Defense Grid: The Awakening Review
What’s Hot:
- Simple controls make it easy to pick up and play.
- Very easy to revert back to checkpoints.
- If you happen to quit, there is an option to resume where you left off. Quite uncommon amongst tower defense games.
- There is a leaderboard built into the menu, making it very accessible to compare scores with friends.
- There are a large variety of game types to play, out with the main story that is apart from the main story line, giving this game a huge re-playability factor.
- It is very easy to see when incoming waves of enemies are approaching, and difficulty levels are indicated by 3 colours (Green, amber and red).
- There is a function enabling you to fast-forward, making it easy to skip to the action.
- Good voice acting, which is often quite witty.
- There are a large variety of maps, all of which are unique.
- Outstanding graphics make it really enjoyable to look at.
What’s Not:
- The towers are limited on as to where you can build them, there is only certain places you can build them.
- When there are lots of towers, it is hard to distinguish tower types.
- Weapon sounds tend to get very repetitive.
- It often gets hard to distinguish enemy strength.
- It gets quite tedious once the towers are built, as there is nothing to do.
- Some important gameplay tips seem to appear after the event has happened.
Verdict: Buy
If tower defense games are your type of game then I highly recommend this. Great graphics combined with plenty of gameplay options create a game that can be played for hours and hours. There isn’t much to complain about, apart from a few minor hiccups. Each level is a challenge in itself and has more to it than your average generic tower defense game. The game is smooth to use, and people new to the Xbox 360 will easily be able to pick this up and play it without a problem, with only 3 or 4 buttons that are used.
The achievements are well balanced, most are rather easy but one or two could prove to be a challenge and will add to the re-playability factor. There are also a few gamer-pics that can be unlocked, and at only 800 Microsoft points, it’s a steal in my opinion.
Definitely the best tower defense game on the market, it sticks to the standard tower defense gameplay, but with a few added extras that make this game unique.
