fall inside a hole
Tomy Turn the Terrible Tank game
First written June 15, 2025In 1979 Tomy released the Turn the Terrible Tank game in North America. The game, as many of Tomy's past "games," is really an electromechanical toy with a reversing tank drill with spinning bore that traverses back and forth over a hill, advancing towards a player until they can shoot the target under the tank that causes it to reverse direction and head towards their opponent.
The North American box for the game is similar to several other 1970s Tomy boxes, mostly also American-market toys.
The box notes that the tank is imported from Japan with the rest of the game manufactured in the United States. The version of the game sold in Japan was entirely made in Japan and had some slight differences in the plastic colors as noted below. Japan-made versions of Turn the Terrible Tank with the same color variations were exported to the U.K. and marketed by Palitoy.
The opposite side of the box has the same pictures of two bowl-cut-headed twins but in an illustrated lined style which is rather striking.
Set contents| Quantity |
Item |
Photo |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tank |
 |
| 1 pair | Launchers |
 |
| 2 | Anti-tank gun |
 |
| 1 | Scorekeeping support |
 |
| 2 | Track sections |
 |
| Metal marbles |
The tank has a cool design, with a black cab with angled angry red windows and a spinning silver drill "nose." The top section rotates around on the base so that it always faces the player it is advancing towards. The treads are molded plastic and there are four wheels, two of which are driven, underneath. The head lifts up and down and signals when the tank can be hit and made to reverse.
Opening the tank involves removing the four screws holding the upper section to the chassis. Two of the screws are inside the gearbox, which is part of the upper body shell. The lower section of the chassis holds the motor and geartrain, which has the reversing lever and other triggers.
Removing the clear plastic housing allows access to the gears and wheels - the drive tires on my example needed to be replaced for the tank to climb the hill properly, but it seems the wheels are the same diameter as Plarail wheels, and still-available Plarail replacement tires fit perfectly. The lifting and lowering trigger underneath the tank is linked to the same drum-reverser as the Big Loader chassis. Another linkage goes up to the upper body to lift and lower the tank's "head", and a contrate gear hanging down makes the drill on the tank spin. A metal tab towards the bottom of the gearbox is bent and snapped back by a gear running up against it, producing a clicking noise as the tank runs.
Each player has a marble shooting home base with a spring-loaded platform on which their anti-tank "gun" sits. One player is the Alpha Force and the other the Zero Squad. When the tank reaches one of the player's bases and presses the extending red lever in, the spring-loaded arm flips their gun to the side. In the Palitoy and Japanese releases of Turn the Terrible Tank the guns are color-coded red and blue, but in the American release they are white.
The track is made up of two orange slopes, with the center support having storage for the marbles and scorekeeping dials. The launchers slot into the track on one end and the two pieces interlock and slot into the center section.
When a player successfully gets a marble to hit the reversing flap under the approaching tank when it is lowered down, the tank turns back towards their opponent. The drill spins and the clicker clicks away the whole time.
When the tank reaches one of the player's bases, the chassis hits against the trigger that flips that player's gun.