Today’s gamer vocabulary word is “Tower Defense”.

Tower defense is a subgenre of real-time strategy video games. The goal of tower defense games is to try to stop enemies from crossing a map by building traps to slow them down and towers which shoot at them as they pass

Wikipedia

A tower defense game is split into two phases which alternate back and forth. In the first phase, the player spends the gold they have building defenses. This might include tower that shoot different ammunition or traps meant to stop the enemies (or creeps). In the second phase, the creeps start walking, running, flying, whatever from one end of the map trying to make it to the other. Once they are all killed, the first phase starts again. The game is over when enough creeps make it across the map or the player defeats all the levels.

You can get an idea of what the gameplay in like from this video of Defense Grid: The Awakening.

There are some games that tweak this formula. In Sanctum, the player takes control of a character in phase 2 and fights the creeps directly. And then in Anomaly Warzone Earth the player plays as the creeps trying to avoid the towers.

Today’s gamer vocabulary word is “Point and Click Adventure”.

A point and click adventure game is a graphic adventure game where the player uses a pointer controlled by the mouse to interact with the world. The original versions of these games tend to involve the player completing puzzles to move the story along.

The adventure genre was big in the early days of gaming with series like Kings Quest, Monkey Island, and Space Quest. It went through a down time as hardware became more powerful and games became more graphic intensive and fast paced.

However, the genre has seen a rise in popularity again in the last few years.  The company TellTale has created adventure games based on franchises like Back to the Future and The Walking Dead. Some of these games (specifically The Walking Dead) are less about puzzles and more about the story. It was also considered one of the best games released in 2012.

You can get an idea of how the genre has changed by watching these video of Kings Quest and this video of The Walking Dead.

Minecraft – A world of infinite possibilities

Today’s gamer vocabulary word is “Open world”.

An open world is a type of video game level design where a player can roam freely through a virtual world and is given considerable freedom in choosing how or when to approach objectives.

Wikipedia

These games differ from games like Call of Duty or Halo in that the player is given a lot of freedom to choose what to do. In Call of Duty, the player is given a specific path to follow to help drive the story. There is very little choice in what to do or where to go next.

Open world games tend to take a lot more of the player’s time. The Call of Duty campaign may take anywhere from 6 to 10 hours to complete. Players can spend hundreds of hours in an open world game if they choose.

There are several recent examples of open world games. Minecraft is an extreme example. There are no real objectives other than stay alive. You can go anywhere and do just about anything you can think of.

Another example is Skyrim. Skyrim is a story-driven, open world RPG. There is a main quest line that takes the player through the story. However, the player is under no obligation to complete those quests. They can spend all their time doing other things. The world is huge and open for exploration.

Civilization 5

Today’s gamer vocabulary word is “Turn-based Strategy”.

A turn-based strategy game is one where the players take turns executing the moves they want to make. One player makes their move and then clicks “End Turn”. The other player will then see the results of those moves and get to make moves of their own. This allows each player to take their time and think through their moves. This is in contrast to a real-time strategy game, where the action never stops.

One of the best examples of turn-based strategy is the Civilization series. The player starts out with a small territory and limited resources. They collect resources and build armies during their turn, with the ultimate goal to take over the world.

Here you can see TotalBiscuit talking about Civilization 5.

League of Legends

Today’s gamer vocabulary word is MOBA.

MOBA stands for “Multiplayer Online Battle Arena”. It is a genre popularized by the Defense of the Ancients (DotA) mod for Warcraft 3.

A MOBA match consists of two teams of 5 players each. Each player controls a single character. The object is to destroy the opposing teams main structure. This is accomplished by leveling the character up through killing the computer and player controlled enemies.

The MOBA genre has significantly contributed to the recent rise of esports. The two main players in this space are League of Legends and Dota 2.

Here is what a professional League of Legends match is like.

Super Meat Boy

Today’s vocabulary word is “Platformer”.

A platform game (or platformer) is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms, over obstacles, or both to advance the game.

Wikipedia

Platformers dominated the early years of video games with games like Super Mario Brothers, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Contra. Their popularity waned, however, when games started to move into 3D. The precise movement required to complete a platformer is much more difficult to replicate in 3D.

Recently, platformers have seen a resurgence. The rise of the internet and downloadable games has opened the door for smaller studios who do not have the money to build a big budget game. They can, however, create 2D platformers that are just as fun. Examples of this include Braid, Super Meat Boy, and Dustforce.

You can get an idea of what a platformer is like through this video of me playing the first world of Super Meat Boy.