If you were to say that Defender Chronicles: Legend of the Desert King follows the standard formula for tower defense games, you would only be partially right. It shares similar game play to Fieldrunners, geoDefense, and 7 Cities in the sense you want to prevent creeps (enemies) from taking away your lives by building towers to kill them. What sets this game apart from most other tower defense games is its unique design, replay factor, and the ability for customization.

Traditional tower defense games usually use a birds eye view of the level. In Defender Chronicles, you have a side-on view of the level, like a 2D platformer such as Super Mario Bros. This new point of view calls for unique strategies and a different style of gameplay that traditional tower defense games lack. While cartoonish, the art does a great job of bringing the Defender Chronicles world to life. The sheer number of different levels alone is great, and players won’t get bored of seeing the same level design over and over. The game constantly throws new allies and enemies into the mix, which keeps the game from growing stale and provides you with new challenges.

Defender Chronicles offers a myriad of ways that the game can be replayed, and keeps each option interesting. There are four difficulty options, ranging from novice to heroic in the campaign, or story, mode. Five game modes help make a difference by varying up game play. The game modes include classic, classic endless, extended, and extended endless which are available when players choose to create a custom game. Along with all the features already included in the game, Defender Chronicles is periodically updated by the developer with new levels, unlockables, and items.

Customization is important to games, and Defender Chronicles does not fail on delivering great customization options. At the beginning of the game, you have a hero which, apart from helping defend your castle from enemies during levels of the game, can be equipped with a variety of weapons and armor that improve both the abilities of himself and your units. Your hero is also able to gain ability points after gaining levels. These abilities points can be distributed across a variety of skills that can increase the amount of damage your towers do, or increase the amount of gold you receive from monsters, among other things. The amount of customization a player has broadens as more updated are released for the game as well.

Defender Chronicles, while keeping many of the traditional elements of the tower defense genre, give the genre a twist with its added features and its unique art design. For all of the tower defense fans out there, Defender Chronicles is a must have for your collection.