Fortify: Special Edition puts players in charge of defending a castle from marauding monsters commanded by a an evil overlord. Enemies approach in waves from all directions of the top-down map, and units can be placed within or outside the castle’s walls to stop its destruction. The campaign mode requires the player to keep the castle standing for the in-game duration of a couple of weeks before finally facing the big, bad, boss man himself. Two additional game modes, Arcade and Multiplayer, extend the playability. Arcade mode ramps the difficulty up to the highest setting to see how many rounds the player can last. Multiplayer (LAN-only) tasks each player with attacking the other player’s castle while still defending their own.

The player’s combat units are represented by various soldier types – including ranged and melee – with different abilities for range, attack power, skills, etc. They are purchased using gold earned by defeating enemies as well as with resources collected on the map (more on that later). Because enemies approach from different directions and each unit has a limited field of view, they must be moved either individually or as a group. This is where a lot of time is spent in the early part of the game, and it is a source of frustration as combat units are fairly dumb. Units will only attack if the enemy is within their f.o.v, even if the enemy is standing right next to them. It eventually becomes less of a problem once enough soldiers are purchased for maximum coverage in all directions.

As with many tower defense games, there’s a decision to made between trying to overwhelm the enemy with sheer numbers versus using valuable resources to purchase upgrades. What helps separate Fortify from lesser games in the genre are the vast number and types of upgrades available. On the lower end of the scale, players can boost the castle’s defenses and add towers to improve offensive stats. Perform enough of these upgrades and that unlocks the ability to move the game – and castle – to newer ages of technological advancement. With those evolutionary changes come new soldier types, new player-executed attack options (i.e. catapult, oil slick), and buildings that open up even more upgrade paths.

Advanced upgrade options will leave foes feeling the heat.

One of my favorite twists on the genre turns the game into a bit more of an RTS. There are three outposts that are located on the map. Each outpost is associated with a different resource – lumber, iron, and stone – and can be mined for that resource with the proper care and attention. A building must first be built on the location, and then workers must be purchased and sent there. Resources are mined incrementally over time as long as there are one or more workers at that location. This all sounds well and good, but it’s not as easy as it seems. These outputs are typically fragile, and since they’re outside the castle’s confines they are open to attack. Workers caught inside when the walls fall are killed. As with the castle, outposts can be upgraded with tougher walls, stronger defense measures, and increased capacity for workers.  So with all of the other issues for the player to contend with, they must also repeatedly decide whether to dump valuable resources – as well as the player’s attention – into the main castle or these outposts.

This factors into the game’s biggest weakness:  the pacing of the difficulty. I’m normally a default-to-Normal kinda guy, but I highly recommend starting at the easiest difficulty setting to get a handle on how the game plays. The early game tends to be the hardest part because the need to constantly adjust the combat units can keep the player from making much – if any – progress towards the longer-term objectives. Some of the individual combat units have special skills or stances that the player can activate, but I found I never had time to use them while they were still useful. There’s simply too much to micromanage, not enough time to assess, and it can lead to frustrating failures. The player can pause the game anytime to get a better look at the battleground and read all of the upgrade options, but that goes against the natural flow of playing an action game. On the flip side, if the player can manage to survive the early onslaught, build and maintain some outposts, and start mining resources, the game pretty much plays itself during the last few days. This problem is nothing new to the genre since the goal of most tower defense games involves creating an undefeatable juggernaut.

Sit back, player. We’ve got this.

Fortify: Special Edition is one of those games where I quickly thought I had my mind made up about it. During the first couple of times I attempted the campaign, I lost and was left with a sour taste in my mouth. It’s easy to become overwhelmed, especially when overestimating one’s own ability to take on a new game in a genre they’re well acquainted with. After easing myself in at a lower difficulty, learning how and when to work towards the long-term goals, and generally just figuring out how to actually play the game, I came away much more satisfied with the experience. I don’t know that this is a game that I’ll keep coming back to once I’ve conquered the harder difficulties, but it’s a solid tower defense game in spite of some issues with the difficulty pacing.

Overall Rating: ★★★★☆ 

What does this score mean?

This game was reviewed using a PC copy provided by the developer for that purpose. Version 1.02 was used in this review. It is available for PC and Mac through Desura, GamersGate, and IndieGameStand. The original Fortify is available as a free download from Holgersson Entertainment.

© 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.

Have you ever wondered what it would be like if chess and the Unreal engine had a baby? (No? Just me?) Well, Rooks Keep gives you precisely that. There’s even a game mode in which you just play chess. But the real game – the real Rooks Keep - is a medieval fantasy arena battle. Like many modern multiplayer games you can play team deathmatch, free-for-all, and last man standing. Unlike other multiplayer games, you can also play a mode called ‘conversion’, in which all players are basically mercenaries working for whatever kingdom killed them last.

There’s also a ‘combat chess’ mode, where your ability to capture another piece depends on your ability to duke it out in a small arena. It’s not just a little animation of one piece killing another, like in Interplay’s Battle Chess; it’s an actual fight– a deathmatch– mano a mano. If I use a pawn to try to take your bishop, I’d better be a darn good fighter because your bishop is much stronger. It takes a bit of the strategy out of chess and makes it more about who’s the better gamer. I thought it was a great idea until one stubborn bishop fried my knight, my queen, and a pawn.

Conversion is my favourite game mode. In this mode, when you die you join the team that killed you. When a team is down to one player he or she becomes something called “the warlord” and gets a huge power boost to make things fair. I played four rounds in a row, losing myself in the carnage.

I did have a couple of problems with conversion mode. The concept itself is really cool, but I don’t know how well it will translate to multiplayer. If I keep switching teams, which team do I want to win? Am I rooting for the team I started on? Couldn’t some players purposely die to get back to their original team?

Also, it took a long time before I could tell who was on my team and who wasn’t. You’re coloured differently, but sometimes it’s hard to tell. And the power ups that turn players all red make it near impossible to tell what team they’re on. I spent a good while chasing my own teammates and the AI spent a good while yelling at me.

My teammate has had enough of me.

But, after an hour or so of playing, I obviously got the hang of it.

Oh, word?

Rooks Keep mimics the basic rules of chess. The characters you choose from are equivalent to pawns, rooks, knights, and so on. You get skill points for playing well, and you can either spend those for upgrades on your current character (like more damage or health regeneration) or you can spend them on a better champion (for example, upgrading from a rook to a queen).

Like chess, it’s a game that can be simple enough for newcomers but has a steep learning curve and a lot of subtleties. The need to balance offense and defense is made clear right from the tutorial. Parrying saves lives. It also opens up opportunities to strike.

I’m interested to see what happens when clan matches come about. When I played, the AI’s teamwork was the equivalent of button mashing. And so was mine. We all just ran to the centre of the map and whacked at each other until somebody was declared the winner. I started getting the hang of the hit-and-run as I played more, but imagine the strategies that clans will use.

I do take issue with the anti-camping mechanic that teleports you to a new location if the game thinks you’re staying in one spot too long. The problem is it thinks that a lot. I was accused of camping while running into battle and I was accused of camping while running away from battle.

Honestly though, I was invested in every match I was in and I found myself pulling the old “just one more round” a couple times.

Rooks Keep is now available to buy at runestorm.com/rook/buy, and as long as it gets enough players it will be worth it. I only played with AI and I had a blast. This is going to a be a scream-at-your-screen-when-you-die kind of multiplayer.

© 2013, The Indie Mine. All rights reserved.