geoDefense Swarm in Review – Kicking it neon style!
Ladies and gents, geoDefense Swarm is b-e-a-u-t-i-f-u-l. Its exceptional, refreshing style couples with no lag for a remarkable game. The explosions are amazing, but no matter how great it is to decimate the creeps, there is no zoom function to get up close and personal with the destruction. Too bad, but not a game-stopping loss.
geoDefense Swarm is Open Field, meaning that creeps enter through a specific point and must never reach the exit point. Their progression is hindered by various obstacles, while your attempts to annihilate them are thwarted by various floor tiles which harbour such powers as such as speed-up, heal, and anti-building. I should also note that tiles are hexagonal, which adds some twist to the overall building strategy. Building mazes to trap your enemies is really what any Open Field TD game is all about and doing it on the hexagonal field presents some challenges. I would recommend studying creep movement patterns since I found out it’s often not necessary to spend valuable resources on blocking all possible routes, especially when a well-placed, upgraded laser tower can do the job much more efficiently.
Like strategy and decimating large numbers of enemies? geoDefense Swarm has an arsenal of strategic weapons types for you to make use of: Canon, Laser, Missile, Thumper and a Static towers, as well as Vortex tower boosters. Considering that each tower has 7 upgrade levels, that is more than enough to keep any TD fan satisfied. I would also note that the 7th level upgrades often make all the difference since upgrading always presents a qualitative leap compared to the previous level. You will have to get used to linking certain towers (like the Vortex Tower) to boost their effectiveness and an interesting thing I found is that the cost of towers varies on some levels, forcing you to adjust your strategy accordingly.
This TD features 30 levels which are split into 3 difficulties tiers, the last one in each tier being endless. geoDefense Swarm really is a “Thinking Man’s Tower Defence” since even at Easy difficulty levels, I have had to spend hours finish some. The strange thing is that unlike many games where such difficulty only causes frustration, geoDefense Swarm draws you like a magnet to try and try again. This is due the depth of the game strategy strategy which may not be apparent at first glance. At the same time, the game is amazingly simple to pick up and play, and the first couple of levels on easy difficulty do a great job acquainting you with the basics of game mechanics. Oh yes, and Open Feint connectivity is always a plus – where else would you brag about your latest high score?
In short, geoDefense Swarm is a treat. It combines the best of the classic tried and tested geoDefense goodness and the deep strategy of Open Field TD games. The stylish graphics are like visual candy and the performance is excellent, even on a 2G/3G iPhone. I would definitely say that the sequel of geoDefense has not shamed it’s original one bit and is a must have for any fan of the genre.
| App Summary | |||
| Title: | geoDefense Swarm (v1.1) | Developer: | Critical Thought Games LLC |
| Price: | $1.99 | App Size: | 7.7 MB |
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