Disclaimer: I've played the free versions of this series for more than 300 hours, probably near 400. (about half of it spent with Gemcraft Labyrinth).

Gemcraft has always been my favourite tower defense game by far, the difference between this series and any other TD is just ridiculous. Main reasons why I love this series as a whole:

• Pause button and ability to act during pause. I hate TD's where I need to act quickly. This allows me to think about what to do at any time I want to.
  
  
• Pretty much everything has a hotkey, which makes the gameplay a bit smoother compared to clicking everything.
  
  
• You're always doing something. It's really rare that you get through a wave without building or doing some micromanagement with your towers.
  
  
• The math in the game. Everything is told with calculatable numbers. I hate TD's that only tell something like "A high damage, low speed missile tower" with no numbers to tell me what it really does.
  
  
• 148 levels. This is not some basic "get high score in these 10 levels" tower defense, but it has a story/lore, hidden stuff, multiple ways of progression/upgrades, etc.
  
  
• The insanely good difficulty scaling. It's not an automatic scaling, but I can choose how difficult I want the game to be. At easiest, it's pretty easy (and boring) to be honest. But you can adjust stuff that changes the gameplay a lot like "next wave comes faster", "you gain mana in waves instead of a constant stream", "faster scaling", "reduced effect of Slow", and of course, endurance mode in any level. You can enable multiple different things at once, and harder settings means more exp = more skills = you can go for even higher difficulty.
  
  
• Difficulty scaling from "easier than breathing" to "failed in first wave" also means that this game has a difficulty for anyone. Want casual click-and-watch-explosions? You got it. Want to see how long you can survive against impossible odds? You got it.
  
  
• Every fail is caused by you and you only. The problem I see with most TD's is the situation where you think "I have no idea which order I should build these towers to complete this level". But because of the difficulty scaling and the complexity of the game in general, I've never had that feeling in Gemcraft. The difficulty scaling causes me to always try harder settings before hitting a wall of "oh sh*t I went too high". But because it was my own choice to begin with, it's just a facepalm moment and retry, instead of feeling that the game is peeing in my cereals.
  
  
• Continuing with difficulty scaling: even in mid-fight, you can make any wave of monsters harder by spending mana on it. Killing these waves rewards you with even more mana, but doing this requires you to really know your limits: anger them too much and they'll eat you alive. Using this mechanic is pretty much required to beat the hardest levels and difficulties, and it turns the game to a constant balancing of "how much can I take?". This mechanic is unique among the TD's that I've played, and it's also one of the many reasons I love this game.
  The usual "get a bonus by sending in the next wave earlier" is there aswell.
  
  
• If I had to mention something negative about it, it's the fact that it might not be the easiest game to get into, simply due to the amount of features in it. It might take a while to find out everything. But really, there's a reason why it has >95% positive reviews on Steam.

The free version of this game can be found at http://armorgames.com/play/15760/gemcraft-chasing-shadows. I'm not even sure what's the difference because I bought this edition instantly after noticing it's on Steam. But I'd say go try the free one, and if you notice that you run out of content before getting bored with the game, come back here.

TL;DR: In the end it's still a tower defense game, but it's filled with loads of unique ideas/mechanics and everything is polished to the limit and above. For me it's the game that made every other TD suck just because they aren't nearly as good as Gemcraft.

Gemcraft series is the ultimate Tower Defense experience for me, and "Chasing Shadows" is the best instalment so far.

At first glance it may work and look like a standard TD game - monsters enter the map in waves, walk to our base along predefined paths and we have to defend it by building towers and traps, as well as occasionally using some spells. However, not only Gemcraft does it superbly but it also offers depth and complexity you won't find in most TD games.

The most unique and fun feature of the game, in my opinion, is the wave angering. Player can spend some mana to make monster waves stronger (by increasing monster numbers and stats), which allows you to gain more mana and experience from killing the monsters... IF you can kill them that is. This one feature changes the gameplay from simple defense to the "how far can I push it" competition.

Another feature, which adds extra replayability value, is the ability to customize levels. It's pretty fun to return to some of early levels later in the game to see how much stronger you have become by beating the level with some extra difficulty settings. You can add more waves, make monsters stronger, faster, tougher or tweak some game rules to get a harder map with higher experience multiplayer.

Ah, the experience - player character can gain levels and unlock various skills and spells which will increase his efficiency in killing monster filth. There is no level cap, however some skills (not all) have a limit to which they can be improved. Add to it a wizard's talisman which can be socketed with talisman fragments gathered along your journey and you get quite a few ways of progressing, improving and specialising your character.

However, Gemcraft originally being a flash game, has some shortcomings. To many people graphics would be the biggest one. Despite it being pretty "clean", readable and fitting the game's darker theme, it's still 2D graphics in low resolution without all those fireworks that other games have nowadays. Personally I prefer it that way, but to each his own.

I have spent dozens of hours (flash version on ArmorGames, so obviously Steam won't show this time) with this game and can safely recommend it to other Tower Defense games fans. If you are unsure then you may try the free version of the game on ArmorGames to see if you like it. In any case be advised that GemCraft is not a game you can finish in a few hours. There are dozens of levels and some of the later ones can take as much as an hour to finish.

I am flabberghasted at how awesome this game is. Ridiculus amounts of content and depth for a "simple" tower defense game and at a decent price. I have absolutely nothing but warm recommendations for this game. But, in the interest of diversity, I will mention a fair few flaws or gripes.

The game runs on Flash via Air. This means there's no hope of running this natively on Linux as it stands. It also means it will lag like crazy when you get to wizard levels 1000 and above and you really start to abuse the enrage mechanic and get thousands of monsters on screen at once. For simple story mode or casual play, you'll never notice. But if you're hardcore, lag will become a factor eventually.

It also means that the entire client will bog down and not respond to inputs as the game lags, this can make controlling the game hard when there's a bajillion things going on at once. Remember to pause your game before issuing commands if you are going into those deep-enrage endurance games.

The story is about as throwaway as it gets. It gets unraveled as you play and is presented in chunks of text with some basic (but neat) artwork. It's a continuation of a series, so unless you played the previous games, the story may seem a bit disjointed but I feel the devs made a good effort to "fill you in" even if you missed the first three.

Otherwise I have nothing but positives for the game. I absolutely detest the tower defense genre. Nothing but uncreative, pretty, cow-clicky games with zero depth and no strategy. They all end up having one super awesome strategy that always works, or having only one solution per level. Gemcraft though? Totally breaks the mold and makes even a hater love it. That's the warmest recommendations I can ever give a game.

I love it and I hate it. The ultimate TD!

I bought GC:CS 2 years ago. Very soon after playing I got very intimidated by the size of the game, and the ´grind´. By now my intimidation has faded, and am having a blast!
- very easy to gembomb yourself to death (calling too many monsters)
- gemcombining is very complex, to the point that you need an external program which should be ingame
- at late endgame the game struggles with performance

+ complexity is hot!
+ Iron Wizard mode for a pure Tower Defense challenge
+ many achievements, which are linked to skillpoints
+ lots of maps

I definately love this game. A big amount of content will keep me busy for hundreds of hours... at least. All that I could ask for is a competitive mode... maybe in chapter 3?

Prepare to be addicted!

A tower defense game with a dark, gritty atmosphere and tons of choices for upgrading skills, choosing which types of gems you prefer to use, as well as extra stuff like spells, shrines, etc. A map that lets you choose your path, and even replay levels to your hearts content. And best of all, tons of achievments that actually give you in-game bonus points to use in upgrading your skills. Finally, we achievment hunters can have a legitimate reason for getting achievements!

Now I must warn you that I have not completed the game yet. But 20 hours in and I haven't seen anything to change my mind that this game is highly reccommended.

Ok, so this is tower defense. You build towers (traps, too!) and hope that they kill off the incoming line of enemies. Only in this game the towers are powered by gems. Each color does something different. The green poison gem is my current favorite. The red chain hit one is good too. There's gems that steal mana from the enemy, deplete enemy armor, prevent enemies from regenerating their health, and more.

Gems are created with mana. You start with some mana but also gain mana slowly and by killing enemies. Use the mana to create more gems or upgrade your existing gems to higher levels. You can have gems from levels 1-12, but so far I have only been able to afford up to level 8. Each level costs more than the previous level to create a gem. You can also move gems around, but there is a short wait time for the gem to socket before it can start attacking. Gems can also be used to bomb enemies with wasp stings, but I haven't found that very effective.

Each time you complete a level it unlocks one or more new levels. Map sections are hexogonal and eventually it opens up two pathway options. So the game is not completely linear, which I love. You gain experience and also get shadow cores to use to upgrade your abilities.

There is so much customization in this game, so you can play it in your own style. You can redistribute your ability points any time you want, so you're not stuck with your upgrades. Or you can spend the shadow cores to increase your chance of getting better loot and rare items. The maps have quite a variety of pathways. And you can build little walls to make a maze to slow the monsters down.

Graphics are seen from a top down angle, and the most realistic looking graphics that I've seen in a tower defense game, though I haven't seen them all. Most of the games in this genre seem to be cartoon-like, but this game has lush forests, stone pathways, and dark insect-looking monsters!

Music is more of a kind of ethereal chorus or extended chords. Not a tune. But it's perfect for this game. It really adds to the monstrous ambiance.

Replay value is huge. As far as I know you can replay levels as much as you want, to grind for experience and to get the hard achievements. But like I said, I haven't finished it yet so I dont' know if there might be a reason not to take too much time.

Controls are done with the mouse and there are keyboard shortcuts.

Story-wise, there are sometimes pages that tell the story but mostly it's just killing monsters. Maybe there's more story later on, I dont' know. This game won't appeal to someone who just wants to play once through a game. It's for people who like to do the same thing over and over again. I like to challenge myself to use the least amount of mana and still make it through the level, and stuff like that. So, if that sounds like you, then buy this game without waiting! It is well worth the price. No need to wait for a sale.

The only bad thing is I'm neglecting my other games to play this one. My poor backlog!

Update: I forgot to mention that there is blood but no gore. And there's a setting where you can turn off the blood if you want.

Don't mind my hours spent on the Steam version, because I have way more than 100+ hours on the free, web browser version itself - but now! - there's an almighty question many most probably have asked.


Well, not only that you're supporting the developers but also introducing a literal gem into your game library. In comparison with the web free version, you'll get more content on the Steam version. Since the very first GemCraft, I was amazed of how a tower defense game could be so wonderful. I've played a lot, then have focused on playing 'Chasing Shadows', which comes after 'Labyrinth'.


A well thought tower defense, with the premise of using gems as a resource for your towers to defend your base point with, advancing through the story by doing so.


You're presented with a field composed out of roads which lead the monsters to your orb. What exactly is the orb? The orb is the point you have to defend from the monsters that swarm all over, that rush towards your orb to vanquish it. If a monster touches the orb, don't fret! Yet, if you let way too many monsters at it, it will get crippled. Once your mana pool is depleted and one last monster touches the orb, it's game over. The mana acts like a shield, protecting the orb from destruction. Dropping a gem bomb (Done by pressing B (default assigned key) and dragging a gem over a spot) on the orb will decrease the banishment cost and will furthermore decrease the damage received by the monsters.
Mana is your single resource in the whole game, used in conjuring gems, towers, traps, amplifiers, combining gems as well as in gem bombs. How is mana acquired? It is acquired by slaying monsters and mining from mana shards with a tower which has a gem equipped.
Defense of the orb is done by creating gems of a respective trait (colour) and grade. The gems can be combined altogether, the traits being distributed by half if the gem has two traits (colours), you can figure the rest out. These gems can be socketed in towers traps and amplifiers or thrown as bombs. In most fields, you will encounter shrines which can be activated by dropping a gem on them. Depending on the grade of the gem dropped on it the damage will be increased, the shrine will inflict the properties on the monsters. Walls can be used to create new paths for the monsters to follow. Traps are built on the road to inflict damage especially on the swarmlings which are quite fast, while amplifiers are built next to towers to amplify damage and properties of the gem it is amplifying. The gems can also be assigned on what to target, a building or a monster. Slowly you'll gain three area-of-effect spells and three gem enchantments, with a specific cooldown. Throughout the game you'll get talisman fragments to randomly drop which you can socket into their respective slot in the panel displayed in the 'Talisman' tab.
The level of difficulty can be easily customized, by adding traits at the beginning of the level, dropping gems on the wave tablets to enrage the monsters which will yield more mana and you can also call waves in earlier which will give you mana as well.
This game also has an experience system which rewards the player with skill points at every level gained and also with every achievement, said skill points can be spent on wizard traits that enhance your playthrough. The skill points can be stashed for a starting mana pool bonus.


Not much can be said about the graphics but that everything is detailed quite nicely, the effects being absolutely wonderful and the way the vivid colours combine when mixing a gem with another of a different colour is overly pleasing.


The soundtrack gives an eerie feeling when playing, driving you to think of how deeply horrifying the story is, fitting exactly to the theme.


Pros

+More than 150 fields to battle on
+Eerie, atmospheric music
+Variety of gems each with its own trait
+Different modes to play
+Personalization of the challenge
+Rewarding XP system
+Lots of achievements
+Infinite replayability
+Addicting

Cons

-Might witness lag on certain occasions

Totally! Highly recommended!

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Played the flash version +300h. This game is not what it seems. It's so much more. This is *the* definitive tower defense game.

Spent like, $150 in the '15 Fall sale. Best purchase was for $2.49: This game.

Figures.

There comes a point in this game where you realize that you absolutely need to learn the deeper concepts of combining gems. There are people out there that have mathmatically derived the best combinations for a specific task to reap the synergies of gemweaving. After getting a grasp on weaving, the base game becomes trivial and the new meta game begins. Getting the highest level gem you possibly can create, how many experience points can you rack up on a single map, completing your tailiman (which provides in game bonuses) with all level 100 fragments, completeing all the achievments, etc...

I whole-heateredly endorse this game.

A TD game with an incredibly high amount of content and extreme replayability but outdated graphics and similar levels.

I didn't like graphics, but I saw this game often on Kongregate. Also, it has awesome rating on Steam, so... I just couldn't skip it. I played it and.. my overall feelings are neutral.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1337913120

This game is about gems. You can summon, transform, improve, explode ("a lot of other verbs") gems. Wow. Gem is a tower in this TD game. There are 9 gems with different features and parameters. You can improve any gem 14 times. Also, you can transform 2 gems of different color to stronger rainbow gem... You also can use each gem as a bomb or a power-up. You can place towers and build mazes...

Despite these in-battle things, there is a lot "between missions" things like experience and skill system.... talisman system (another power ups), a lot of achievements which gives extra skills, runes which add more customization to battles and.... a lot of a lot of battles. Each has several stages.... I caught myself thinking that the game is endless. There is a story. Wow №2..

So, why don't I play it? I passed about 20 levels and they were the same for me. Put gem anywhere, upgrade it, repeat, victory. There were nothing where I can apply my strategy skills and it's bad for me. I saw screenshots and guides, like gameplay is really deep.. but I couldn't force myself to play to reach this point.

But the game has a lot of fans and huge community, so if you like sandbox type games, farming exp, finding perfect character/build this game could be great for you.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1337913241

Pros
- A lot of different features and mechanics
- Extreme replayability
- A lot in-battle tactics
- Deep gameplay
- More than 100 hours of gameplay

Cons
- Outdated graphics even for 2013 when it was released
- Levels look like the same
- First missions are boring. You just place any gem anywhere and win.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1337913186

I didn't find this engaging for me, but I see a lot very interesting concepts and features. Anyway, I played it more than 10 hours to realize that. So, it's definitely not bad game. Just not my type. But there are a lot of guys who has more than 100 hours in it, so Overwhelmingly Positive rating is real. At least, you should try to play it. I see often it on sales with 50% discounts. So, add it to your wishlist right now!