[h1]Overview[/h1]
[b]Cartonfall Fortress[/b] (CF) is a first-person action tower defense game set in an alternative world where a brutal war is being waged between self-aware gardening tools and the "cardboard people". Playing as one of the latter, you'll have to use boxes, defensive towers, traps and various weapons to defend your fortress from the relentless enemy waves, and come up on top.
🟩 [b]The Good Side[/b]
[list]
[*][b]The world is your canvas[/b]
In CF you are free to build defenses using cardboard boxes of various shapes, anywhere in the world (except very close to your base core). This system allows total freedom without limits, has a convenient snap tool to create precise structures. Each box has physics and can be dislodged by enemy hits, so taller structures can fall, walls can be broken down and so on in a dynamic fashion. The amounts of rubble and destruction can be good to look at, but also makes things messy.
[*][b]A scavenger's life[/b]
Maps are generally large and you'll be able to freely explore them. Around each stage there are materials, ammunition and even random consumable weapons to find... but also additional enemies that will chase you because of this. Especially in the initial phases of a level, exploration can be very useful to get many extra materials and resources to get an advantage. Balancing exploration and defense building to not leave your base uncovered is important.
[*][b]Weapons of Defense[/b]
There is an overall good variety of towers and weapons to employ for defense. These range from your run of the mill shooter tower to more exotic devices such as toxic gas propellers, flamethrowers - or hand-held weapons you can use yourself such as shotguns, recoilless rifles and a variety of grenades, launchers. Some of these tools work too similarly to each other but in the complex there is definitely enough variety to try different approaches.
[/list]
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2195238442
🟥 [b]The Bad Side[/b]
[list]
[*][b]Mountains of cannon fodder[/b]
Enemies in CF, unlike weapons, have very limited variety. Even if they do change skins and colors to outline slightly more resistant variants, their patterns, attacks and behavior remain the same - and can be divided in a few archetypes. Special enemy units are far too rare and underwhelming to give variety that much needed sprint. In the end you will be facing the same fodder over and over again without enough variety to keep interest high, and diversify playstyles in response.
[*][b]Good concept, flawed execution[/b]
At the game design level, there are several problems that compromise how CF plays out. You can't recycle or destroy defenses that got knocked over by attacks, transforming the battlefield in a junkyard of debris. Such remains will obstruct building new ones, and the only way is to manually move each. Turrets often get knocked down ramparts by their own recoil, fire at enemies behind solid objects or misfire completely, leading to massive waste of ammunition.
Endless mode gives you time to build between waves, but normal campaign mode does not - it should be the opposite within any logic. Time between waves is not nearly enough, and this will lead to having to rush everything to end up with half-built, poor defenses most of the time, which is really annoying for a tower defense where planning should be the prime element.
[*][b]A rough edged work[/b]
The general feel of gameplay, animations, sounds and map layouts all give out an evident lack of polish and refinement. The game balance has not been properly fine-tuned throughout, while turret aiming patterns, combat and enemy AI need major improvements. Overall the quality delivered is the one of an early beta, and is not ready to be a fully released game even for an Indie.
[/list]
[h3]Rating: Mediocre[/h3]
[url=https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1989090445]Click here for the complete Rating Chart[/url]
[i]It took me around 6 hours to complete each level on Hard and unlock all content in the Shop. For the current price of 10€ but also mediocre quality, I do not recommend purchasing at this time.[/i]
[quote]Liked this review, and want to see more of the same quality? Check out [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/39323490]Tamaster's Review Archive[/url] to see all my Reviews in a single, convenient location.[/quote]
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2195238543
[h1]In-Depth Breakdown[/h1]
🎮 [b]Gameplay Analysis[/b]
Gameplay is divided into Exploration, Building and Combat.
[b]Exploration[/b]
Is performed on foot through large maps, though only a limited portion of them is actually worth exploring, and most are devoid of anything useful. There are groups of stationary enemies usually guarding additional resources and weapons, triggering them will make them chase you or your base if you get too far. Generally exploring is worth early on to get a bit more materials, but becomes redundant later. There are no secrets or special locations to note.
[b]Building[/b]
Is performed with two interfaces. One is dedicated to towers and boxes to make defensive bastions to protect your base, while the second is dedicated to weapons used by your character, such as rifles, bombs, airstrikes and more. To build anything you'll need the correct resources, divided into Scraps, Parts, Ammunition and Cardboard - each craftable requires a certain amount of them. Conveniently, you'll be able to make Generators near power sources (in fixed locations), that will produce specific resources over time.
These can be demolished just like everything else, so protecting them is recommended. You can also repair and refill ammunition of turrets, which is necessary in the long run. The fact built things cannot be removed / sold is crippling and united with physics, makes the field a true mess in time.
[b]Combat[/b]
Plays out in first person, where you, aided by your defenses will face the enemy hordes. Almost all enemies are exclusively melee, and so are you unless when using a craftable weapons, which has limited ammo. Defenses have generally much better efficiency than any crafted player tool when it comes to killing, investing on them is the way to go. There are various elemental effects such as freezing, burning and poison to inflict upon enemies, using area of effect weapons and turrets in the right places makes them much better at defeating foes.
Elements can also affect your Boxes, for example water will soak them and make them immune to fire, while burning will slowly drain their health and make them damage anything they touch at the same time. Spamming boxes to then make a big "bonfire" is actually one of my favorite strategies to inflict massive DoT with minimal cost - and can very well exceed any other defense when it comes to effectiveness. Many player weapons are gimmicky or useless, and very few are actually worth using for the cost. Enemies have no weakspots or particular resistances either, so combat meta depth is limited.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2195238948
[h2]Technical Breakdown[/h2]
[u]PC Specs: RTX2080Ti, Ryzen 3900X, 32GB RAM DDR4[/u]
[list]
[*][b]Critical Problems[/b]
None.
[*][b]Optimization[/b]
Not very good. The GPU usage given the simple graphics is around 45% on a 2080Ti.
[*][b]Performance[/b]
Runs without issues in 1440p, 85hz.
[*][b]Bugs[/b]
Achievements do not unlock properly, most are currently broken.
[*][b]Other Issues[/b]
No options to disable bloom and other heavy distortion effects, making visuals hazy, blurred and over-saturated.
[/list]
[i]This game was reviewed using a free key[/i]
