Anthill Review
This review was originally written for TheNintendoVillage.com, a website I founded and ran from 2018 to 2021.
Key Info
System: Switch
Developer: Image & Form
Publisher: Thunderful
Release Date: 24 October 2019
Price: $9.99 / £8.99
An endless Infinity Mode adds to the replayability.
Image & Form have garnered a stellar reputation for their SteamWorld series of games. From the recent SteamWorld Quest RPG, to the metroidvania SteamWorld Dig 2 - one of Switch’s best indies - the franchise has tackled numerous genres with aplomb.
In fact, the series actually started out as a tower defence back on the DSi, and before that, the studio gained a reputation with another tower defence title on iOS. Anthill was the game in question, and it’s now been given a new lease of life on Switch.
New Franchise Who Dis?
Despite the change of franchise, that characteristic Image & Form polish is present and correct. It’s a relatively pleasing game to look at, and the dialogue from your various units is full of all the wit and charm you’ve come to expect from their robotic cousins.
As a result of starting life as a mobile game, the Switch port is entirely touch-based. We’d recommend removing the Joy-Con to play - or lying the Switch flat on a desk or table - as it can be a little uncomfortable holding up the Switch after a while.
Fortunately, the touch controls are accurate and easy to master. Swiping around the map, pinching to zoom in and out, and drawing the paths for your ants to follow are all quick and simple to do.
Those ants in question come in four varieties. Soldier, Spitter and Bomber ants are required to take out the other insects that are coming to attack your anthill. Worker ants harvest their bodies for food, to create more units, and to beef up your score.
Managing your resources and finding the right balance to make it through the levels and earn higher scores poses an increasingly difficult challenge as you move through the game’s 6 chapters. That said, I found myself increasingly reliant on my Bomber Ants, as they’ll fly directly to the target you’ve tapped rather than sticking to paths like the other three.
Keeping track of which pheromone paths are still worth maintaining is the key to success, but it can be difficult to do once things start getting hectic. With ants and enemies crawling all over the place, I often found ants marching up and down paths that no longer led to a food source. Those wasted resources were often the difference between success and failure, a four star level score and a two star one.
Tougher enemies provide an extra challenge as you progress.
Ants On-The-Go
Those stars you earn at the end of each stage can be spent on upgrades for each of your four units, offering an incentive to go back and shoot for a higher score if you find yourself stuck on later levels.
The balance of difficulty and progression is well maintained by and large. I was able to upgrade often enough as I progressed naturally to ensure that I was able to earn some extra stars when I hit a roadblock and returned to earlier stages.
Unfortunately, although enemy variety is changed up to give you some strategic decisions to make, the gameplay is fairly shallow over all. Tougher enemies crop-up as you move through the game, needing some well-managed firepower to take down, but the core loop is consistent. I’d fallen into a fairly standard routine by the end of the first half-dozen stages, and found little need to change it up all that much as I progressed.
One imagines this wasn’t an issue on mobile. The concept is robust enough to be entertaining for 10 minutes or so whilst grabbing a quick game on your phone. For extended console sessions though, it can wear a little thin after a while.
Image & Form are pitching this game at Switch Lite owners, and you can see why. Besides the touchscreen-only controls, it’s a decent tower defence game to play a little of during a commute - the Lite’s added portability ideal for your morning bus ride. But as a console experience, it ironically feels a little light.
VERDICT
Anthill is a solid tower defence game that’s full of the characteristic polish you’d expect from Image & Form. As a console game, it’s unlikely to hold your attention for too long. But for a quick dip when you’re out and about, there’s enough here to recommend it to fans of the genre.
Pros & Cons
+ Presentation
+ Enemy variety
+ Controls
- Gets a little repetitive on longer play sessions
- No docked mode