My Favourite Tower Defence Games

I love tower defence games. They're amazingly addictive and I sometimes find I can spend hours playing on them and not have noticed the time pass. I really enjoy the combination of one level at a time strategy and being able to upgrade as you go. On this lens I will share some of my favourite tower defence games.

All photos courtesy of Online Tower Defence and the respective game creators.

Gemcraft is an extremely large and addictive tower defence game. To complete each level you must defend your tower from the invading bugs by using the power of various different coloured gems. Each colour of gem has a different power. For example; purple helps destroy armour, green poisons the enemy etc. The gems can be used by placing them in towers where they can fire at the enemy or putting them in a trap, which damages the enemy as they walk over the top.

Gems can be combined to make them more powerful, or even thrown like grenades as a last resort against powerful bosses.

As you progress through the many levels, you can upgrade your powers to make gems more powerful or cheaper, make towers cheaper etc.

I once spent an entire summer holidays addicted to this game. It's very good.

There are currently 3 Gemcraft games available to play.

A fantastic game with bright, joyful graphics. On Bloons, instead of the usual invading monsters, you must defend your base against invading balloons, or Bloons, by placing special monkey-based towers along the path. There are different coloured balloons which pop in colour order, i.e.green bloons pop to blue, blue bloons pop to red, red bloons pop to nothing, etc.

You can choose between various monkeys such as a traditional dart shooter, frisbee thrower, super-monkey and many more.

There are many, many games in the Bloons series, each one getting bigger and better than the ones before.

I have replayed Cursed Treasure many times I enjoy it that much. In this game you must protect your gems from the invading hordes. Each type of enemy will run past your towers to grab the gems and then run back with the gems in their possession. If they are killed while carrying a gem, they drop it on the path, making it easier for the next enemy to get it.

You can use three kinds of towers to protect your gems, with the powers of earth, air and fire, and each tower can upgrade in a variety of ways.

The sound effects are one of my favourite parts of this game. They're great.

If you enjoy Cursed Treasure, there is a sequel which is also well worth playing.

To play any of the games mentioned in this list, plus many more, visit Online Tower Defence: A collection of the best tower defence games to give you hours of entertainment.

Canyon Defense is a delightfully simple, but good tower defence game. You take control of various towers such as rocket launchers, bomb firers, goo firers, anti-shield lasers etc and defend your base from both ground and air attacks. The graphics and gameplay are simple, but it is still great fun.