Game: CURSED TREASURE (Don't Touch My Gems!)
So, I've played a lot of tower games in the past. Bloons Tower Defense 4, 3, 2 and the original, Bubble Tanks Tower Defense, Warzone, Onslaught, Gem Craft, Desktop Tower Defense, etc. So suffice to say, I have a lot of experience in this matter...at the expense of my GPA...and social life (Seriously, if you value academics/ long-lasting friendships, stay away from this game).
So the basic gist of this game is that you try to protect your gems from wave after wave of enemy, with a multitude of towers that shoot, laser, freeze, poison, burn, and scare your enemies to oblivion.
Alright, so I've never written a legit video game review before (except one for Mass Effect, which I submitted to GameFAQs, but they never accepted it for some reason...screw them). I have, however, read way too many video game reviews (My favorites toolbar features IGN, Gamespot, Gamespy, and Gamerankings...I guess that makes me the toolbar), and I feel that the best way to approach reviewing this game would be to break the game down into different components, and talk about each.
GAMEPLAY: Alright, so the typical mechanics of any tower defense game are present here. You pay money, which you get from destroying enemies, to build/upgrade towers. There are three different types of towers, which can be built on different terrain types. The three towers, which I'll call blue, green, and red, all perform different functions. So, it's up to you to find the proper balance, correct placement on the map, etc. Your ultimate goal is to make it past all the rounds, with at least 1 gem remaining in your nest(s).
Alright, so what makes this game interesting, and forces me to neglect studying for my bio midterm, which I have in 5 hours, is the replay value of the game. So, you beat all 15 levels once, but you're still left with plenty to do. You get "badges" for each level depending on how well you play.
Yeahhhh, see that? That's my progress so far. I've got brilliant in 11 levels, which means that I beat the level without a single enemy even TOUCHING my gems. Yeah, I got mad skills. Excellent means that I saved all the gems, but an enemy touched a gem (Spoiler alert: make sure you upgrade your meteor powerup all the way to even have a shot at getting brilliant in levels 11 and 12).
What makes this game cool is that after every level, regardless of whether or not you win or lose, you get experience, which lets you level up. Once you level up, you can upgrade and customize pretty much every aspect of the game. You can change everything from the cost of upgrades, to how much money you get per enemy kill. It's a really creative twist, that introduces a TON of replay value, that makes you thoroughly reconsider getting another hour of sleep in favor of leveling up to level 27 in another effort to try to get brilliant on level 14 (really hard to do btdubs...)
It's a tried and true formula, and while this game may not revolutionize the tower defense genre, it certainly nails down the basics, while introducing highly addictive RPG leveling-up elements.
FRILLS (Graphics and Sound): Alright, now we've got to keep things in perspective. This is a FREE online flash game, so expecting graphics that rival Crysis, or the movie Avatar is asking for a bit too much. Asking for graphics that rival any 3rd-party Wii game would be asking for too little. Burn. That being said, the graphics are crisp, clean, and get the job done. There really isn't much slow down, and everything runs smoothly. As for the music, turn it off. The Pina Colada Song is better quality than the strange pseudo-epic/medieval/techno mashup that drones in the background.
OVERALL: 8.5/10
That's just a random number that I gave this game. It's a lot of fun, there's a ton of replay value, and its extremely addicting, with a good amount of production value.
EDIT: Wow, I can't believe I just spent an hour and a half reviewing an online flash game.
EDIT: Just got brilliant on levels 11 and 12. What up.
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