideoGame/SonicColors'', the Wii-exclusive Green Wisp's power is to turn Sonic into an ''organic'' version of this, which also allows him to fly across trails of rings.
* ''VideoGame/EmpireEarth'': The first game has a hovertank unit that, for some bizzare reason, traverses ''underwater'', probably because of engine limitations. It cannot be built outside custom maps, either.

* The UsefulNotes/AtariJaguar games ''Hover Strike'' and ''Hover Strike: Unconquered Lands'' has the player pilot a futuristic hovertank against enemy tanks and bases to rescue colonists from space pirates.
* ''Incoming Forces'' included hovertanks as well as conventional tanks as playable units. Their advantages over conventional tanks were tenfold - they could slide sideways for evasive manouvering.
* ''VideoGame/{{Warzone 2100}}'' includes a hovercraft option for propulsion, which unfortunately wander into AwesomeButImpractical territory; they're fast but poorly armoured, but if weighed down with the more powerful late-game weapons their speed drops noticeably. Their one advantage is that they're amphibious, enabling attacks from unexpected directions.
* ''VideoGame/SupremeCommander'' features both Fragile Speedster and main combat versions. In addition, all Aeon Engineer units hover, as opposed to the more traditional amphibious nature of the other races.
* ''VideoGame/TotalAnnihilation'' featured Hovercraft in it's Core Contingency Expansion, to the point that they were essentially merely hovering versions of the normal ground vehicles. Useful on the wide variety of swamp maps however.
* As noted above, ''VideoGame/DawnOfWar'' had the Eldar and Tau's hover tanks (though the Falcon is the transport). However, only the Eldar tanks are able to jump over terrain, while the Tau's Devilfish is invisible.
* VideoGame/Hovertank3D, obviously.
* ''VideoGame/BlasterMaster'', once Sophia gets Hover Mechanics.
* The obscure polygonal arcade[=/=]UsefulNotes/PlayStation game ''Cyber Sled'' is ''VideoGame/VirtualOn'' with hover tanks. The vehicles in the game (some of which take more generosity than others to call a 'tank') are extremely agile and can move in any direction (save vertically) with ease, and in spite of a reasonable array of textures on the vehicles, caterpillar treads are conspicuous with their absence.
* ''[[Videogame/MechWarrior MechWarrior Living Legends]]'', set in the same universe as ''TabletopGame/BattleTech'', features allows the player to pilot several hovertanks. The Harasser is an actual hovercraft with a rigid skirt, allowing it to accelerate, move, and turn very quickly, though it frequently nosedives if one tries to transition onto water too quickly. The Epona and Hephaestus lack skirts and instead use vectored thrust to move about. Previous games have had the Harasser, though as a [[CannonFodder worthless cannon fodder unit]] used only by the singleplayer enemies.
* Several of the larger warrior-type Transformers in ''VideoGame/TransformersWarForCybertron'' and ''VideoGame/TransformersFallOfCybertron'' can turn into hovering tanks, most notably Megatron and Brawl for the Decepticons and Warpath for the Autobots. Shockwave from the latter game also appears to be some kind of mobile artillery platform, and is effectively close enough in form and function to call him a hovering tank.

* Hover tanks can be researched and built in ''VideoGame/{{Armada 2526}}'' to be used to defend and attack planets. They require special transports.

* ''VideoGame/CivilizationBeyondEarth'' features these as the top-tier version of the "cavalry" and "artillery" unit, with various changes depending on your choices (such as longer weapons range/higher damage, more mobility within turns, and so on). Furthermore, the most powerful units that can be built by Purity-aligned factions are the LEV Tank, which is capable of hovering over canyons and mountains and packs quite a punch, even able to bombard targets with impunity. Its big brother is the LEV Destroyer, the ultimate Purity unit, which looks like an enormous floating fortress, although it's more of an artillery piece than a tank.
* ''VideoGame/Cyberpunk2077'' brings us the Militech Basilisk, which, despite being called a tank by several characters [[TanksButNoTanks is actually more of an APC/armored transporter]] than a true tank, and is actually considered obsolete by the time of the game's setting, with its primary buyers being less-fortunate countries and government organizations that cannot afford true tanks. However, to the Nomads who steal it and use it against the [[DesertBandits Wraiths]] harassing them, [[CurbStompBattle it is just as good as a tank for them]]. [[spoiler: One of the ending branches even has the Basilisk make a reappearance as the Nomads use it to spearhead an assault on Militech; despite taking heavy damage, it plays a critical part in the battle and even survives to the end.]]
* ''VideoGame/EmpireEarth'' has a Hover Tank in the editor, available only in the postmodern eras. It has exactly the same stats as the regular tank, and while it can move across water, it does so by following the ground instead of the water, much like the Hyperion cyber.

* In ''Hardwired'', the main male character is a "Panzerboy" who drives/flies his hovertank "Pony Express" across the balkanized U.S.A., smuggling all sorts of contraband.

* ''VideoGame/{{Brigador}}'': Agravs (short for anti-gravity units) are one of three vehicle types in the game. They possess free movement (as opposed to TankControls), giving them unique mobility.

* In ''[[VideoGame/EpicBattleFantasy Epic Battle Fantasy 5]]'', Lance's Valkyrie tank is upgraded into this, complete with TronLines.

** They also show up towards the mid-late game in ''Alpha Centauri's'' SpiritualSuccessor ''VideoGame/CivilizationBeyondEarth''.

* ''VideoGame/DoomEternal'' introduces the Doom Hunter, the top half of a heavily cyberized Agaddon hunter grafted onto a hovering "sled" outfitted with lock-on rockets, machine guns, and a shield generator for the fleshy bits. Since the sled itself is unshielded, it's something of a weak point that when destroyed will not only disable much of the Hunter's offensive capabilities but also it's shield.

* ''Tanarus'' has the ''[=MagRider=], a hovertank similar to the one from ''VideoGame/Battlefield2142''. It is also the only tank with a turret that cannot be swivelled, with the turret swivel commands instead allowing the tank to strafe, while a built-in Dampener negates any damage from falling at height, making it a MechanicallyUnusualFighter.

* Another unpopular Interplay-published video game ''[[MeaningfulName Tank]]tics'' gives players [[DesignItYourselfEquipment D.I.Y.]] tanks that can ride on five types of propulsion. One of these propulsions is the aptly-named "hover base". They allow tanks to go over all terrain, though are balanced by being slow moving.

* ''Tanarus'' has a hovertank in it, similar to the one from ''VideoGame/Battlefield2142''. Fast, maneuverable, packed a decent punch, but no traversable gun turret.

* ''VideoGame/DoomEternal'' introduces the Doom Hunter, the top half of a heavily cyberized Agaddon hunter grafted onto a hovering "sled" outfitted with lock-on rockets, machine guns, and a shield generator for the fleshy bits.

* Also common in ''[[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renegade_Legion#Grav_vehicles Renegade Legion]]''.

** ''[[VideoGame/CommandAndConquerRedAlert2 Red Alert 2]]'' did not feature armed hovercraft but the Allies did develop robotic hovertanks in the ''Yuri's Revenge''. Robot Tanks, as they were called, act like remote-controlled Hover MLRSes: they could fly over water, but if their control station was destroyed or lost power, they would fall into the drink.

* Another unpopular Interplay-published video game ''[[MeaningfulName Tank]]tics'' gives players [[DesignItYourselfEquipment D.I.Y.]] tanks that can ride on five types of propulsion. One of these propulsions is the aptly-named "hover base".

Military hovercraft aren't included. They ride on a mundane air cushion, barely lift off the ground, and have a difficult time operating on non-flat terrain.

** Around the close of the 41st Millennium when the Primaris Marines were introduced, new hover tanks were developed to support them. In practice, these new toys are beefed-up version of iconic Space Marine vehicles of old: the Impulsor is a floating Razorback (APC), the Gladiator is a floating Predator (battle tank), the Repulsor is a floating Land Raider (heavy APC) while its Executioner variant replaces some transport capacity for a {{BFG}}), the Storm Speeder which is a more boxy Land Speeder, and finally the Astraeus Super-heavy Tank. However, on tabletop none of these, except the Storm Speeder and the Astraeus, is considered a flying unit.