ZDefense: Establish a strong wall and channel your enemies to their doom in this Android Tower Defense game.
Classic gameplay where your enemies stream out and head towards the exit. An interesting blend of features in this one, but you’ll probably have to be a hardcore tower defense gamer to enjoy this one.
OK, I’ll admit that this isn’t a new fresh game to the market, but I’ve had a bit of a craving to play a mini TD game lately…
Gameplay: You’ve got a funky looking hexagonal grid board where you play and as per most tower defences, enemies appear at an entrance and then crawl along to the exit. You need to stop them by putting down different types of turrets. As you kill creeps, you’ll be awarded money… that doesn’t really mean you can let enemies slip through though because your number of lives are so low that you pretty much need to obliterate everything anyway. The weapon choices are: cannon, laser, missile, shockwave and slow. Each can be upgraded 6 times.
What’s different? There are special cells which have different effects on the creeps: speed up, energy rejuvenation. Some cells can’t be built on, and there are some which boost the range of your turrets. There are also these channels which force the enemy to walk along particular paths – this can help you to setup your blast channels. Oh, and I can’t forget to mention the teleports – these can change the whole dimension of the game, and yet they can also confuse the heck out of you!
Strong elements: The graphics are clean and sweet, in particular the particle effects and the glow feeling really give a wow factor. All the sound effects are simple and add to the game… nothing is glitchy or out of the ordinary. The AI for the creeps seems fairly clever, so they’ll take the most optimum path which means that the whole pack can sometimes suddenly turn 360 degrees to go in the opposite direction! But more importantly, the creeps handle the special blocks correctly.
Weaker parts: The game is tough to understand for non tower defense players. Not too much tutorial exists, and the different tower strengths and weaknesses are hard to spot.
Verdict: 3/5 A good game overall and enjoyable for people who like challenges. If you have no patience for learning a game though, then you should avoid this (probably a 2 star for more casual gamers). This game is tough… but if you like tower defenses then this is probably a 4 star because it really challenges your ability to adapt to the level and defend the fort correctly. For me, the towers themselves let this game down: it was hard to understand them, and they’re a bit unbalanced so it felt like there were game anomalies. Another drawback is that once you’ve aced a level with a perfect setup then you’ll find the level too short because you can’t keep throwing enemies at your perfect defense setup!! Overall a good game for tower defense enthusiasts, but not one for the mass public unfortunately because it’s way too hard.
ZDefense Tips from Android Game Reviews:
- Whole chains of towers usually doesn’t work after a few rounds. So generally you should start upgrading your towers after a 3-5 rounds
- Upgrading your towers one level usually helps in some shape or form. The first upgrade is priced cheaper than getting a new turret, and the upgrade is also fast.
- Check the prices of towers when you start a level. The slight variances can affect your build strategy.
- Generally I’ve found that the laser cannon excels beyond the other towers. It’s better because the power increase and range boost for every upgrade is proportionally much better than the other turrets. It might cost more, but the benefits achieved far outweigh its cost.
- Generally I’ve found laser cannons with slow towers (and sometimes shockwaves) work well. The standard weenie gun is best for cheap channelling. It’s upgrades don’t seem quite as powerful as one would expect. Though interestingly once you max a gun turret to level 7 then it’ll do the most damage in game (…it’ll shoot darn slow too)
ZDefense QR Code
(Click on the image or scan the barcode with your Android Phone to goto the Android Market)
Developers: ZStudio
