Okay, I realize I'm like the last person on BYOND to discover this, but in my attempts to actually play more BYOND games, I tried out Abra's Castle in single-player mode a couple of times this weekend.
Fun game! Rare distinction of being a game I immediately knew I'd be playing more of in the future. No wonder it's #3 in the BYOND rankings.
It's simple, yet addictive...you are on the corner of a castle, and you can purchase and place units on top of the castle wall. Waves of monsters parade by below, and you've got to kill them before they get past you. You can't actually see your castle entrance, but if they get past you, you hear them whacking away at the doors, and once they damage the doors enough to get through, your game is over.
[Edit: Actually I was very wrong about this. You can move around the map and see the castle entrance, using the arrow keys. Good thing, too, or I never would have gotten past the first few waves!]
What makes this work is that you have a nice variety of units to place, you make money as you kill monsters, which lets you upgrade your units and add more (eventually you get traps you can place on the ground, etc), and you are perpetually curious about what's coming next. The monster graphics are fun, and the sounds are very nicely done.
Also, the contents of each wave (there are a total of 20 waves) are consistent from game to game, so as you play you are developing strategies for how to overcome each wave. What kind of units to place, which units to sell and replace at this point (I believe, as I didn't do any selling yet), etc.
It was quite fun placing a mage and watching him fireball the baddies, with the fireball bouncing among them.
I love the fact that this is completely playable in single-player, and that the set nature of the waves means you can develop strategy. Once you've beaten the game, you can increase the difficulty and go for it again.
At some point I'll have to try in multiplayer and see what that's like...though I'm curious about lag issues, since there are an awful lot of arrows flying at any one time!
I haven't played enough to be able to give a real suggestion, but perhaps each five waves or so your starting point should reset to that point.
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Lol, I used to be t3h best :(
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The level of difficulty determines how many waves there are, on hard there's 30 and it loops through them again buffing up the monsters the second time for a total of 60. =)
As far as losing goes, I certainly wouldn't want to start up again right where I died, usually I end up dieing a few waves after a big foul up. Perhaps we could set our own checkpoints, at a cost. | |
Uhm... you know you can move in the game, right Deadron? You said "you're in a corner" and "you can't see your entrance". Well, you can see the door, and you can see them attacking it. And you don't always have to be in that corner :-P
Just F.Y.I., not trying to sound rude or anything. | |
Uhm... you know you can move in the game, right Deadron? Actually that was a question I had...I had a feeling I could probably move, but didn't figure it out. I was clicking all over and such...I bet it's just the arrow keys, right? Duh. | |
Castle was actually a subject of one of my older reviews. No idea if it was before or after I started gong more in depth in to the games or not, but yeah... It IS a fun game, and is quite addicting if you're in to that type of thing. I think I ranked it something like 8 out of 10.
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haha yea like if you were a spec. Also there's a Castle Guide in the hub that's really usefull. Tells you what monsters are next and what unit you can use to beat them.
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It might be cool to have 3 Heirs (lives). When you lose a Wave, one of your Heirs takes over and you can retry the Wave. After you run out of Heirs (lives), you have to start over. Works really well in them old arcade classics.
~X | |
Ya, Deadron, just a little pointer. You can toggle your "icon" off and on, depending on what player you are. If your first player, and you toggle your icon, you'll be a blue ball.. Didn't know if you knew that.
--Chwgt | |
Glad I posted about this!
Now if we're lucky Abra will see the suggestions (which sound good to my newbie ear, but what do I know about the game yet). How does Multiplayer work? Is it co-op on the same castle? | |
Yeah, it's co-op on the same castle. As for Abra hearing these suggestions, it may be a while. He seems to have gotten caught up in that whole "real life" thing lately. Perhaps one of the people with an existing account on the Castle forums could leave a note for him.
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Well Abra is into creating 3d games now. He hasn't log in a very long time. I was shock when i seen him log on yesterday when he showed online on my pager, But he only stood online for like 5mins and never returned.=(
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Ah well, too bad...his game is played too much, he oughta be around to enjoy it.
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Castle is a good example of a game that fits BYOND's format perfectly.
I've always had a ton of fun with the Starcraft/Warcraft 3 custom maps that Castle is based upon. | |
too much so much | |
Well, Abra's alt key is AveryFergie <_<'. :D
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It reminds me a bit of the old Mindcraft Siege series. Basically, you were either attacking or defending with either the forces of light (elves, dwarves, men, light wizards) or darkness (orcs, trolls, goblins, skeletons, dark wizards). Good stuff. http://www.the-underdogs.org/game.php?id=1455
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Good song :D
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It's a pretty awesome game, but overall, I don't think it's a game I can enjoy for too long. My friend Paul who never plays BYOND ended up enjoying that game and playing BYOND more.