Knights vs Aliens

When you consider how present-day mankind fails miserably in the face of alien invasion in Hollywood movies, you'd assume that our mediaeval ancestors would be absolutely hopeless at defending themselves against hostile otherworldly visitors.

With nothing but plate armour and arrows to call upon, logic dictates that it would have been an absolute bloodbath - yet Knights vs Aliens paints a different picture. Technological disparity notwithstanding, the humans manage to give the aliens a figurative bloody nose.

So it's clear that Knights vs Aliens isn't attempting to portray an accurate picture of what it would be like if mediaeval man were pitted against advanced warriors from another planet. What it does offer is a pint-sized tactical war game that not only exercises your brain but also gives your fingers a workout.

After picking a nation, you're presented with a slate of battlefields each populated by towers. Controlling these structures is vital to success. When you control a tower it generates a garrison, and these new troops can be used to subjugate other towers and ultimately defeat the xenomorphs.

Moving your units around is a matter of tapping a tower and then drawing a line to another tower. Once this is done, half of the garrison sallies forth to conquer the target, while the rest remain behind in a defensive role.

Ingeniously, it's possible to link together attacks by moving a finger around towers you already control. By doing so you combine your forces for one colossal attack against the enemy. However, caution is advised because such a move leaves your towers undermanned and susceptible to counter-attack.

Victory comes once you vanquish all of the enemy bases on the map, and while it helps to control as many of the neutral towers as possible it's not a requirement. The only thing that matters is the total destruction of your alien foe.

You can play as several different nations in Knights vs Aliens, and each has unique attributes which affect the way you play. Some nations are quick to create new troops, while others are excellent at defending, even when in small numbers.

This setup - along with three different difficultly levels to unlock - grants the game a lasting appeal. Sadly, the game's biggest failing is that the core gameplay doesn't change.

The enemy becomes more cunning and the levels sometimes differ (night stages have a reduced level of visibility, for example), but ultimately the first level is identical in scope to the last. It would have been nice to see some additional gameplay elements introduced later in the game.

While Knights vs Aliens isn't a bad title by any means, it's just too simple a concept to stand up to prolonged play, and within the space of a day or two you're sure to have discarded it, moving onto more varied tower defence exploits like developer Prophetic Sky's superior Spires.