Games

The Best Tower Defense Games Of All Time

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20 seconds ago

January 19, 2025

Christoph Rediske

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Summary

Table of Contents

Tower defense games span various themes and settings, keeping gameplay tense or calm.
Rock of Ages 2 offers high-speed gameplay different from traditional tower defense games.
Orcs Must Die! 3 adds fantasy elements with traps and mage characters defending against hordes.

Tower defense games have been a staple of the gaming world since the 90s, consistently challenging players to construct pathways and weapons to take out attackers and stop waves of enemies from advancing on their base. This genre has seen multiple different styles and settings but has remained a beloved category that can be tense and exciting or calm and relaxing, almost like an idle game.

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The genre can take on any location, whether classic fantasy, silly and satirical, or sci-fi. As the genre has evolved, some classics have made their way to the top as clear standouts and must-plays for fans. While there are countless entries in the tower defense category, some stand out as genre-defining and memorable in their own right. Here are the best tower defense games of all time.

7

Rock Of Ages 2: Bigger & Boulder

A Frantic Dash To Fire The Biggest Boulder

Released: August 28, 2017
Developer(s): ACE Team
OpenCritic Rating: Advertisement

Strong

An exciting game that takes some of the aspects of tower defense to their extreme, Rock Of Ages 2 sees players building walls of defenses along a ramp and firing boulders at each other as soon as they are carved. These boulders try to build up speed to do as much damage to the defenses as possible, and can be controlled by players to smash into the opposing base.

The pace of this game feels manic, which sets it apart from other tower defense games that can often feel measured, or even plodding. In a story mode that pits players against strong opponents from history, controlling the rolling becomes the main event and the defense building can often take a back seat.

6

Sanctum 2

Sci-Fi First-Person Shooter Tower Defense

Sanctum 2

First-Person Shooter

Tower Defense

Systems

Sanctum 2 takes a very open-ended approach to the usual tower defense formula. Throwing players into strange alien strongholds, the game shows fans where the bug-like enemies will come from and the path that they will follow. Players can then build walls to direct foes and arrange their maps to extend the paths that the aliens take. Automated tech weapons can then be set up along the path and players can join in the assault on the opposition by firing their own weapons in FPS style.

The game gets remarkably tricky when new sources of enemies, flying foes, and bosses that can destroy the walls come into play. Nonetheless, Sanctum 2 revitalized the tower defense genre and made for a fresh and exciting game.

5

Orcs Must Die! 3

Fantasy Fighting Against Evil Foes In Co-op

Systems

Released: July 14, 2020
Developer(s): Robot Entertainment
OpenCritic Rating: Advertisement

Strong

Orcs Must Die! 3 is actually the fourth title in the series, and it brings with it the lessons learned from the previous games. Players will become mages tasked with defending magical rifts from the hordes of orcs and goblins that attack in waves. Larger fantasy enemies, like giants, will also appear to face off against players, so traps like walls that fire arrows, spiked floors, and spring-loaded pressure plates that launch enemies backward must be used to build defenses that can hold up against the attacks.

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Players take on a third-person perspective and can also use their character to get involved and fight against the hordes using ranged or melee weapons and special unlockable skills.

4

Element TD 2

Elemental Combos Used For Devastating Towers

Platforms: PC
Released: 2 April, 2021
Developer: Element Studios

In a way that feels similar to Magicka 2, Element TD 2 has a focus on the elements and the way that they interact to make stronger attacks. A traditional, top-down tower defense, enemies will wander along their preassigned paths, and players will have to choose which combinations of magic they wish to use to stop them.

Using Light, Dark, Fire, Water, Earth, and Nature players can put together laser towers, towers that build golems to fight along the paths, and freezing towers to distribute a slow effect. Upgrades can help players stockpile more funds, but the waves get increasingly tricky and players will have a tough time completing both the optional objectives and the main battle ahead.

3

Plants Vs. Zombies

Facing The Apocalypse With Horticulture

Zombies in both the water and on land attacking plants in Plants Vs. Zombies

Released: May 5, 2009
Developer(s): PopCap
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One of the pioneers of the modern tower defense genre, Plants vs. Zombies throws players into the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse and has them defend their home from the shambling undead by using happy little plants. Zombies arrive in waves, and players must use sunlight—generated by sunflowers—to grow an army of projectile-firing and zombie-blocking allies.

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The lawn in front of the player’s front door acts as the battleground, and the massive selection of possible plants makes for a challenging decision of what to build defenses with. A selection of mini-games, a personal garden in a greenhouse, and challenging modes that randomize the plants that players can use mean that Plants vs. Zombies has earned its status as a timeless classic.

2

Death Crown

Minimalist Art Style With Real Time Strategy

Platforms: PC
Released: 23 August, 2019
Developer: 5WORD Team

A new take on the usual tower defense gameplay formula, Death Crown casts players as a necromancer bent on revenge who must use mines to gain currency and purchase graveyards, where she then can amass skeleton warriors. Defensive towers also act as a way to push borders, allowing for more buildings but also giving more space for foes to make their way into the player’s land.

Playing like something between a tactical real-time strategy game and an intense tower defense game that has players glancing around to ensure that every advance doesn’t leave them open to attack, Death Crown‘s two biggest draws are the incredible boss fights that turn the game on its head with new mechanics and the pointilist art style.

1

Bloons Tower Defense 6

Balloon Popping Monkey Mayhem

Systems

Released: June 14, 2018
Developer(s): Ninja Kiwi

No list of tower defense games would be complete without Bloons featuring somewhere. Bloons TD 6 is an expansive game with a multitude of towers with branching upgrade paths, each fitted for destroying a specific type of strange balloon. Players control a mass of monkeys who pop regenerating, camouflaged, and even blimp-sized balloons as they fly through predetermined paths.

Maps are varied and players can even submit their own challenges. The regular updates and heaps of content make the Bloons series an easy recommendation. However, the newest title in the series has special hero towers who can gain experience, as well as Odysseys that task players with beating a series of themed maps one after the other, making it the best of the bunch