A terribly cursed yet addictive flash game...
Cursed Treasure tower defence is yet another flash-based tower defense game, this time from Iriysoft. It was released in May 2010 and is a typical tower defense game which is also based on gems and their possession, much like the GemCraft tower defense game series. However, this game has a lot more features and quirks added in to increase the fun quotient and looks like a great game. Here are some of the key features of this new game:
Gameplay
Well, this is a typical tower defense game with enemies wanting to steal your gems by traversing on a much-used path while you set up towers all around them to try and incinerate these enemies. But before you start yawning in boredom and give up on this game, just know that there's a lot more to this game than the typical tower defense game stuff that we've been seeing for years now. All of that then contributes to make this game more addictive than nicotine or what have you.
There really isn't any story for this game, and it doesn't really need any, to be honest. You have gems in a cave and there are all sorts of people who would like to steal them from you. After all, who doesn't like gems? But then, you have this handy army of mythical monsters like demons and orcs just waiting for your command to destroy these men who think they can steal your gems and literally get away with them. Just load these monsters up in your towers and watch the magic.
If you're looking for a lot of variety then this game isn't really for you. There are just three types of towers: Arrow-shooting ones or "Dens" full of orcs, freezing ones or "Crypts" full of the undead and lava-spouting ones or "Temples" full of demons. If you knew that the demons would be in the temples of all places, you should probably keep your religion a secret. Anyway, what this game lacks on the variety front, it more than makes up for it in the strategy department. The towers can only be placed in specific terrains suitable to the towers themselves. So Dens go on grassy terrain, crypts go on the snow and temples go on rock. Many of the areas are also covered with forests, so that limits your tower-placing capabilities.
To remove the forest obstacle, you have the "Cut Out" spell as one of three spells that you can use. This spell removes trees from the one tile that it is used on, so you can then place a tower on that tile. The other two spells are "Frenzy" and "Meteor". Frenzy sends the inhabitants of your towers into a, errr, frenzy, so they all start firing faster and the firing rate of your towers goes up. Meteor just blows up all the enemies in the selected radius through a meteor strike. All of these spells require mana, which you gain slowly with time.
To speed up the mana-earning process cursed treasure tower defense, you have certain tiles called the mana pool tiles. When you build a tower upon these tiles, your earning rate shoots up. Apart from these, you also have certain raised tiles. Placing a tower on one of these tiles increases their range manifold, and the best part is that you can place any type of tower on these tiles.
Each of the three types of towers also get upgrades that increase their damage and range. You can also specialize the towers as they upgrade from level 3 to level 4 to do something other than just causing damage. For instance, with the crypt towers you get a couple of choices. Either you can select the Chilling Crypt or the Ghost Crypt. One of them increases the amount of mana you get for every enemy that you hit, the other has the capability to scare your enemies and make them run back to wherever they came from.
You have a lot more variety in the range of attackers that want to steal your gems, however. You have everything from Ninjas, who turn invisible whenever they spot your first tower, to Bards, who can play a song to speed up the other enemies and ultimately the Champions, which you'll also know as the good old bosses. They are super strong and really take some killing. To further counter these menaces, you also gain skill points based on the amount of experience you get after finishing a level. You can use these skill points to level up and improve your condition so that you start with more gold, more mana and earn more of them as the game goes along, etc.
The toughest enemies to take out are the Ninjas, and a Ninja Champion is quite simply the worst. To counter this ultimate threat (or just any ninjas really), try to build a tower at the very entrance in every level. Since ninjas become temporarily invisible as soon as they spot your first tower, they will become invisible as soon as they enter the map, which means their invisibility will wear by the time they reach the middle of the path and after that they're just as vincible as the rest of the enemies. Apart from that, there really isn't anything that's particularly difficult. As long as you upgrade properly you should be fine.
In fact, that is probably the main issue with the tower defense game. Although it requires a lot of strategy with how best to place your towers and everything, fully upgraded towers can mow down pretty much everything that's foolish enough to come near them. This is a problem because it isn't exceptionally hard to upgrade your towers to that point. It's tough and requires some brainwork, but it could have been more challenging is what is being said here.
There's also a problem with the individual levels in the game and the length of the game as a whole. Some levels drag on too much, especially when it becomes obvious that nothing's going to get past. Ironically, the problem with the game's length is that at only 15 levels, it's a bit too short and ends a little bit too quickly for one's liking. It's almost like getting that hugely anticipated novel in a long-running series only to find that it ends with lots of cliffhangers and the next novel isn't scheduled to come for a decade or so. You feel happy for having played it, but it all ends too quickly.
Graphics and Audio
The graphics are great but quite repetitive as well. In fact there really isn't a single change in the terrain throughout the game. You just have the same design over and over again, which gets a bit boring. However, the detail and colors within that design are excellent. Plus the way every dead enemy leaves a skeleton behind that looks like its midway through a dance step is hilarious.
The audio is decent in that it matches the game step-for-step, isn't jarring at all and doesn't interfere with the game. The sound effects are almost the best part of the game though. The sound your enemies make when they charge, the highly satisfying screams they make when they die, and that hideous laughter that emanates when one of them manages to make off with one of your jewels...This game is probably one of the best examples of how sound effects can be used to make a game better. Wanting to quell that laughter alone is likely to keep you going for an hour more than you would originally play this game for.
Conclusion
Just when you think that the tower defense genre is done for, along comes yet another excellent game to keep you stuck to your chair for hours on end. Really, Cursed Treasure tower defence is almost the prefect tower defense game in my opinion. Maybe with a bit more length and maybe one or two more tower types it might well have crossed the perfect line and into legendary territory. It has simple choices with some high-end strategic gameplay that will put the best minds to work, although once you figure it out you'll never have another problem throughout the game. And then there are all those sound effects to consider, which make this game easily one of the best there is. All on all, if you want to spend a couple of hours playing the quintessential "thinking man's game" that for once will also be enjoyable, go for this game.