Siege of Centauri Review

[Michael {United Critics}]

A tower defense game with nice graphics and overall presentation. It's a shame it doesn't bring anything new to the genre. 

Siege of Centauri:

Siege of Centauri takes place in the same universe as the more popular strategy game Ashes of the Singularity. Despite all the bells and whistles, this is still a tower defense game.

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📕Story:

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The story is pretty light and you're not even welcomed by an intro when you enter the game. All you need to know is presented during mission briefings when you start a level. While voiced characters do occasionally offer hints during missions, they don't offer anything else. Long story short, Earth has lost contact with the colony on planet Proxima Centauri. A single ship is sent to investigate. When it arrives, the planet is already under siege by aliens.

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🎮Gameplay:

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The campaign throws you straight on the map of planet Centauri with your starship Carpathia hovering above. You can see all the locked mission that will become available as you progress the story. The game follows a linear path and choosing which level you want to tackle first is not available. Difficulty can be set to 9 different settings ranging from training to nightmare. A handy description underneath tells you which things will be affected by the selected difficulty.

Missions:

Missions may have up to three stars – the number of objectives. One is mandatory for progress and always requires you to destroy all enemy waves. Completing objectives will earn you an upgrade point. Successfully completed mission will also unlock additional towers you can then use in any of the previous missions to grab the missing objectives.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2388404823

All missions or maps are constructed of different types of terrain and follow the same basic principle. Your primary goal is to protect the colony from incoming forces by placing towers or guns on elevated positions. Some maps will contain other structures that you need to defend if you want their perks. The lower ground is reserved for enemy waves and can't be built upon. The number of waves and enemies remaining can be seen at the top of the screen along with the enemy icon. While you can point your cursor on the icon and get information about the enemy and their weaknesses, you won't see all of the enemies in the current wave.

Surprises are possible. There's a short time window between waves you can use to check your defenses. This can be cancelled by clicking on "Rush wave" button which will send forces immediately and reward you with metal. The faster you click it, the more metal you get. A special rechargeable power called Chrono shift is available in the event that you require more time. It will slow down enemies and can be activated or deactivated at will.

Structure deployment is limited by your supply of metal. You don't have to worry about gathering it as it's generated automatically. The variety of towers is quite impressive and each is useful against a certain type of enemy. While it's true that emphasis is placed on offensive towers, there are also a few that offer support. In addition to three main stats, damage, range and cooldown, towers have certain limitations - some only hit ground targets while others need line of sight.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2388404264

All this can be checked in the equip menu before starting a mission. Here you add or remove towers from your action bar – you can only take 12 towers into a mission - and upgrade them. Each tower has three upgrades that improve the tower itself or affect some other part of the game, like faster metal gathering or reduced cooldown of special abilities. If you're not happy with the results, you can always remove upgrades and put them into something else. Basic stats of towers can be upgraded during missions as well, but before you can do that, you'll have to improve the main colony first.

Tower Deployment:

Deployment can be a bit problematic if you're not familiar with the towers. Those with line of sight need to actually see the target to be effective, so it's logical to place them on the edge, but even if you place them right in the middle of a hill, the game won't warn you that you've just wasted your metal. The thing is, you don't get metal if you sell a tower, which can lead to quick game over.

But towers are not the only thing you have at your disposal. By liberating colonies, you gain access to orbital abilities that can completely turn the tide of the battle. They use energy, also recharged over time, and have to go through a cooldown period before they can be used again. One of those abilities are reinforcements you can place right on the path and buy yourself some time or block enemies between towers. Then there's a robot that can finish off a wave all by itself or an orbital strike that decimates all units.

You'll have to get comfortable with your arsenal quick because the difficulty is brutal. It's not that noticeable at the start where you only have to worry about basic enemies that can be destroyed with almost any towers. But as soon as swarms, shielded and flying enemies start to pop in, strategy will be required. The easy solution for this is to play on the easiest difficulty, unlock new towers and earn upgrade points by going through all the missions, and then tackle the game on normal with full hardware.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2388403248

A handy archives section accessible from the main menu has all the info you need on characters, structures, enemies and orbital attacks. You'll also find strategies on how to beat certain enemies. Other gameplay options are Endless mode where you pick a planet and try to survive as long as you can and Scenarios that allow you to download maps from the workshop. This mode doesn't appear to be that popular and I could only find 5 new maps. If you feel inspired, you can make your own in Map editor.

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🙋‍♂‍Final Thoughts:

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This game fits the category "You've seen one tower defense, you've seen them all." I admit that graphics and sound are both impressive and it's a joy to see huge number of units blow up all over the map, but the game doesn't bring anything new to the genre. It looks like it was done by checking the boxes on the tower defense list. I still recommend it because it delivers what it promises, but only to the fans of tower defense games who know what they're getting themselves into.

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👍/👎Pros and Cons:

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Pros:

• Upgrade system
  
• Graphics

Cons:

• Nothing new to the genre
  
• Easy to mess up deployment
  
• Difficulty

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🏆Make or Miss:

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Rating: 6/10

Reviewed by: Sosich