Over the years the game genre of tower defense has grown from a straightforward, simple, quick pastime to a huge time sink involving lots of strategy. Now the genre has ported to mobile devices such as the iPod. With so many different tower defense games out in the app store, find out how Tower Defense: Lost Earth stacks up after the jump.
If it’s a game that will last you hours while standing in a long line and keep you entertained, it’s got to be a tower defense game. A simple premise where you, the player, select from a wide array of attacking structures in order to stop a horde of enemies from reaching their goal, can get pretty engaging. Later stages eventually require quite a bit of thinking and time to beat.
COM2US has produced Tower Defense: Lost Earth and trademarked “tower defense”, in a bold move to trademark the name of a genre. Now if the game sucked, this would have been a most terrible decision by the company. But fortunately, the game doesn’t suck. Lost Earth delivers quite well and provides a complete tower defense experience.
The game uses your traditional defend the base structure. A fixed path is laid out between the player’s main base and the entrance of the opposition. The standard towers are provided, including: rapid fire, range/sniper, splash, slow, laser, etc. In addition, a special weapon is provided for times when towers are just not enough, such as: a nuke, carpet bombs, toxic smoke, and gravity fields to further slow down the advance of the enemy. Lost Earth of course provides three difficulty levels, with the number of enemies and resources varying from easy to hard. I have to say, the game gets quite difficult, even on easy. Some levels will require many hours and tries for that perfect combination of towers in order to move on.
There are two main types of gameplay provided. First is the campaign, which tells a generic sci-fi RTS story of man, having depleted all resources of Earth, goes to the far reaches of space to find a new home. Upon landing on a new planet, man decimates (or at least attempts to) native creatures of the planet that oppose the expansion of a new home. The campaign incorporates different game modes to keep things interesting. In addition to the standard defense mode, where the enemy comes in waves, there is survival mode, where the waves are omitted and replaced by a timer that counts down. All you have to do is not die until the timer reaches zero. Resource requires you to collect a set number to complete. It needs a delicate balance of spending and saving. A special resource-collecting tower, placed in designated areas, is available in this mode. Attack turns it around on the enemy and forces you to strategically place towers in order to kill an enemy (usually tucked in a corner). This mostly requires destroying obstacles, which also grants resources, to create a path to the target. The campaign sports more than forty levels across different terrain tilesets. Even after beating all forty levels, there are still two other difficulties to go through. Someone like me will want to get gold stars for all the levels. Aside from the campaign, Lost Earth offers a challenge mode. The player is presented set scenarios, which also include a level that allows freeform style defense where creating a path for the enemy is key. The challenge mode also includes online leaderboards.
Lost Earth has a nice touch of cartoon inspired graphics, giving it that distinct pop style. The game, in the looks front, is amazing. The colors are vivid, making it easy to differentiate from different elements of the game. The towers are nicely designed and their attacking animations are clear to see. Pinch-zoom can be utilized to get a better view of the action. It is pretty helpful as the tapping grid can get too small, which is one of the minor problems I had. You need to be a little careful while placing towers as there could be a chance of accidentally selling a key tower in a decisive moment. This is especially important as further along the game, some of the enemy need to be manually targeted. Aside from this minor bump though, the game is pretty solid.
Now, while I don’t scour the internet looking for new and unique tower defense games, I am quite a fan of the genre, playing since the days of custom user created maps of StarCraft. Tower Defense: Lost Earth is no exception to the great tower defense I’ve played. It doesn’t introduce anything groundbreaking to the genre, but it’s a well executed game even people who aren’t fans of the genre should enjoy. This game is a definite buy from the app store.
Check out the trailer for the game:
Get it at the app store:
Tower Defense: Lost Earth $0.99
Tower Defense: Lost Earth HD $4.99
