Read Play Blog is a meme about video games and books, posted every 16th of the month. Bloggers are encouraged to answer a discussion question, and recommend a video game that is similar to a book they liked. Hosted by Happy Indulgence Books & Read Me Away.
Question: What is your favourite gaming genre?
My favourite gaming genre is Tower Defense, I have had a soft spot for that genre ever since my boyfriend introduced me to it by letting me play a free tower defense game on the internet, where you had a bureau and had to make sure the bugs didn’t got to the other side. I was immediately hooked and have been on the lookout for new tower defense games ever since then.
So what exactly are tower defense games? Here’s a quote from wikipedia that accurately describes the genre:
Tower defense is a subgenre of real-time strategy video games. The goal of tower defense games is to try to stop enemies from crossing a map by building traps to slow them down and towers which shoot at them as they pass. Enemies and towers usually have varied abilities, costs, and upgrade prices. When an enemy is defeated, the player earns money or points, which are used to buy or upgrade towers, or upgrade the number of money or points that are earned, or even upgrade the rate at which they upgrade.
The choice and positioning of the personal towers is the essential strategy of the game. Many games, such as Flash Element Tower Defense, feature enemies that run through a “maze”, which allows the player to strategically place towers for optimal effectiveness. However, some versions of the genre force the user to create the maze out of their own towers, such as Desktop Tower Defense. Some versions are a hybrid of these two types, with preset paths that can be modified to some extent by tower placement, or towers that can be modified by path placement.
What I love about tower defense games is the strategy part, I love planning and thinking about how best to position my towers and it’s one of the few genres of games where I can replay a level multiple times to make sure I get it right. I usually don’t mind failing a level for the first few times and I love improving my strategy to make sure I succed (or almost succed) the next time.
One of my favourite tower defense games are Sanctum and Sanctum 2 by Coffee Stain Studios. It’s a combination between tower defense and first person shooter. And it’s just awesome! Beside the strategy part there is also the shooter part and if somewhere there aren’t enough towers or your stragey is a bit off, you can just stand there and go shoot like crazy on the monsters. My favourite character is Simo, he’s the sniper. I’ve tried playing with other characters, but I am just so used to Simo’s character that I can’t play with another character.
If you want to know more about my love of tower defense games and my favourite games in the genre, please check out my Tower Defense post.
Another of my favourite genres are city building games. I love planning and organising and this genre plays into that really well. So what are city building games? To quote wikipedia:
City-building games are a genre of strategy video game where players act as the overall planner and leader of a city, looking down on it from above, and being responsible for its growth and management. Players choose building placement and city management features such as salaries and work priorities, and the city develops accordingly.
Currently some of my favourite games in this genre are Banished by Shining Rock Software and Tropico 4 by Kalypso Media. Banished is a city building game where you have to build a medieval city for a group of banished people. It’s fun and the grpahics are pretty nice as well.
Beside that I love games with a strong story, RPG’s and love to try a variety of other genres as well. Some examples of some of some of my favourite RPG games are Kingdom Hearts, Ratchet and Clank and Final Fantasy. Although Ratchet and Clank comes close to being a shooter as well.
Recommendation
You probably already predicted my recommendation, this month I recommend Sanctum 2 by Coffee Stain Studios. And here’s the link to the game on Steam.
It’s an amazing tower defense shooter game, which you can play just as easily with friends as alone.
And what even more awesome both Sanctum and Sanctum 2 are on sale for 85% off till 18 august on steam, so if you where thinking of getting this game, go get it now!
Currently Playing
I haven’t had much time to play games in the last few weeks, the game I played most was Avalanche 2: Super avalanche by Beast Games.
Avalanche is a fun and addictive game. Basically you are a marshmallow who climbs higher and higher with the help of blocks and there’s lava chasing you. We don’t don’t know if there’s a limit on how high you can go, but as far as we know you can keep climbing forever. You can play it solo or with two people behind one computer. My boyfriend and I often play it together, you can help each other then, although my boyfriend is a bit better at the game then I am.
If you’re playing solo you can gain achievements and each achievement unlocks something in the shop. You can buy things like hair or glasses in the shop to make Marsh look different. My March is pink with red librarian glasses, purple hair and a pink bow in her hair.
Also you die a lot, by falling in the lava, getting a block on your head or gettign attacked by enemies and then you start climbing from 0 feet again. It can be a frustrating game sometimes, but overal it’s just a lot of fun. There’s a free demo on the website so if you’re curious check it out 🙂
So that’s it for this month’s Read Play Blog post :). Do you play games and what’s your favourite genre?
Hi, Lola! Thank you so much for participating in Read Play Blog. I’m so happy to see you joining us! 😀
Yay, tower defense! When I was younger, I didn’t have much patience for these kinds of games because I’d almost always lose in a few levels. Impatient little Ana would do a ragequit, basically. 😛 But now that I’m older, I like them! I think I have one on Steam that I have to get around to playing, and I’m excited. I love replaying the levels too, trying to make sure that NOTHING gets past my defense. 😛
City building games! Those are fun too! I’m better at those than tower defense games, and I think the one that I played a lot was “Westward” or something of the sort. It fueled my very short phase of being very into westerns/cowboy stories. 😛 And speaking of Banished, I think this review might interest you. Haha!
Ana @ Read Me Away recently posted…Read Play Blog: My love for fantasy
I plan on joining on the next months again I had so much fun writing this post :).
Yeah tower defense games can be frustrating, I’ve played a few tower defense games that where so difficult that I had to play some levels like ten or twenty times before even clearing them at all. There’s a point when it stops being fun, it need to have a right balance between being challenging, but not too difficult.
And that review of Banished on youtube was hilarious! He does have some great points about the game though, it can be very frustrating and difficult at times to keep your people feed.
Lola recently posted…Read Play Blog #1
Thanks for participating this month Lola! It looks like you’re a very strategic gamer, I have enjoyed some tower defense games in the past like Ninja Town on the DS. I do admit I need to get into them more though! I do like my FPS games, so Sanctum will be one that I’ll be checking out 🙂
City building games are so much fun, but I admit I haven’t had the patience for them recently. I loved the old Sim City and just building your town together, that was so much fun.
Jeann @ Happy Indulgence recently posted…Read Play Blog #2 – Favourite Gaming Genre
I haven’t played that many DS games and have never heard of Ninja Town, it does sound fun though! As long as you have a tower defense game that is challenging, but not too difficult, they can be a lot of fun. I really want to play some more Sanctum 2, but I used to play it with my boyfriend and his computer can’t play the game anymore. So I didn’t play it as much as I used to as it’s less fun to play alone. And it’s on sale now, so it’s a good time to grab it and try it :).
I have never played Sim City actually. I like having to coordinate and plan things and see your city growing. Although they can get a bit boring if you play it too long in one go.
I haven’t played many tower defense games, so I can’t say for sure if I like them or not, but based on the one TD game I can remember playing — Dungeon Defenders, on the XBOX — they’re pretty fun! I agree, the strategy contributes a lot to the enjoyment, and even though I got tired of the game after a while, I did have a great time while I was playing it. So I’ll definitely try to give Sanctum a go when I have the chance!
And YES to city-building games! Some people think it’s lame, but I love it. I haven’t played any of the city-building games you mentioned above, but one of my favorites is the Sid Meier’s Civilization franchise. Have you played that before? It is SO FUN. I just love being able to see my city grow and research new technologies and go to war with other countries. >:)
Megan @ Adrift on Vulcan recently posted…Read Play Blog: Favorite Gaming Genres
I think I played Dungeon Defenders and enjoyed it. I hope you give Sanctum a chance, it’s a great game!
If I remember correctly I played one of the Civilization games a while ago. And indeed growing your city and developing new things is one of the most fun parts of a city building game. Only mistake I always tend to make is spend a little too much money, so I have to wait again till I have enough money to build something new.
One of my first PC games was Civilization (I don’t remember which number) and I LOVED it. Could play it for hours. But I haven’t played that one in years. I did like the strategy of it. I think that’s why I like sneak games like Dishonored. It’s not just about going around and killing things. In fact, the less you kill, the better the conditions of the city get. It’s pretty cool. Sadly, I have a Mac, so a lot of the online games aren’t available. 🙁
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I played one of the Civilization games, but can’t remember which number either. And indeed I like the startegy aspect in those games. I’ll have to check out Dishonered, don’t think I’ve heard of that one before.
That’s sad that a lot of online games aren’t available on mac :(.