No game genre is more addictive than the humble Tower Defense. When it comes to sheer PPP ( “Procrastination Promoting Power”), even “Just One More Turn” heavy-hitters like Civilization 5 must bow down to the quirky cuteness of Plants Vs. Zombies, or the elegance of Kingdom Rush. Maybe it’s a human instinct to barricade yourself in a fortress surrounded with protective watch-towers (or perhaps wizards, aliens, trees, Pokémon, robots, or mushrooms: the TD genre is vast and varied), or maybe we just like to watch lazily as our carefully constructed maze of fortifications lays waste to armies of baddies; whatever the reason, Tower Defense games have come to all but flood the mobile gaming market.
This of course leads to a good deal of redundancy, repetition and re-skinning of hackneyed ideas. Which is where Skull Legends, created by Spanish studio Playshore, comes in. Somewhat similar to games like Sanctum and Orcs Must Die!, Skull Legends is a hybrid First-Person Shooter / Tower Defense game (or FPS/TD, if you want to sound like you’re in the know) that adds fresh color to an increasingly monotone TD landscape.
In Skull Legends, you play an unnamed archer travelling to various locations around your kingdom (I actually know nothing about the system of government in the game, but fantasy nations do tend to be monarchies), trying to stop undead hordes from… err…doing what undead hordes do. The storyline is clearly secondary to the Skull Legends experience. The fact that I was fighting in “what was once a thriving commercial port”, was irrelevant to me. However, this lack of plot in no way diminished my enjoyment of the game: gameplay mechanics in Skull Legends are so compelling, that any story-elements that it does throw at you feel like juicy nuggets of flavor falling onto your plate, enhancing an already robust platter.
In some ways, the shooter elements of Skull Legends are more pronounced than the TD elements. In each level, you start with only your trustee (upgradeable) bow with which to take down the variety of skeletons that crawl out of crypts, caves, swamps and graveyards. Now, I normally both dislike and fail at shooter games, and tend to have terrible aim. Skull Legends, however, manages to keep the shooting mechanic easy enough for klutzes like myself, yet challenging enough for me to keep playing. You drag a smoky targeting disk over a skeleton and release to shoot, but beware: while “Squire” skeletons may be easy pickings, “Assassins” leap out of your way, “Knights” block your arrows with their shields, and “Spartans” even hurl their spears right back at you. And don’t forget to watch your stamina: each shot consumes some of this precious resource and once it’s out, you’ll have to wait to recover before you can shoot again. This forces you to plan your shots carefully, and shoot only when you need to.
Once you’ve killed enough enemies, you can spend their souls to build and upgrade towers, walls, and even exploding barrels in specially designated areas on the map. Playshore has done an excellent job of balancing the various levels. Only late in the game will you ever have enough resource to fill every spot on a map with towers, and the you’re forced to carefully consider how and when to spend your souls: Would a temporary wall to barricade a choke-point be useful right now, or should you wait until you can afford an “Ice Tower” to freeze your enemies in place? Should you invest in a “Poison Plant” near the skeletons’ spawn point to hit them early and keep ‘em hurting, or is an “Explosive Launcher” for area-of-effect damage more valuable right now? The game is full of interesting and very frantic decisions, keeping every level exciting and fresh.
Speaking of levels, each one is expertly designed. Remember when I said that playing in an abandoned commercial port was irrelevant? That was only true for story reasons: in reality, each level is lovingly designed, both in terms of art and gameplay. You’ll see skeletons scramble towards you on rickety, wooden platforms, crouch behind piles of junk to avoid being hit, and descend into below-ground passages to escape your arrows. To survive, you’ll have to change up your strategy for each level, preventing the game from ever becoming a monotonous chore.
Finally, unlike most Tower Defense Games, you’re constantly doing something. Whether it be rebuilding fortifications, blocking enemy fire, or choosing the right arrow from your quiver (armored enemies are more vulnerable to electric arrows, for example), you’re always just the right amount of panicky, feverishly trying to prevent the throngs of skeletons from reaching you.
A mere $0.99, Skull Legends feels like a much more expensive game with great visuals and excellent gameplay mechanics. It’s exciting, fast-paced, fun and I highly recommend it.
