Awesome, awesome game, but... a few big issues-
This is honestly one of the most well-made games I've seen on Newgrounds. My longest review ever- hope it's useful.
Some of the things I loved:
-the detail and depth of tower selection and strategy made this feel a lot like an RTS/tower defense rather than simply a TD. There were tons of strategic choices to be had and the game did a wonderful job of keeping you on your toes. The last levels were hard as f___ and always pushed you to almost breaking your back.
-the voicing was superb, and the comments were hilarious
-you did an awesome job throwing curveballs. The frozen and sealed towers during bosses were absolutely awesome and added death (although the sealed towers did get pretty annoying after a while when you had to click like 7 at once)
-art style is fantastic, loved the comic style and the 60s Batman-style cheesy sound effects like "wok" etc.
-the specials were nice and gave a bit of control over the game
-the system is very innovative and having melee characters be the "slowing" tower is quite innovative. The game forced you to think ahead and use sparse resources.
That said, this is probably one of the best strategies I have seen on Newgrounds.
Now to the things I didn't like-
-PREMIUM CONTENT. I put hours into beating this game and the fruits of my labor are locked content? Very, very uncool. That knocked a point for me, which makes me VERY SAD, because I very much enjoyed this game. But I want to be honest about my disappointment (substantively with the issues below I feel it's a 9 otherwise).
-I felt the difficulty spiked too much toward the last two levels. I played the second-to-last level too many times. Plus a lot of times the game would throw a curveball (like on that second-to-last, the fricking demons which are much harder to kill always spawn on the left, so I had to plan ahead and concentrate my D on that side... as I found out by dying on round 15 >_>)
-The levels feel way too long. Maybe there could be a fast-forward for when you're waiting for guys to scroll down? I understand time needs to be slowed for the micro of relay points. But it was just irritating if you died on the last part of a level. Very, very irritating, because it could take 10-15 minutes to get back to that point. Plus I love collecting stars but honestly this is one game I am not going to go for three stars on every level for. Many times just one guy would slip by on a late wave and it's like - do I feel like playing that 10-15 minute round ALL OVER again ust for a star?
-Sometimes I noticed that melees would not engage monsters and just let them waltz by. Don't know if this is a bug or just design, but there were a few times when a guy was just standing there and once I relayed and "nudged" him he started attacking.
-The resource allocation is a little too frustrating at times. It was hard to really explore all the options out there because the upgrades often felt really risky. Would giving barbs throwing axes or muskets shrapnel really be better than upgrading another tower? And combined with the cost of messing up or taking risks (starting a LONG level over again), it didn't seem worth it.
-The balance of towers seemed meh at times. The only towers that ever turned the tide or made a noticeable difference were fully upped barracks and fully upped mage towers. The muskets worked well too, but were too slow for mobs. Honestly there wasn't much that could beat a red mage tower (with the poison effect and golems) plus paladins. Paladins tank, and the tower poison hits even enemies with magic resist it seemed. Archers seemed good at times but their DPS just seemed lacking compared to mage towers. And the cannons were useful at times but never felt usable as a backbone and more just like an "experimental" unit, if I had extra money and could risk it.
