N'Gai Croal
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Aug 20, 2007 04:49 PM
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.
Some excerpts from our exchange:
N'Gai Croal: 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.
Stephen Totilo: Desktop Tower Defense 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.
To read the Final Round of our exchange in its entirety, click on the link below.
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