Yeah, it's fun and I've beat it a few times but agreed that the balance is a little off. You have to really rush everything to stay ahead, it's a frantic game to stay ahead of the curve.
Since towers fire slowly (and it seems like the monsters can only take so much damage at once or have invincibility frames?) it's better to spread them out along the first row. Once you have 10 -5 towers you should be able to start buying -10 towers. I usually have 5 -5 towers at the top and then the other -5s spread through the second row, and the -10 towers on the bottom row. Once you're buying -10s there's no reason to buy -5s. Last game I won with 100 health was 11 -5 towers and 7 -10 towers
In all of the games I played, I was only able to afford the ÷2 tower once, and it wasn't helpful as the monsters were already ahead of the damage output. Seems impossible to be able to buy the ÷3 and still do enough damage to the monsters. I think it would be better with a little tuning to make more money, make monsters scale more slowly, space them out a little more, or something.
Really cool idea though to use the math as the monsters. A little tweaking and it could be quite an interesting game.
Thanks for playing! Yes, spamming -5s and -10s is one way to do it. But you can win with a total of 7 towers.
I don't want to spoil the game for other players, but essentially it's all about when and how you place them, considering they will always aim for the numbers that are closer to your base.
Towers have a cooldown between shots, so that's why numbers only take certain damage while they are in range. This cooldown is currently not indicated visually and I might add it in the future once the voting and jam are over.
Again thanks for playing and taking the time to comment! :D
Thanks! I played some more and got pretty closed to 7 towers, maybe 9-10 or so, good to know there's a way to push even more. I definitely started seeing some value to ÷2 when trying for minimum towers. That kind of "win strategy" reminds me of Zachtronics game goals where you try to win with lowest cost, lowest area, fastest, etc. Could be a neat mechanic for your levels.
Showing cooldown and visibly showing a tower firing would both be quite helpful.
I hope you continue developing it, the unique premise offers a lot of opportunity for interesting game mechanics. Good luck on the game jam!
