A little part of me dies every time I review a tower defense game. I've said this many a time before, but I just don't even know how to judge the quality of a tower defense game. I can tell you how boring it was for me to play it, but that only tells you that I don't like the genre, which you all know by now. What am I supposed to critique, the rate at which baddies shuffle through your shoddily assembled defenses and kill you?
Another reason Stratalyst Blastegy is not nearly as fun to review as it is to pronounce is that it's just such an average tower defense game. There are killable things trying to kill you, so you have to put things in the way of the things that will shoot things at the things to make the things dead things. The 3D art is cool, I guess, but other than that, there's not much to distinguish it.
I suppose there is one unique feature, though, and that's that you can modify the baddies' paths by putting things in their way. The level is pretty much just a flat surface to start off with, but by building towers in the enemies' way, you can force them to take a more roundabout route, adding to the time they'll spend soaking up bullets. It's a neat way to add a layer of strategy (or, blastegy!) to the game, but that does little to distract from the fact that 90% of it is still waiting for your slow ass towers to kill enough enemies to let you build more.
Also, there's a bit of an issue with balancing. The only thing I ever ended up building was attack towers. There are 2 other structures you can build: slowers and slicers. The slowers, obviously, slow enemy movement, which is helpful, but they cost so damn much that I always decided it more prudent to slap another attack tower in the way. The slicers ostensibly damage enemies that are close by; they're cheap and very small, so they could be a useful tool in determining the enemies' routes before slaughtering them with attack towers, but they do so little damage that you're better off just using attack turrets from the get go.
So, yeah. Once again I have to conclude the review with "if you're a fan of this kind of game, you should try it out." For what it's worth, Stratalyst Blastegy's unique selling point was unique enough to sell a least a small part of me, so if you're a tower defense enthusiast, maybe you really will have a great time with this one.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay blastegical
Links
Strata bada bing bong: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1474
