RPG and Tower Defense are genres that, at first glance, don't seem like they would mix. One is about adventuring all over the world, while the other focuses on protecting a given place in isolated, individual stages. But then, one look at Defender's Quest, and it makes you wonder why no one had this idea before.
Its story takes place in The Pit, a valley that's practically isolated from the rest of the world by the nigh unsurpassable rock formations that surround it. This isolation made the place a prime candidate for a quarantine zone when a plague hit, one that turns the people it kills into mindless monsters and led the people to take all the afflicted, whether dead or dying, and toss them into the Pit, abandoning them to their fate.
Such is the fate of Azra, the Royal Librarian of the Ash Kingdom. Thrown into the Pit and left to die, during her last moments, she hears a mysterious voice, that of a dark being beckoning her to its side. She finds out that, unlike most of the other afflicted, she can resist its call and fight back, and after preventing her life from being taken, she sets out on an adventure across the Pit, where she'll meet other survivors like her and seek the truth behind the plague.
While the "written by an actual English major" tagline from the game's marketing might strike one as a bit obnoxious, Defender's Quest absolutely does deliver on the promise of a compelling story. Azra's adventure has the comfy vibes of a cartoon, featuring a varied cast and mixing drama, mystery and comedy in an enthralling package. The main narrative alone is worth the price of admission.
The way the game meshes tower defense and RPG mechanics completes the experience. Instead of towers, Azra can place units on the field to protect herself from the enemy hordes, units you not only recruit, but also develop while outside of stages. Each unit has a class and a skill tree that can enhance some aspects of that unit's functionality, in essence, allowing you to specialize each character for certain roles when deployed.
During stages, enemies come in waves towards Azra's position, in standard tower defense fashion. There are no gotchas: from the start, you're given information about every wave that will come at you and the paths they'll take. There's also no interest mechanic, so you're free to focus solely on your strategy. You can pick between using your resources to deploy units or upgrade them, or you can cast one of Azra's powerful, but short duration, spells.
Each stage challenges you to beat it in different difficulty levels while letting no enemies get to Azra, which has you going back and forth in the world map while developing your team. My favorite part, however, was doing Hero Mode, which purposefully limits your unit count and forces you to not only develop your team more carefully, but also go back and forth during certain battles. It's a new dimension to the game's strategizing that I never forgot about, and it’s not hard to lose track of time doing it, as not only is the gameplay exciting on its own, the game also also features an incredibly good soundtrack.
Defender's Quest is just such a blast -- I originally played it for dozens of hours, and simply opening it for the sake of writing this review accidentally had me playing for a couple more. It's an underrated gem of an indie game, and a tower defense game that is able to please even people who don't typically enjoy the genre.
One last thing: older reviews might comment on the game's poor performance. Back when the game was first released, it used a framework called Adobe AIR, which was notably janky: it would take a lot of RAM and slow down the entire computer. Since then, Defender's Quest received a DX version which is the same game remade in a proper game engine, and runs much more smoothly. If you already had the game, the upgrade was free, so if you had performance problems before, it's worth giving the game another shot.
I cannot wait for the sequel!
Its story takes place in The Pit, a valley that's practically isolated from the rest of the world by the nigh unsurpassable rock formations that surround it. This isolation made the place a prime candidate for a quarantine zone when a plague hit, one that turns the people it kills into mindless monsters and led the people to take all the afflicted, whether dead or dying, and toss them into the Pit, abandoning them to their fate.
Such is the fate of Azra, the Royal Librarian of the Ash Kingdom. Thrown into the Pit and left to die, during her last moments, she hears a mysterious voice, that of a dark being beckoning her to its side. She finds out that, unlike most of the other afflicted, she can resist its call and fight back, and after preventing her life from being taken, she sets out on an adventure across the Pit, where she'll meet other survivors like her and seek the truth behind the plague.
While the "written by an actual English major" tagline from the game's marketing might strike one as a bit obnoxious, Defender's Quest absolutely does deliver on the promise of a compelling story. Azra's adventure has the comfy vibes of a cartoon, featuring a varied cast and mixing drama, mystery and comedy in an enthralling package. The main narrative alone is worth the price of admission.
The way the game meshes tower defense and RPG mechanics completes the experience. Instead of towers, Azra can place units on the field to protect herself from the enemy hordes, units you not only recruit, but also develop while outside of stages. Each unit has a class and a skill tree that can enhance some aspects of that unit's functionality, in essence, allowing you to specialize each character for certain roles when deployed.
During stages, enemies come in waves towards Azra's position, in standard tower defense fashion. There are no gotchas: from the start, you're given information about every wave that will come at you and the paths they'll take. There's also no interest mechanic, so you're free to focus solely on your strategy. You can pick between using your resources to deploy units or upgrade them, or you can cast one of Azra's powerful, but short duration, spells.
Each stage challenges you to beat it in different difficulty levels while letting no enemies get to Azra, which has you going back and forth in the world map while developing your team. My favorite part, however, was doing Hero Mode, which purposefully limits your unit count and forces you to not only develop your team more carefully, but also go back and forth during certain battles. It's a new dimension to the game's strategizing that I never forgot about, and it’s not hard to lose track of time doing it, as not only is the gameplay exciting on its own, the game also also features an incredibly good soundtrack.
Defender's Quest is just such a blast -- I originally played it for dozens of hours, and simply opening it for the sake of writing this review accidentally had me playing for a couple more. It's an underrated gem of an indie game, and a tower defense game that is able to please even people who don't typically enjoy the genre.
One last thing: older reviews might comment on the game's poor performance. Back when the game was first released, it used a framework called Adobe AIR, which was notably janky: it would take a lot of RAM and slow down the entire computer. Since then, Defender's Quest received a DX version which is the same game remade in a proper game engine, and runs much more smoothly. If you already had the game, the upgrade was free, so if you had performance problems before, it's worth giving the game another shot.
I cannot wait for the sequel!