Feb 13, 2018 Aegis Defenders Review. Though it comes with a few control quirks and team AI quibbles, Aegis Defenders is still an engaging experience that marries two unlikely genres together in.
Aegis Defenders is a fantastic game, brilliantly blending the tower defense and platforming genres in a unique way to produce a memorable and enjoyable experience. Lovable characters, interesting lore, plenty of secrets, engaging gameplay, and gorgeous presentation combine to make this a must-have title for your Switch. We would recommend this to anybody looking for a detailed world to immerse themselves in, or to somebody looking for that next game to play through with a friend. Aegis Defenders is a real gem on the eShop; don’t miss out on this one.
Aegis Defenders is disappointing because it had potential, and I still think that potential exists. There is satisfaction to be found in setting up its towers and combining them in interesting ways to make bigger and better turrets. And its loop of exploring, defending, and upgrading is alluring. But the game never meets your expectations. Whether it's the nonsensical narrative, the frustrating combat, the numerous bugs, or the simplistic platforming, Aegis Defenders stumbles more often than it excels.
Aegis Defenders is a pretty good game that deserved to get a bit more attention than it did. In some ways it succeeds and in others it fails, Aegis Defenders is a pretty good game that deserved to get a bit more attention than it did. In some ways it succeeds and in others it fails, but I would still recommend it to most people interested in Tower Defense/indie games with a good art style. The game is a mix between a TD and an action platformer, with 1 or 2 players controlling 2-4 characters (the number increases the farther you get into the game). Each character has specific structures that can be built (some of which require ingredients from 2 or more players), unique weapons, and a special ability.
Every element can be upgraded. Personally, I challenged myself by finishing the game on 1P mode and insane difficulty without backtracking to previous levels.
I suggest others do the same if they don't have a friend to play with. The game succeeds in being engaging, even if not always extremely fun.
You quickly get thrown into this gameplay loop of challenge rewarded by extra story and your own choice of upgrades. In terms of story, the game is pretty good but not excellent, though it hits high notes from time to time. The characters are only decent. Outside of the story, the game has enough variance to where it hardly ever feels boring. Over time, certain structures start to be unlocked and some structures lose value as you generally have more resources available. At some point, I felt I had reason to use almost every structure, weapon, and character at least a few times. The flaws that this game does have are pretty huge.
For one, there were a few minor glitches I encountered. Besides that, most levels have an exploratory phase before the tower defense phase. These are used for tutorials and puzzles (of which only a few are excellent), but hardly ever for platforming. Even the tower defense has more platforming because it requires you to collect and manage resources with a time limit. While juggling between characters to accomplish this is fun to some extent, the AI is too incompetent when you're not controlling a character.
It's always rooted in once place and doesn't attack unless an enemy is very close, and when it does it's at a low firing rate. While the character combat is made more engaging by having to stay on your toes and adapt, fighting enemies usually means staying in one place and shooting. Some of the systems in place are easy to forget about. The game gives you a limited number of player hearts, but they are easily replenished so they're mostly easy to forget about. On occasion, I even forgot some of my characters had special abilities because I hardly used them. That being said, adapting around some of the game's flaws is much of what makes it so special.
You have to see what works and what doesn't with your limitations and understand how to manage characters most efficiently. For example, it might be necessary to bring a character somewhere to repair buildings, another to work on a resource generator, another to stand by an enemy spawn where the enemies are of the same color so they take extra damage, and another to be controlled to extract resources. Then you can use one of the same characters as an anchor, using the 'follow' command to bring the resource miner back more quickly.
It's stressful at first, but once you get used to it it's all good, strategic fun with a huge level of depth and variety. Overall score: 7.5 out of 10 Expand.