• DEVELOPER: Grizzly Games
• PUBLISHER: GrizzlyGames
• PLATFORMS: PC
• GENRE: Tower-defense
• RELEASE DATE: August 2, 2023
• STARTING PRICE: 6.89 €
• REVIEWED VERSION: PC

The first thing to point out is that Thronefall is still in Early Access and doesn't have a lot of content. Currently, the game features only five playable levels, over 40 perks, a dozen unlockable weapons, and 3 to 4 hours of basic gameplay with no additional difficulties and no customization of level settings. It brings with it a unique gaming experience with beautiful minimalist graphics and seems like a breath of fresh air in the Tower Defense genre. In addition to defending and building our kingdom, we will also strategically plan the positions of our army and which building to build first, all set in fantasy medieval world.

At the very beginning, we have a tutorial that introduces us to the basics of the game. We have a day to prepare the defense and a night to fight against hordes of enemies. Each level has about 14 waves of enemies that are different, be it regular people, flying creatures, and siege machines. Of course, in the game some enemies will be stronger than others. In Thronefall, you will have to pay attention to money the most, because without it you can't build and upgrade anything. Money is obtained with the help of farms, housing, castles and enemies, that is, every day you will receive a certain amount of money.

For defense, we will build watchtowers, barracks and walls that can be upgraded later. From soldiers, we can choose between swordsmen, regular archers, crossbowmen, spearmen, etc., and each of them has its own advantages and disadvantages. To be honest, Thronefall is very easy to play, there are no complex features, it's just very important that you know how to plan ahead; how to place an army and which side of the level to focus on first.

We play as a king who rides a horse and moves around to attack enemies, be it with bow and arrow, spear, sword and magic. Our king also has a special skill, and it depends on what weapon he has with him. For example, if he has a spear in his hands, then he can attack and heal very quickly. A skill only lasts for a few seconds and then goes on cooldown before we can use it again. We can also manage our army which will be very useful if the enemy decides to attack only one side of the level.

As for choosing the difficulty of the level itself, normal gameplay is not difficult to beat, but that's why one of the last levels, in which there is one boss, will be a bit harder and will require your overall knowledge of this game. On the other hand, if you decide to take different difficulties, which are also called mutators, for example, so that the enemies have more energy or hit harder, you will struggle a lot, but you will get a large amount of points with which you can then unlock different perks and weapons via level system.

However, what bothered me a little too much was the fact that our king is not that useful. I agree that this is very difficult to balance, but if it takes me 50 spear hits to kill a common creature, then I have to question if the weapon is any good at all. There is also the question of which upgrades to go for during gameplay, should we just focus on our king so that he has more health and hits harder, or maybe it's better to take general towers upgrades, it all depends on your playstyle. I'm currently in the testing phase of different approaches, but it seems that it might still be more profitable to focus on the buildings around you.

Also, we have too few of these upgrades at the beginning and it will take a long time to unlock them all because it will depend on what level you are and how many points you got. In addition, I would like the game to have more interactive things in one level, for example, in the desert level we could go through mines and appear in another part of the level. Maybe it is specific to that level, but the game in general should offer more buildings to build, such as the forge on the ice level, because this way everything becomes repetitive, that is, you will always build one of the same things. Furthermore, the game doesn't have any major bugs, but it's very strange to me that when you replay a level, the enemies would appear again in the same places, I think this game lacks the randomization of enemy locations.

The game also does not allow us to go a slightly different way in terms of building; there is always that proper pattern that works, because you can really complicate the situation if you play with harder settings, otherwise you will lose very quickly. I believe more content will be added over time, and I would have liked to see more bosses, the ability to upgrade different perks, as it never felt like each perk wasn't a direct upgrade from the previous one. All in all, if we consider that Thronefall was released in Early Access and still has a lot of work to do, it has already managed to gather a certain player base. My only real question is how long it can keep players interested. Now imagine if we had a cooperative game mode, this game would definitely be even more popular.

In the end, Thronefall is simple, addictive, and creative, and we'll have a chance to come back to this game from time to time when new updates and new content come out. The developers are constantly working on improving and balancing the game, and recently added the Endless mode where you can play for a very long time and survive a large number of waves of enemies.

Review copy provided by the publisher