Ye Olde Protector III Review

Well. You've seen it, I've seen it, the noobs who troll the vast land of Kongregate have seen it. Any idea what I'm talking about? Well, it's a game obviously. Any clue yet? It's a new release, and a strategy one. Oh, and from a very promising series as well. Oh, aha, I see how some may be having trouble, what with all of the strategy games coming from great series being released lately. Go ahead and move over, Desktop DTD Pro and Sonny 2, there's a new great game in town.

Or is it really that great? Does Protector III live up to it's two predecessors and deserve the title "Protector"? Let's delve further into this promising title and dissect it piece by piece.

Let's start with the graphics. At first glance, you'll realize the graphics of Protector III, or any game in the protector series for that matter, are all their own. Using almost sprite-esque graphics, Protector delivers it's visuals with great appeal, albeit bland at (rare) times.

Next, the sound. Remember those annoying sounds from the first two protectors? And the music that just didn't fit the mood of a tower defence game? Yeah, that stuff is back for a third time. If you didn't like the sound in the first two games of this series, you more than likely won't like the third game's. I, personally, found myself muting the game constantly because I just couldn't stand to hear the grating sounds that this game produces.

Next up is the difficulty/gameplay, since I feel they blend together into one topic nicely. The core gameplay is just about the same as the original Protector's, but the rest of the game has evolved quite a bit since then. There was one thing in particular I was HUGELY dissapointed in after opening up Protector III: Remember the great leap between the first and second Protectors?

You know, how Protector 2 evolved the game into a whole new aspect of tower leveling, skill trees, and other things of the like? Lemme make a simile here, for my sake. From most Tower Defence games to Protector was like two huge steps forward. From Protector to the sequel was like three bounds forward.

However, with the third in the trilogy, it appears we aren't budging at all. With all the evolutions Protector 2 added to the series, Protector III doesn't really live up to the expected evolutions we, as fans of the series, wanted. We craved more depth. We craved more features. We craved more concepts. What did undefined give us? They took away the skill tree, added in some grinding, put in "achievements" (which are pretty much the Protector II skill tree, but you have to do things like 'hire X (element) mages/warriors"), and put in "entourage" units. Then, they slapped on the III and sent it off "to market". That will conclude my rant on this topic, thanks for attending. Oh, and about the difficulty, they included grinding. That should give you an idea.

And I suppose I should briefly touch upon the controls as well...As you'll know if you played the first two Protectors, the controls (Mouse) are great.

So, as a final verdict, I'd say that the graphics are pretty good, the controls are great, and the core gameplay is great. However, it was a huge letdown from what you would have been expecting, and really just Protector 2 with one or two small new features. In a word, it's a letdown, and not what I've come to expect from undefined. (I didn't mention the numerous glitches in the game, did I? Yeah, several glitches are present.)

I'll leave you with one final quote, from MrRubix himself:

It’s like a golden rule, guys. Test before you release, research before you sponsor, play before you rate. When you jump the gun on these things, you’re going to run into wasted time, resources, and unplayable games.

And with that, I'll be off.

~PlatinumIce