Certainly one of the game styles I give the tablet generation the most credit for latching onto, and then helping slowly to perfect, is the tower defense subgenre. While some form of them had been around in the past, the fact that controlling them is touchscreen-friendly, that they don’t tend to be that incredibly complex, and that they can be enjoyed in pretty bite-sized sessions made them perfect for a semi-casual crowd. The fact that they’ve been well-represented on the casual-friendly Switch is then not terribly surprising, but more often than not they’ve been mobile ports that in some way have felt, or at least looked like they were, generally failing to impress on a dedicated gaming console. To this point I’ve generally considered the Kingdom Rush series to be among the best out there, but it’s now with Vengeance that it feels like someone has finally made a gaming console quality release in the space, and that’s great to see.

Aside from visually looking more polished and impressive than its forebears, the one deliciously different element of Vengeance is the fact that you’ll be playing it from the evil side of the coin for once. For those of you who remember playing the amazing Dungeon Keeper 2, one of the most beloved strategy titles ever made that had a great mean streak to it, it’s important not to get too excited… this never reaches that level of fun, but it at least does some good work. Your challenge will always be to work within the scenarios you’ve been given, figuring out which of your towers to put where, in what order, and with which upgrades, and while it starts out quite simply things do get more intense. The great wild card the game has is that every time you start to feel like you have a good base setup that can take all comers, some new unit will come along that will ease right on through your defenses and make you feel stupid. Whether that’s through speed, shielding, the fact that they’re flying, or some combination of elements, each time this happens you’ll need to go back to the drawing board to figure out how to integrate an answer for those units into your core defense plan.

What you’ll have on your side to try to help supplement your defenses, first and foremost, will be your hero. Each of them has their own strengths and weaknesses, and knowing how to position them and keep them safe but effective at chipping in is key to your success. While you’ll probably begin to develop some preference for specific ones, again you won’t be allowed to get too comfortable, as you’ll find that some specific missions have demands that different heroes are simply too useful against to ignore. Throw in perks that will beef up specific units and stats, for both your base units and heroes, and there ends up being plenty to contemplate the further you go, allowing for adjustments to keep yourself on top of things.

Even better, if you really dig the campaign, and would like even more, there are two terrific DLC packages available at launch for it as well. These not only add more missions, new towers, and assorted challenges, but each also has a unique hero unit that unlocks with them, opening up even more strategic possibilities. Weirdly enough, I’ll admit that as many more elevated types of games as I enjoy playing, I’ve always been kind of a sucker for a good tower defense game, though the challenge is that honestly they’re more often lackluster than worth my time, sadly. Among them all though, Kingdom Rush has always stood out as the best in class, and now with Vengeance it feels like the series is getting even closer to maximizing its potential more than ever.