Hand Drawn Games' Desktop Tower Defense

In Round 3 of our Vs. Mode exchange on short session games with MTV News reporter Stephen Totilo, which is also being posted on Totilo's blog MTV News: Multiplayer, we shared our thoughts on some interesting possibilities for an EveryDay Shooter sequel, while Totilo sang the praises of game consoles becoming more like cable TV, where there's always something new to check out and evaluate. In our final installment, we firmly express our beef with Totilo's bright line distinction between twitch-driven and thought-driven small games. But Totilo strikes the most vicious blow yet, making like Marlo Stanfield on "The Wire"--best currently-running show on TV, bar none--by dropping the most lethally addictive product we've consumed since, ironically, Dope Wars. What is it? We're speaking of Desktop Tower Defense. And if you value your life, your productivity, your every waking moment, do not play this absolutely brilliant gem of a game. You have been warned. Read on.

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To: Stephen Totilo

Fr: N'Gai Croal

Date: August 15, 2007

Re: Twitch Like A Butterfly, Think Like A Bee

Stephen,

Your analysis of what makes Pac-Man CE great is spot on. I love the way it takes the empty spaces that I've already cleared--which would have been useful only for escaping the ghosts in the original game--and continually reconfigures and reloads the cleared half of the screen as you operate on the other side. It's a small but profound shift in gameplay that completely outclasses the original.

Separately, I'm not sure that the gap between twitching and thinking games is as wide as you've made it out to be. Some of the best games combine the two in engaging ways. Each new level of EveryDay Shooter first asks you to suss out its chain attack system, then exploit it to better eliminate enemies and rack up points, without ever downplaying its frantic twin-stick-and-move basics. The puzzle games Lumines and Gunpey out thinkishly (I may have to start trademarking these new words), but become more twitchy as time progresses and the pace picks up; ditto for Frequency/Amplitude, Guitar Hero and the forthcoming Rock Band. Wario Ware requires you to quickly recognize the situation at hand, then push, twist or gesture to solve it. And in order to maximize your high score in Super Stardust HD, you have to keep in mind multiple factors: avoiding elimination to maintain and increase your score multipliers; choosing the right weapon for the right asteroid or enemy; acquiring and conserving bombs for tough situations; keeping an eye out for power-ups and point pickups; boosting through point pickups to increase their scoring value, and more.

These aren't just my favorite short session games in recent years--they're some of my favorite games, period--in part because of the way they combine deliberate choice and reflexive response. I popped Diner Dash into my PSP for the first time earlier this week, and after a bit of initial frustration with the controls--and a bit of disappointment with the lo-fi graphics and mediocre soundtrack--I found myself pleasantly challenged by the same twitch-and-think dynamic. But during our Halo 3 multiplayer beta discussion, didn't I say that the combination of tactics and action in frantic, highly pressured situations "blow[s] past the outer limits of my gaming abilities"? I did, but give me permission to revise and extend my earlier remarks. The reason that twitch-and-think doesn't bother me in the games I cited in the first paragraph is that the gameplay in each title is 2-D, not 3-D. I never get disoriented. I never have to worry about something coming at me outside of my field of vision. I don't have to aim high or low. Because of this, I can at my best become one with these games, in a way that I can't with their 3-D gameplay counterparts.

There's so much more that I could say, but this is my final entry, and I'm about to hit the word limit. But we should consider revisiting small games in six months or so. It's fertile ground for discussion and debate.

Cheers,

N'Gai

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To: N'Gai Croal

Fr: Stephen Totilo

Date: August 17, 2007

Re: Better Than BioShock?

N'Gai,

Another derailment, another dog-ate-my-homework excuse. I planned to write this final letter of our exchange last night, at around 6:30 PM. But first I wanted to try a quick little game a few developers from New York City development studio area/code raved to me about: Desktop Tower Defense. I understood that, like any good small game, a session could only last a few minutes. I'd give it a quick try, make a snap judgment and have something to say about it--maybe--in that final letter.

At 7:56 I was still playing it.

At 7:57 I considered bailing on evening plans I had so I could keep playing.

At 7:58 I decided Desktop Tower Defense might be better than BioShock.

Try the game yourself here. But be warned: It's free, can be played in a browser and is easy to grasp. There's no defense against this game, except maybe not liking it. But how could you not like it?

Stubbornly sticking to categories you rejected last letter, let me tell you that DTD is a thinking game, not one designed for twitch. The playing field is the top of a desk that has had its clutter push to the edges, where only one path is open on each side. Little enemy "creeps" stream through the openings in marches toward opposite ends of the desk. The player plants turrets on the desk to shoot them down. Different types of turrets cost different amounts of money, as do turret upgrades. You gain money for the purchase by shooting the creeps, but lose health if they bypass your defenses. A few wrinkles aside, that's it.

DTD doesn't look nearly as good as BioShock. It doesn't even have a story, let alone a narrative exploration about what it means to be in control a game. It doesn't have amazing water effects.

But if one of the key draws of the nearly perfectly reviewed BioShock is that it is designed for gamers to tackle and re-play its challenges with varying strategies, well, Desktop Tower Defense, then is at least as good at that. I think it might even be better. Because while I may have beaten BioShock using a few different approaches (more on my 16-hour run of the game in next month's first-person-adventure Vs. Mode), I've already played through DTD about 25 times, using almost as many different strategies. And I keep wanting to go back and try something else. The game has me hooked.

I agree with you that the accessibility of 2-D gaming can easily trump the immersion of a 3-D experience--even when the 2-D experience masquerades as 3-D, as in short-session Super Stardust HD. Best of all with these small game is that the gameplay can't hide. It's the core and the surface. A great short-session game has the chance to get it so right, it makes you wonder why anyone bothers to make anything more grand.

Talk to you next month.

-Stephen