Gem Miner TD

It is almost perfect I played a lot of Gem Tower Defense when it was just a web flash game. I’ve known of it for a long time, and this is clearly a game that hopes to take that core, incredible (yet very unpolished) gameplay and give it the final push it needs to feel like a full experience. I feel very little need to play the original game after playing this really great game. The price tag almost scared me away but I believe the full price for the game is very fair for just how rewarding the gameplay feels. I have a few issues I want to discuss but I first want to commend some stuff Design for enemies and gems/general gameplay design: flying and stealth enemies are a challenge, but don’t completely break the rules of the game. Often they can just be ignored, and even later on admired when they get stomped on by a defense that doesn’t plan around them at the slightest. It does feel negligible, but also frustrating when an early run is lost to stealth when it feels like nothing good came up to defend against both that and regular enemies. The enemies themselves are well designed and give a strong challenge to the player, especially at higher difficulty levels. The gems (for the most part) do vastly different things. I do think some of the gems (like citrine) feel very broken (not in a strong way) when they are consistently targeting a wall instead of enemies in their line of sight. This feels like an easy fix, but it also provides a unique challenge if it is intentional, and I still had fun trying to make it work. Level 2 gems feel like they work well as stepping stones into the later game, as relics bridge gaps between builds. I find the gem system to feel clunky in the latter half of the game. Starter gems are useless so you’re just fishing for the last few upgrades to the build. By the time you get what you need, you either just broke past the base balance of the game, or it didn’t matter much. The enemies scale too fast, and so does the damage. The scaling of both should be reduced. It would make the game a bit smoother overall, and make starting gems not as horrible. Also some relics and combos are way stronger than others. Particularly the one that stacks to 20 and gives gems randomly a damage boost. Getting that early is a free win, especially when combined with enchants or other boosters. Luckily the endless mode and boss check were both great ways to push the game to the limit, but the endless mode is bugged for me. I have to restart the match in order to interact with the board The frozen map should be bigger. Let me build a bigger maze. The game clearly doesn’t shy from the game modes being vastly different, so make the map bigger and give me a few more actions. It’s obviously a copy of the flash game but with a smaller grid, meaning I quickly run out of actions The forced event with the “reduce actions to 2 but get more options” is not fun. It’s basically always worth it late game when you run out of space after building the maze (unless you somehow get action points to make a more complex maze?). I don’t feel like it’s an interesting enough mechanic to warrant managing when I switch to it every game. Speaking of, the moving gems relic should be included at the start of every game. It should at least be considered. It deeply enriches the gameplay. Maybe have gems leave something behind after they are moved that is a negative effect to balance it out? Just a suggestion I do not like most of the relics. I think some are fun. Some enhancements too are great, but overall I get the same relics every game, go for the same gems every game, and win every game. If I don’t, I lose. I want some more unique options. Stuff that maybe works multiplicatively to other damage boosts, so that gaining 10% per round doesn’t feel so bad later on, and 24% to every gem every round doesn’t feels so broken. Maybe do stuff that specifically buffs certain types of underused gems (like the poison upgrade but better). Maybe now poison can slow and have a chance to stun enemies? Maybe rubies apply a 10% bonus damage rebuff to enemies. Coal now causes enemies to bleed, and can stack causing increased damage. I’d like a reason to not just rush the broken stuff but to try new builds (but without flooding the pool with garbage. Maybe add a weighting system At this point I feel like I’m rambling. Basically I think the game needs more content somehow. It’s clear that it’s been given a lot of love, and that the dev loves what he has made. The backbone of the game was great to begin with, and I love where it’s been taken. I plan on playing more, but I definitely feel like something big is missing. I should be wanting to put hundreds of more hours into this. I will be keeping an eye out on what is next 8/10

I've been having a fun time finding out I'm my own worst enemy in planning mazes.

I like this game, the optimizations possible are actually kind crazy, and the way that there's a few different methods of acheiving near-infinite scaling is pretty great! I've had a lot of fun, and within the first like 10 hours i managed to make it to the top 5 on the endless leaderboard. It's not necessarily a hard game, but it certainly has a lot of replayability. Plus it's a steam game, so y'know i got it pretty cheap

The children yearn for the mines

Great game, great dev, come relive the old GEM TD days from DOTA

Reminds me of GemTD on Dota Definitely what I needed

Wow, amazing TD, not much more to say. if you like TD´s with mazing and a A LOT of interesting Towers --> buy it i played a LOT of TD´s in my 43 years, this is definitly one of the best

Very fun TD with multiple play styles. Not your average TD in the sense you can put towers wherever you want, but fun nonetheless. Feels rewarding to get a working play through going with towers, augments, buffs, and enchantments. Lots of replayability. Looking forward to updates!

good game! reminds me of elemental TD from Warcraft RTS nostalgia hit hard

buy