Listen up, soldier! The aliens are headed our way and it’s up to you to keep them out of our base. You’ll have access to a variety of offensive towers that you can upgrade along the way, as well as a special Hero and other power ups to turn the tide of battle in our favor.
If you’re like many of us, you love a good tower defense game on the go. There are a few good ones out there (Fieldrunners, Kingdom Rush), but we’re always willing to give a new take on this classic gaming genre a spin.
The true test of a tower defense game, however, is whether it keeps you in that zen-like flow state while you play, and whether or not you want to keep playing it.
Alien Creeps HD, an upcoming game by venture-funded Outplay Entertainment, accomplishes both tasks with aplomb.
This free-to-play title boasts solid fixed-path tower defense game with boss fights, three different difficulty modes to earn extra stars with, up to 50 different towers, three different heroes, and some social sharing features to gain more reinforcements and airstrikes.
You’ll start each level with a certain amount of energy to use on towers. Killing creeps as they inexorably head toward your base will gain you more energy to then purchase more towers, or upgrade the ones you have. Every time your hero kills an enemy, you’ll earn coins, which can be used to purchase better towers and add upgrade slots to the ones you own. Coins are also doled out for Game Center achievements as well as completing levels at each level of difficulty.
The gameplay is familiar enough to easily slide into that desirable gaming flow state we all crave, and unique enough to offer a challenge to newbies and seasoned players alike. The variables — including a three-use electric zapper, reinforcement troops, and airstrikes — keep things hopping, and at no time did I feel like it was too easy. While you can either earn your upgrades or buy them with a purchase of coins, the free-to-play in-app purchasing is kept to the background, which is a welcome find in today’s current in-your-face market.
The only niggling issue I have is that there’s only one speed — most tower defense games have at least one faster speed at which to run the creeps through. Though, to be honest, the first six levels I’ve played have been challenging enough to keep me at normal speed if I had the option.
Ultimately, the download of a free-to-play game is entirely risk-free, in terms of money. Wasting time trying one out, though, is a sad, utterly first-world moment. If you like tower defense games with a military sci-fi cartoony feel, Alien Creeps HD will probably float your hovercraft just fine when it releases, which should be sometime in the near future.
