Defense Grid: The Awakening - The Most Impressive (and Fun!) Tower Defense Game Yet
Written: Jan 25 '09 (Updated Oct 24 '09)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great graphics and sound effects, $20 (or less), challenging, fun gameplay
Cons: Single player only, Xbox version cheaper than PC version, & w/more levels
The Bottom Line: Defense Grid: The Awakening is the most impressive Tower Defense game that I've seen. The learning curve is nil, your only challenge is winning the game.
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| nc10's Full Review: Defense Grid: The Awakening for Windows |
Defense Grid: The Awakening is a challenging, addictive Tower Defense game with impressive production values from Hidden Path Entertainment. Defense Grid is the first Tower Defense game that I've seen that brings polished graphics, complex sound effects (explosions!), and an effective supporting storyline to the fun and addictive nature of the Tower Defense genre. Defense Grid is available as a download frorm Steam and Direct2Drive, XBox Live, and a boxed version is available in stores (updated 10/09).
The Game.....
Tower Defense games are real time strategy games where the player is asked to strategically locate defensive weapon towers on a map, in an effort stop enemies from crossing the map or accomplishing some goal. The player typically has a choice of different types of defensive towers and limited resources to buy or build towers. The towers must defend against an ever increasing number of various enemies susceptible to different weapons, on increasingly difficult maps. Successfully stopping the enemies usually results in rewards which allow the player to buy/choose better defensive towers to stop the next series of attacks This combination of strategic choices, increasing difficulty, and increasing rewards for success often makes for enjoyable, addictive gameplay, even if you only have 15 or 30 minutes to play a game.
Hidden Path takes this basic model and inserts it on a futuristic planet that has been peaceful since ending alien attacks 1000 years ago. The aliens have returned, with survival of the planet depending on the player reactivating the planetary defense grid. As you start the first of twenty levels of the game, you hear a somewhat confused voice from a computer terminal, awakened after 1000 years. This voice is apparently an artificial intelligence that contains the spirit or memories of the leader who stopped the attacks 1000 years ago. He's coaching you on how to use the defensive towers to stop the enemies from stealing your power cores, the goal of each level. This voice becomes increasing more coherent as the game proceeds, discovering/remembering more weapons and teaching you how to use them, and provides a few sparse details to fill out the game's backstory as you go. While the back story might not be considered great fiction, it does tend to bring sense and purpose to what you are doing without becoming annoying. This builds your feeling of accomplishment as you complete the levels, and virtually eliminates the learning curve, ultimately helping to make the game more "fun".
Gameplay
Defense Grid: The Awakening consists of twenty levels, which can be completed in about 8 hours, if you rush through the game and complete just the minium requirements for each level once. Hidden Path has built in enough ways to play each level that I expect most people to spend several times that, taking avantage of the options to win achievements and replay different levels with different play models. Hidden Path has done a great job designing this game, bringing the player more difficult challenges with each level, while keeping game play intuitive, engaging, and fun.
Each level is built on a unique 3 dimensional map. Gameplay starts with aliens entering some point on the map, with most aliens following the shortest route (sometimes predefined by a road or other track) to a power core storage area containing 24 power cores. The aliens which reach the cores steal them and then try to leave the map, to a specific exit point. Your best bet is to arrange your defensive towers to stop the aliens before they get to the power storage area. However, uf your towers kill aliens with cores before they leave the map, those cores are set free and slowly return to the storage area. If the aliens leave the map with all the cores, the level is over and lost. Most aliens travel along the ground on the map, though a few aliens can fly, and can follow any path to the cores. If you finish the level with at least one power core, the level is considered complete, and you can progress to the next level.
The player starts each level with a small amount of resources to build a few towers to initially defend against the aliens. Towers can only be placed at specific spots on the game maps, though maps have more options than you need. By the end of the game, there are ten towers to choose from, each upgradeable (at a price) two times. In the early stages the number of towers and upgrade options are limited, as are the types and numbers of enemies, making the game's learning curve almost flat. Available defensive towers included gatling guns, cannons, flamethrowers, lasers, anti-aircraft missiles, meteors, concussion towers, and a temporal tower that slows aliens. Resources are limited, so you must locate the towers efficiently, locating short range and long range towers so they have as many chances as possible to kill the enemy.
Towers are indestructable, have unlimited ammo, and can also be used to block the alien's path, forcing them to take alternate (hopefully longer and more dangerous) routes. With each alien killed you earn more resources, which you can use to build more towers. The more resources you have, the more you earn, making it important to conserve resources. Other strategic factors to consider include:
- locating towers so that they don't block each other
- Some towers enhance others. For example, the "Temporal" tower slows aliens, I try to locate this tower near several short range weapons towers to give them more time to inflict damage.
- Using towers in the right combination, for example, flame throwers don't hurt enemies with shields, so you might want to locate the flame tower after the gun or cannon towers, which are more effective at breaking down shields.
- Some towers are weak against a single alien but can affect all aliens in area. Its best to locate these where they can affect several aliens at once.
- Deciding whether to spring for an expensive upgrade to a tower, or add another level 1 tower somewhere.
- Optimzing tower location so that short range towers like the gun and laser towers are close to the alien's expected path, while locating the long range towers (like the meteor and cannon tower) further away from the path.
- Midpoint in the game you get access to a orbital laser, which you can use once each level, to inflict massive damage to small area.
Balancing these and other strategic decisions is what makes the game fun. Each level has two difficulty settings. On the easy setting, most players will be able to complete the level with at least one core remaining with one or two attempts at the level. Completing the level with all power cores intact is much more difficult and requires more strategy.
Hidden Path also provides alternate gameplay modes (Rule Sets) for some levels, generally they've chosen sensible options that make sense for each level, options that add replay value to the game. Some levels can be set so that only 10 or 15 towers are used at at time. Others can be played with a large amount of resources, only using 1st level towers, or "grinder" mode where 99 increasingly large waves of a specific alien attack your power core area.
Production Values
Graphics and sound effects really set Defense Grid apart from the other games available in this genre. Using the mouse scroll wheel allows you to zoom into or out from the map. Zooming in allows you to see how smoothly and realistically the aliens walk or fly, and watch their pained movements as they die. The designs of the various aliens are mostly robotic and mechanical. They're also interesting and futuristic, but not human, meaning you won't see any blood or objectionable violence. Sound and visual effects are effective and fun. The gatling guns, exploding meteors, missiles, cannon, flamethrowers are all interesting and engaging to watch and hear. The background music is motivating and militaristic. The music fits the story, but can be a little repetitive. The computer artificial intelligence helps make the game environment and design believable, and also keeps you trained on new weapons and aliens without ever being annoyed.
Other Comments
When I first wrote this, Defense Grid was only available at Direct2Drive.com and Steam (http://store.steampowered.com/) as a $20 download, but an Xbox Live and PC boxed version have since been released. The game is single player only.
I installed Defense Grid on a 2+ year old Gateway PC running Vista with a 2.8 ghz dual core cpu, two gb ram, and a 6800GS video card. On this system the game runs great, I haven't seen slowdowns at any time, and the game has never locked up, in 15-20 hours of game play. Recommended requirements are Vista or XP, a 1.8ghz cpu, 1.5gb ram, and a Radeon 700 or better or a Geforce 7600 or better with 256mb ram, and DirectX 9c or later with detail settings set at full on a 1280 X 1028 monitor. I also tried to install and play the game on a system with Intel X3100 integrated graphics and a 2.16ghz core 2 duo cpu, but I had to turn down the resolution and detail levels to make the game playable (and it was still sluggish).
You can quit the game at any time, and resume at the point you quit, or go back to a "check point" save if you make a mistake (like buying the wrong tower), but you can't have multiple save points.
I purchased the game at Direct2Drive when it was on sale for $15. Defense Grid is also available on Xbox Live for 800 points (10/09), half the list price of the PC version, a terrific value. The Xbox version differs from the PC version by including 4 additional levels. The Xbox version is implemented nicely, controlling the game via the wireless controller is easy and intuitive. Fun to play on a big screeen tv if that's what your Xbox is hooked too.
Mfr web site:
http://defensegrid.hiddenpath.com/
Recommended:
Yes
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