Villainous

Villainous by Cellar Door Games is a reverse tower defense game. Tower defense games are those where waves of baddies charge towards an objective. In their way are tower defenses that will attempt to stop the baddies. Usually, the baddies have no way of harming the towers. Yes, it is a bit ridiculous for the baddies to grit and bear with the abuse but we usually overlook that and enjoy the game anyway.

In normal tower defense games, the player controls the towers. In Villainous, the player controls the baddies, the side with the ridiculous grit-and-bear-it philosophy. Just ignore that part and think of it as a puzzle game of some sort. In a sense, it is a puzzle game since the player has to figure out ways to complete his/her objective.

Preparing for the rush.

The objective of the game is simple: get the Goblin Raiders past the towers to the end of the road. There are other units the players can send along to keep the Goblin Raiders alive, but only the Goblin Raiders matter. There are bronze and gold medals awarded when a certain number of Goblin Raiders complete their journey in the game.

At the start of the game, the player selects the order and number of units to send. There is a limit to the number of units the player can send.

Marching heedless of danger.

Once the player has selected the order of his/her troops, the game starts and the units will march single-mindedly along the road, without making any attempts to avoid incoming fire from the tower defenses. After all the units reach the end, surviving units are sent again in a new wave, allowing more Goblin Raiders to reach their objectives.

This continues until all units are shot down. Which will eventually happen, since with each new wave, the towers deal more damage.

The player is not reduced to idle watching. There is the speed up button. Also, the player can cast spells to support his/her units. Spells cost mana, which regenerate over time, or are dropped by dead units. Since the mana cost of spells increases with each use, the game cannot be prolonged indefinitely with spells.

Game Map.

While playing the game, the player is awarded Infamy, the ingame currency. Infamy is awarded each time a Goblin Raider reaches his objective. It is also awarded for obtaining medals in games and it is dropped by slain units (similar to tower defense games where dead units award resources).

Bronze medals are necessary to unlock new levels on the map. Gold medals are just for bonus Infamy and bragging rights.

Building the infamous castle.

Infamy is used to purchase upgrades for the player. A side effect of purchasing upgrades is that the player's castle is built at the same time. For cosmetic reasons.

Since Infamy is still awarded by slain units, the player will have a source of the currency to eventually develop himself/herself enough to beat a level.

Bragging Rights!

There is also a throne room that gets decorated with more items as the player completes achievements. For cosmetic reasons and bragging rights. Bragging is after all a very important perk of playing games.

Villianous is a nice game that challenges the player to think of ways to use the assets available to complete the objective (getting enough Goblin Raiders through for the gold medals). The game has a good tutorial system to explain the game mechanics and features, so it should be easy for players to learn the game.

For spoiler screenshots of the game, look here. Needless to say, there are spoilers in that link.