Coming from independent Chinese studio Lemon Jam, Idle Defense: Dark Forest is a new tower defense game that has enjoyed a pretty successful beta phase recently, attracting over 50 thousand downloads. The game is now available on Google Play as a free-to-play title. Check out its trailer below:
The story of Idle Defense: Dark Forest kicks off when a young wizard apprentice burns down a large chunk of his school by accident. Unsurprisingly, he is expelled, but the fire he caused destroyed a magical seal and thus plenty of monstrous creatures are now swarming the land. Our young protagonist, who has just inherited a book called 'Turret Engineering' from his father, is now determined to stand up to clean up his own mess using his newly-acquired knowledge.
All this makes for a much more involved premise than what you usually see in an idle game, which is often just “here’s some towers, now go and protect your base”. So we must give a nod to Lemon Jam for putting in the effort to create a backstory.
In term of gameplay, Idle Defense: Dark Forest features ten distinct types of towers with different functions. Some will simply shoot arrows while others will inflict poison upon the enemies. Enemies have different weaknesses as well, so there are more strategies involved here than just putting down as many turrets as you can.
You also have the option to summon demons to help you out when things go south. Currently, there are 16 unique demons for you to call upon, and the developer has promised that more will come in future updates as well. And if you do end up falling in battle, you can use the resources that you gather over the course of the game to revive yourself, so theoretically, if you have enough resources, you should never lose.
Idle Defense: Dark Forest is currently up for grab on the Google Play Store. It’ll be a free-to-play title with IAPs included.