Defense Grid 2 a tower defense strategy game developed by Hidden Path Entertainment developers of the defense grid series and the well renowned Counter Strike Global offensive. Published by 505 games Defense Grid 2 is available for the PS4, XBOX One and PC’s.
The story… well the story’s interesting, interesting in I don’t think I fully understood what was going on all the time, at the start you pick up a distress beacon and decide to rush over to help to find out that the planets in this system are all under attack by some kind of alien race, don’t ask me who because they seem to all be under of the banner of just simply the alien race. As the story progresses you discover more human A.I things that are a little bit messed up. Not in the I going to kill you and wear you as a hat kind of messed up I mean the more kind of funny and less threatening that that leads them to talking about acquiring “raspberry lollipops” in the middle of an emergency. I wish that was my own joke but the quotes directly taken from the game. There’s also some kind of audio log style text in the loading screen that adds a little bit more depth to the story as eventually it starts to make sense in how it relates to the story. The Dialogue between the A.I’s are both witty and interesting adding a comedic overtone to the fights.
The mechanics of the game are fairly simple and although can look daunting at first with all the long listed menus before you can even get started into a game. It doesn’t take long before the basic building of towers become accessible and how to use them becomes easy. The towers are also gradually introduced as starting out you just get the gun tower (a good all-rounder) and the inferno tower (deals low damage but effective with swarms).Later you get towers like the temporal tower (slows enemies down when they are in its range) and the meteor tower (shoots massive fireballs from practically the other side of the map). Other than towers there are other ways of fighting those irritating non-human pests like with the special abilities that each A.I has. Each of these are unique like the shades of madness they seem to develop as the game progresses like dementia or split personality disorder. The useful differences however are how you can use a powerful laser blast, an ability that adds to your resources or even a blast that slows the enemy wave at the area you blasted for a short time. The last thing you can do to help you survive is the ability to modify the towers before your fight with augments such as priority targeting, self-explaining if I am honest, and tachyon shells which slow down the enemy on contact. There are a variety with these augments however I didn’t really feel like they changed the game too much.
Graphically, I mean for a basic tower defense game it’s very pretty and does vary a bit but not by much. The scenery does make a noticeable change every now and then. However the design of the levels to add more of a challenge to the player with the positioning of turrets is becoming more crucial in certain maps both to survive and get a pat on the back with a shiny medal. The animations were kind of cool too with the zappy towers shooting sparks across the maps and fireballs flying everywhere when you really get in the game just at times the game felt it had no atmosphere. This probably isn’t helped by the simple fact that I can’t remember what the background music used sounded like and even if there was any at all. Maybe this was done deliberately so the A.I s lines would be easily heard as without them you really don’t get a clear understanding on what is going on – it would still be nice if I could recall one note from a soundtrack used in the game.
Overall Defense grid 2 is a great tower defense game and definitely looks like it should be on a next gen console; just it gets real repetitive real fast. With a certain way you need to play to win each level once you have done it you really don’t want to do it again because it’s easy. The game does a brilliant job of given you plenty of units to try and use but, again, once you have your own style and way of doing things it doesn’t really do much to change how you play or give you interesting challenges. If you want a good game that may be a little short and doesn’t have a massive story that eats into your time and really like tower defense/strategy games then this is for you. Ding -ding-didi-ding. Nope. Nothing.
Disclaimer:All scores given within our reviews are based on the artist’s personal opinion; this should in no way impede your decision to purchase the game.
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