Tower Defense catch-all

It's 2018 and people are still making tower defense games. What's more, is that some of them are actually really good. Maybe it's nostalgia speaking (oh those endless hours playing Warcraft III custom maps), but I've been getting more and more interested in modern tower defense. It certainly helps that it's a genre very well-suited to mobile gaming.

Accordingly, I figured a catch-all for this neat little sub-genre of strategy could be fun. Do you still play TD games? If so, what are your favourites? What do you think makes this genre so compelling? Alternatively, if you think it's dated, why hasn't it held up over time?

A handful of my favourites to kick things off:

Creeper World 3: Arc Eternal

IMAGE(https://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/0/2891/2267758-cw3_spores.jpg)

A little unconventional, but totally unique. Instead of waves of enemies, you combat a rising tide of alien goop. Towers disintegrate the liquid, and if you're not quick enough, it will rush back over any progress you've made. It's a very interesting liquid-physics game with some crazy base-building.

Bloons TD 5

IMAGE(https://images-eds-ssl.xboxlive.com/image?url=8Oaj9Ryq1G1_p3lLnXlsaZgGzAie6Mnu24_PawYuDYIoH77pJ.X5Z.MqQPibUVTcf9qCeFHIjc6EyjqUtGeFGx8XiY6gEJcfSd7QQPLeOG6IpKCyNH0nm2d56mVrgSBEKLEXmFAk9heyy6Vq189c.CxmbgpSCae4WHVlPpsQLGB6R.IZ9HhH0phpqSBL2H4SyHqn8otfb1GZbTvk9_bU8nAR6Foxeh7ygTNQ6CUatqY-&w=754&h=424&format=jpg&mode=letterbox&background=%23FFF0F0F0)

This is what mobile gaming is all about. I've played countless hours of this. Looks silly, but it's very deep. Tonnes of upgrades, huge enemy variety, and a good amount of strategic decisions to be made. One of the first games I install on any new phone.

Defenders Quest
IMAGE(http://www.wraithkal.com/wp-content/uploads/defenders-quest-dx.jpg)

I had way more fun with this than I expected I would. It's a fun mix of persistent RPG levelling and tower defense. You have a "party" which you can build up how you see fit, and it's those characters that you plonk down on the lanes to defend. Works better than you'd think! Surprisingly good writing.

Honestly, I just enjoy sitting back and watching something I've created work. It's a similar sort of satisfaction to watching a rig come together in Factorio (though nowhere near as complex). I like building, and I like seeing how my creations deal with a problem. The ability to spend a bit of time on something, then take my hands off works very well for mobile gaming too - which I find myself drawn to more and more as my days get busier.

Bookmarking this because I love me some tower defense.

Interesting you chose Bloons 5 when Bloons 6 has so recently released. Not that I have played 6 yet, but I hear it's more of the same only better....

+1 on Creeper World: Arc Eternal. Knuckle Cracker made another game called Particle Fleet which featured a similar mechanism, but just wasn't as good because (I think) it lacked the feel of the fluid dynamics.

Now they are hard at work on Creeper World 4! IN 3D!

Only reason I picked 5 was because I haven't tried 6 yet

3D Creeper World seems like a logical next step. I like that it still looks very much like the other games.

Edit: Dungeon Warefare is $2 on Steam right now. I hadn't heard of it before, but it's excellent so far. It plays like a top-down Orcs Must Die without a playable character. More of a focus on traps than towers. Absolutely worth checking out!

Dungeon Warfare is great, DW2 is also out too.

The Kingdom Rush series started as a mobile game but the PC releases come fully featured with no microtransactions and have been prettied up a bit.

I haven’t played a TD game in a long time but I was addicted to Harvest: Massive Encounter for a while. It’s all real-time and difficult but I enjoyed the frantic “go for it or die” aspect and the variety of enemies was cool.

Just coming back to confirm, that yes, Dungeon Warfare is excellent. Absolutely pick this up. I started 2 hours ago and I can't stop!

mrwynd wrote:

I haven’t played a TD game in a long time but I was addicted to Harvest: Massive Encounter for a while. It’s all real-time and difficult but I enjoyed the frantic “go for it or die” aspect and the variety of enemies was cool.

Aaaand onto the wishlist it goes. That looks absolutely absurd! I need to try it!

Here is the previous 9 page Tower Defense Games thread if you are looking for some older stuff like Creeper World, Defenders Quest, Dungeon Warfare. I am glad to hear they are making Creeper World 4. I did not really get into their non-CW game they most recently released.

They just came out with Dungeon Warfare 2 and it improves on the original game in most ways. Steam says I have 16 hours in since I bought it 15 days ago...

Defenders Quest 2 has been in development for years. I "pre-ordered" it several years ago.

Cross linking from the iOS thread, Kingdom Rush is getting a new entry sometime soon:

The Kingdom Rush series has been my favorite iOS TD series since release, so I'm very excited for a new one.

Tamren wrote:

Dungeon Warfare is great, DW2 is also out too.

The Kingdom Rush series started as a mobile game but the PC releases come fully featured with no microtransactions and have been prettied up a bit.

FYI: The first one was a free browser game followed by an IOS release full featured on both IIRC.

There is still Kingdom Rush: Origins that hasn't had a PC release, but it sounds like they are working on new stuff too.

Also as in the OP picture Gemcraft is a pretty good TD. I found it a little too complicated to get into because there's way more than just towers. You slot gems into buildings to make turrets but you can also build walls to maze the enemies, put sockets on the ground to create floor gem traps and you can throw gems directly onto the field as bombs that release little gem-bees that fly around and sting your enemies. Also has a ton of level replayability to work with the level system, but like I said a little too complicated for my taste.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Here is the previous 9 page Tower Defense Games thread if you are looking for some older stuff like Creeper World, Defenders Quest, Dungeon Warfare. I am glad to hear they are making Creeper World 4. I did not really get into their non-CW game they most recently released.

They just came out with Dungeon Warfare 2 and it improves on the original game in most ways. Steam says I have 16 hours in since I bought it 15 days ago...

Reading through that thread is quite a trip down memory lane in terms of past members. Also in the time since then I've somehow accrued a bunch of the games mentioned and never played them.

Downloading Sol Survivor and Sanctum 2 now to try out.

One game I actually was in the beta test for that was pretty cool, but I don't know that it ever took off was System Protocol One. My only contribution IIRC was, 'Damn, this first level is too hard.' and they toned it down. Was still challenging though.

Bloons TD 6 is very solid. In fact, I think I’ll go crawl into bed and play some.

Gem TD, the long time Warcraft and StarCraft custom map, has a great implementation in DotA 2! It's very very hard and somewhat opaque, but I'd be more than happy to help with the learning curve. It's my go-to chill out and watch Netflix/YouTube game. I watched at least half of the first campaign of Critical Role while picking gems! Worth a look as it's free!

EDIT: Hit me up if you're looking at playing this game. I'm at a point now where I can do coop play with another person and help them through the initial learning phase. Getting those first couple wins under your belt is a game changer and having another hero helps immensely for that.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Here is the previous 9 page Tower Defense Games thread if you are looking for some older stuff like Creeper World, Defenders Quest, Dungeon Warfare.

I knew we did this already.

I picked up a bunch of new (to me) tower defense games during the latest Steam sale. I started playing Warstone which I think is originally based on a free flash game but expanded for Steam. It is a typical tower defense with some wrinkles of building a town with the proceeds, a quest and item system, and also a sort of 'attack' system where on certain maps your army is the creeps and the enemies are the towers. I've played six hours over the past few days, thumbs up if you are looking for something new. It has some weird niggles, but overall a good game.

In other news, a few months back I gave Particle Fleet another shot and it clicked for me and I beat it. This is the game from the Creeper World devs that came out a couple of years ago. I ended up liking it once I took the time to understand what was going on and it is another solid entry from them. If you haven't tried it and you liked the Creeper World games, I recommend it.

Bloons TD 6 I also bought on the Steam sale, I can't recommend it on PC. I think it might be fine as a mobile game but it has a lot of the free to play BS that is native there like multiple currencies, upgrades all over the place, etc. Even though the Steam version costs money it still has this stuff (and they even sell a 'double cash mode' DLC). I would have asked for a refund but it was only $1 on sale.

LeapingGnome wrote:

Bloons TD 6 I also bought on the Steam sale, I can't recommend it on PC. I think it might be fine as a mobile game but it has a lot of the free to play BS that is native there like multiple currencies, upgrades all over the place, etc. Even though the Steam version costs money it still has this stuff (and they even sell a 'double cash mode' DLC). I would have asked for a refund but it was only $1 on sale.

I also picked this up for a dollar, and have put some time into it over the past week or so. It's... fine? Ish? The various currencies and points and xps and maps and upgrades and events and cash shop things... eh.

I kinda wanted some kind of campaign mode, and didn't realize there wasn't one. But, since it was a dollar... eh.

Interesting. On mobile, Bloons TD 6 is generally considered to be the best tower defense game. I would mostly agree with that. I just ignore the pay stuff. There’s more content there than I could ever get around to experiencing. It’s usually $6 or $7 bucks in the App Store.

Has anybody tried out Mindustry?

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1...

Looks complicated with only marginal graphics but the long list of overwhelmingly positive reviews on Steam have me thinking about giving it a shot. Plus, only $6.

I got it on the Steam sale but haven't tried it yet.

I have tried Mindustry and I don't get the overwhelming positive responses. It seemed like a pretty bad tower defense game, and you need to also start over building your industry to unlock new tech--which was annoying.

A lot of the tech didn't seem to have much purpose in the order you unlock it, and the whole game seemed unpolished (very indie, even the UI is a little sketchy).

Though maybe I haven't put enough time in it to get it (only a couple hours) I found a review that I think explains it pretty well:

https://steamcommunity.com/profiles/...

To paraphrase: It's kind of a crappy tower-defense game, but can be really fun as a sandbox game where you make a complicated factory with all the components unlocked.

I dont see Mindustry as a good PC game but I do see it as a good mobile game. It has light elements of Factorio and fairly forgiving Tower Defense elements. I enjoyed it on vacation but havent really been back (Its on the Google Play Pass) I threw like 8 hours into it that would have otherwise been spent staring at football.

And yes it's very indie but I dont think there's anything else that captures the production logistics gameplay of Factorio on mobile (and I'd love to be proven wrong there)

It seems a new Gemcraft is out on Steam. I played the last one and it was decent, the new one is trending at 84% positive. Has anyone tried it?

I am still working my way through Warstone, getting near the end I think.

Oh right, gemcraft! I liked the early flash / web games, and bought Chasing Shadows on steam to support the dev. I'll probably do the same with this one.

Arise! Has anyone played anything good lately? I have been working my way through the Creeper World games again. Just comfort food gaming for me I guess. I have also been doing all of the 'bonus' missions, which I had never done before. I cleared 1 and 2 over the past week or two, starting 3 tonight.

Any new TD games out in the past few months that people had fun with?

I did try XMorph Defense on Switch a month or two back. It's one of those overhead shooter hybrids. But I think it leans heavily on the shooting part. I felt like my towers were just there for routing enemies and I had to do all the killing. That might not appeal to some.

There were some cool boss fights in the first few areas. Probably more but I didn't finish the campaign, got distracted by something else. Final wave big enemy comes in, and they knock down some buildings and it was pretty fun. I think one of those was even in the demo if you want to try.

It's been on sale for less than $5, so catch it cheap if it sounds interesting.

Bloons 6 is still the apex TD for me. For a new TD to get my attention, it will have to be pretty special. I’m sort of sad that the genre has died, but I’m not surprised. There’s a limited amount of possibilities in designing a TD and the good ideas have been used and reused.

Bloons 6 is a great fun game. Lots of achievements and new content added often enough to keep playing from time to time.

This Thu Oct 15th Kingdom Rush Vengeance releases on PC Steam. The prior 3 games in the series have all been great so hopefully this is also.

Kingdom Rush: Vengeance just came out on steam. Been playing it a bit and its pretty much more Kingdom Rush. Only difference I'm seeing is upon winning the level you get two choices. So far the choices have have come up have been 3 upgrade points, allow towers to upgrade to the next level, or a new hero.

Also not sure what playing the "bonus" stages of the levels are. In the past games you would get an upgrade point for completing it. This time I'm not seeing that. So not sure what the point is.

Playing on normal the game is somewhat easy. In the 8 or so maps I've done I've lost a total of 1 health. But it may be I'm now just used to these games. I typically play them on normal through first then a second time on the harder difficulty.

There's a demo of the game if you want to try before you buy. Since I owned the other games they offered a discount. And a slightly greater discount via the bundle (even though I owned the other games). Otherwise $20.