Immortal Defense

5 Story driven TD game... just wow
Immortal Defense is a tower defense game, but with many great and unique twists. It takes place in a weird half sci-fi, half mystical universe and it’s by far the only game of this genre that is story-driven. Well, the only one I know of.

And the story… it’s really, really great. John Thornton, its author, is a talented professional writer and it’s immediately apparent. Immortal Defense goes much further than you average video game and touches many quite serious subjects – purpose, barrier between gratitude and worship, limits of responsibility, loneliness, memory and love. And it does it really well.

It is sci-fi, yes. But it’s more on the Roger Zelazny’s, Ursula le Guin’s and The Fountain’s (movie by Darren Aronofsky) side of the genre, rather than the usual spaceships and aliens stuff.

The gameplay is mostly what would you expect from the TD genre, but with few quite unique twists and subtle touches. In what other game the towers (here called “Points”) are different aspects of your personality? Even the cursor, representing you – the ghost, the defender – has some interesting special abilities and is closer to being your actual avatar rather than a simple clicking tool.

The game’s universe and physics also play their subtle role in the gameplay, making for a nice level of optional depth and adding lots to immersion.

Immortal Defense mixes pixel-art and trippy procedural effects. It can look chaotic at times, but it works great at creating the abstract and mystical mood.

Of course, it’s not flawless. The story is so great that it sometimes seems to overshadow the gameplay. Several times, I catched myself trying to finish a level as quick as possible and without much thought just to see what the writing will bring next.

The game’s strategic part is also not deep enough for my tastes. Placement and types of your towers aren’t really that important and the game lacks the fun of optimizing you little ‘pathway through hell’ that I find so addicting about other TDs.

Still, these problems aren’t of much importance considering what the game tries (and for the most part succeds) to achieve. It’s really touching and well worth playing.

It’s one of few examples in which an art game proves to be a good and complete game on its own rights.