History Videogame / DefenseGridTheAwakening

''Defense Grid: The Awakening'' is a TowerDefense game developed and published by Creator/HiddenPathEntertainment. It was released for the PC in December 2008 and UsefulNotes/XboxLiveArcade in September 2009.

** Inferno are [[SkillGateCharacter Skill Gate Towers]]. It's the first tower available to do damage to groups of aliens, but can be easily outclassed by Concussion or Meteor towers.

* ArbitraryMinimumRange: Cannon and Meteor towers cannot target enemies next to themselves.

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/DefenseGrid_6656.jpg]]

** ''Containment''; an eight-level campaign funded by the ''Defense Grid 2'' Kickstarter, and some community-made levels included for no extra cost.

* TurtlePower: One of the enemies is actually called the "Turtle". It has a lot of health, and just like a turtle, contains [[MookMaker stuff]] inside its hard shell.

* DifficultySpike: Comes in as early as the third level, 'Ancient Knowledge'. Crashers show up for the first time, but more significantly, the score requirement to get the gold medal becomes ''incredibly'' strict.

Developed by Hidden Path Entertainment and released for the PC in December 2008 (and UsefulNotes/XboxLiveArcade in September 2009), ''Defense Grid: The Awakening'' is a TowerDefense game that's been hailed as one of the best in the genre.

Hidden Path gave the sequel ''Defense Grid 2'' [[http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hiddenpath/defense-grid-2?ref=live the Kickstarter treatment]]. Though they didn't get enough money to fund it, the project [[http://www.strategyinformer.com/news/23002/report-single-investor-helped-back-defense-grid-2-crowdfunding was funded]] by AscendedFanboy Steven Dengler, who also helped co-produce various Creator/DoubleFine projects. It was finally released on September 2014.

* AlternateRealityGame: Is one of the 13 indie games that form the bulk of the material of Creator/{{Valve|Software}}'s "[[http://valvearg.com/wiki/Valve_ARG_Wiki PotatoFoolsDay]]" ''VideoGame/{{Portal 2}}'' ARG.

* BigDamnHeroes: General Cai saves your back with the orbital laser in the Containment DLC of the first game when you have to face Crashers and Juggernauts much earlier than expected.

* BoringButPractical:
** Doubles as SimpleYetAwesome. Once they're fully upgraded, Gun Towers are one of the best damage-dealing towers available. They're also the cheapest tower to buy and upgrade, and they're effective against nearly everything, working against both flying and ground enemies and rapidly destroying shields. ''[[UpToEleven Even more so]]'' in the sequel where Gun towers can have one passive upgrade that ranges from damage over time, to shield piercing rounds, or even area damage, giving it more flexibility to adapt Guns for your strategies.
** Temporal towers. Aside from a nice lightning effect all they do is slow down enemies... Which helps immensely when dealing with anything but flyers. They also have a stable, constant, upgrade cost rather than getting more expensive as it levels up.
** In the first game, Command towers. They don't do anything fancy or flashy, but they do reveal stealthed aliens and give an increase to your much needed resource gaining if anything dies in their (rather generous) range.
** In the sequel you have Boost towers. Cheap but they don't do anything besides blocking aliens' path on their own, but a tower built on top of a Boost can have a number of other bonuses on them ranging from damage, to invisibility and shield disruptor, to score booster.
** Admiral Phillips' skill in ''Defense Grid 2'', it's no death laser, tower buffing or resource gaining ray, but it allows the player to pick a priority target so all towers will focus fire on it. Particularly useful against troublesome targets like Landing Pods and Rumblers.
* BottomlessMagazines: Gun towers are explicitly stated to have infinite ammo, yet the last step of their unfolding animation when you build or upgrade one involves audibly reloading their guns.

-->''[If a boss is killed by a Inferno tower]'' '''General Fletcher:''' I believe the proper word is "toast".

* BrainUploading: General Fletcher, who stopped the previous invasion is now the AI running the defense grid. He often talks about things he would do if he was still in his body. Mostly eating raspberries.

* {{Cloudcuckoolander}}: Spending over a thousand years uploaded inside a defense computer network has left General Fletcher a little... Odd, [[SubvertedTrope but he realizes how he's acting]] and resolves to stay focused on repelling the invasion.

** Concussion serves as CloseRangeCombatant dealing constant damage to anything withing its range, extremely effective against large groups of small enemies that can diverge the attention of other towers, however it fares poorly against heavily armored enemies like the Crasher.

** Tesla towers have MightyGlacier properties: it can attack constantly with low power, however it takes a while to charge to full power, but if it does it will deal massive damage on the next hit. Teslas are also very effective against shielded aliens.
*** In the sequel Teslas end up being MasterOfNone, good damage against single targets which will chain to another giving it some crowd control properties, but it is easily outclassed by any other tower that focus on that specific role. Even it's shield-breaking ability is easily replaced by a Boost tower upgrade (Disruptor) which also disables stealthed enemies.
** Missiles have the highest damage output in the first game but suffers from CripplingOverspecialization since it can only target airborne aliens.
*** In the sequel they become [[MightyGlacier Mighty Glaciers]] being able to target ground enemies with powerful, single target (without an upgrade) missiles, but with a pretty slow fire rate.

* DamnYouMuscleMemory: If you are playing versions of ''Defense Grid 1'' and ''2'' on PC and is used to the numerical shortcut to create the towers you might build something you didn't intend to when swapping to another game.

* DeathFromAbove: The Meteor tower; incredible range and deals area-of-effect damage.
** In the sequel characters can use a satellite to fire a beam with varying effects. General Cai sometimes even says "Death from above!" word by word when selecting her as commander.

* DoWellButNotPerfect: If you are having problems getting a gold medal, sometimes it's better to go easy on the final enemies and let them live live a little longer with a softer defense while the interests rack up your resources towards the gold score.
** Similarly in the sequel it's best to kill enemies as late as possible as you'll be gathering resources meanwhile. The more resources you have when you kill something the more points you'll earn.
* DownloadableContent: In the form of map packs. The Resurgence series is four packs of two maps each, Containment is a short campaign of eight maps, and You Monster is a crossover with ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}''.

* ExcusePlot: [[Administrivia/TropesAreTools A well-done example of one.]] It's a rare thing to see a Tower Defense game with CharacterDevelopment.

* FlamingMeteor: both games feature the 'meteor tower' - it's a Meteor InNameOnly though, as it is launched from the ground as a fiery ball which arcs to its impact zone, dealing massive amounts of damage.

* HellIsThatNoise: You'll learn to fear and hate that "zap" sound whenever aliens get a hold of your cores. If one of them runs with your core General Fletcher will leave a distressed commentary.
-->'''General Fletcher:''' No, no, NO! Not another core gone!
** If the aliens grabs all cores from your base (but doesn't leave it) General Fletcher will comment [[OhCrap the power is low, thus indicating your interest is basically nonexistent]].

* HeroicSacrifice: Cai attempts one in the first game in a TakingYouWithMe maneauver. [[spoiler:Fletcher and the Commander are having none of this, though]].
* IntercompanyCrossover: The You Monster DLC features [[VideoGame/{{Portal}} GLaDOS]].

* LightningGun / ShockAndAwe: The Tesla tower. Its attack is stronger if given time to charge up, and it can [[ChainLightning chain enemies]].

** Rhinos are [[HeavilyArmoredMook heavily armoured]] and can take more damage, similar to how the real life rhinoceros has a thick armour.
*** In the sequel Rhinos can charge much like a real rhinoceros. They do have to slowdown to turn, though.

** Mantas looks kind of like manta rays, and also [[AirborneMook fly through the air]] in the same fashion the manta ray glides underwater.

** Decoys give stealth to units around it but do not have stealth themselves. Thus, they act as a decoy and attract attacks from your towers towards it, instead of the enemies it gives stealth to.

* MarathonLevel: The Grinder and Super Grinder challenges pit you against '''99''' waves. And yes, you ''still'' must finish to obtain medals. The score requirements are quite low in proportion (ideally, you'll hit ''at least'' one million on these sorts of challenges out of the 100,000-200,000 needed for gold), but if you so much as lose a single core, there goes about an entire hour of your efforts.
** Adrenaline and Shredder challenges are not as long, but still far longer than any level in the game, they can have '''50''' waves to fight.

* MetaPowerup: Command Towers are these--they don't add any extra power for your towers, but they will reveal Stealth units and also allow you to gain more [[YouRequireMoreVespeneGas resources]] from any enemies killed in its range.
** Professor Briel's skill, it transfer resources instantly on the use, increases the more aliens you hit with it, which is quite useful especially early on.

* MinimalistCast: Just the unnamed player character and Fletcher. ''Containment'' adds two more, Cai and Simon Ritter.
** Averted in the sequel which adds a fair bunch of new characters.

* MookMaker: Seekers periodically open a portal to the enemy aliens' home planet, allowing (usually) smaller but weaker aliens to join the fray. In the final campaign level, there are Seekers that will generate nigh-endless waves of Crashers and Rumblers if they aren't dealt with.

* NoGearLevel: In ''Containment'' [=DLC=], the level Foothold has you only with your basic towers (Gun, Inferno and Laser). [[spoiler:Since you went through the portals aliens were using to try another invasion, after you thwarted their first, Fletcher still needs to re-power the new grid for the other towers]].
** In ''Defense Grid 2'', Double Take deprives you of any special ability. Justified by the fact the abilities are modified versions of a satellite beam and you're defending an orbital elevator.
* NoFairCheating: If you completely block the aliens' path to the cores, they'll simply walk right past the offending tower. Depending on your tower composition, this will result in a shorter path than you planned for the aliens, which is very, ''very'' bad.

* OhCrap: In the sequel Simon has a pretty big one upon seeing a giant alien space ship stationed close to the cores.

* PyrrhicVictory: The first game has an achievement by the same name, which is earned by killing a flying alien who has taken a core. Since cores snatched by flying enemies are permanently lost even if they are destroyed the name of the achievement is pretty fitting.

* SequelHook: ''Defense Grid 2'' ending. [[spoiler:After foiling Advisor Zacara's plan to use MindControl on the aliens to create her own army, she is possessed by the aliens and they leave an ominous message about they will return and this time they ''won't'' underestimate Fletcher]].

* TheGoomba: Training drones in the first stage are very weak and can only carry one core. That's the ''only'' time you will fight them, though.
* TheMaze: Making them with towers is necessary to slow down alien progress long enough to keep them continously exposed to your attacks. The DLC map Height of Confusion is nothing but one big grid of tower slots, requiring you to structure the level yourself.
* TheUnreveal: [[spoiler:None of the games actually reveal why the aliens are invading and what they are really after or even why they want the cores you go through hell to protect]].

* UnexpectedGameplayChange: In ''Defense Grid 2'', Power Outage challenges forces the player either to keep their cursor close to the towers or build them close to the core housing, otherwise they won't even activate and shoot aliens.

* WakeUpCallBoss: Ancient Research in ''Defense Grid 1'' is the first map to feature boss level aliens, the Crashers which are tough and '''very''' resilient and can carry up to ''three'' cores. The game only gets harder from that point on.
** 07 - Split Decision on ''Defense Grid 2'', it's the first map with two core housing which forces you to learn to balance your resources to protect both and it's the first level to feature [[MightyGlacier Crashers and Juggernauts]].
* WhamEpisode: In the first game, [[spoiler:Containment]], when the aliens launch an attack to your home city.
** In ''Defense Grid 2'', [[spoiler:Mission 19 - Out of Control]], explains who's behind the kidnappings of [=AIs=] and the cause of their loss of memories.
* WithThisHerring: Justified by the fact General Fletcher has to slowly reactivate the towers since they've been offline for who knows how long.

* WhoWantsToLiveForever: General Fletcher.

* ZergRush: Swarmers. Weak health, but damn, they come in large ''swarms''!

* LikeASonToMe: General Fletcher treats you like his surrogate child and looks out for you, and expresses concern when [[spoiler:your hometown gets attacked]]. In the final mission he [[spoiler:offers to meet your family after everything is said and done]].

* IntercompanyCrossover: The You Monster DLC features [[VideoGame/{{Portal}} GlaDOS]].

** Laser towers are a mix between JackOfAllStats and GradualGrinder. It's heat beam can easily destroy fast enemies via burning caused by its ray, but it's a bit weaker than the Gun tower and practically useless against shields.

** The Grinder game mode is exclusively Walkers, just barely above the weakest creature in the game, but increasing in intensity for ''99 waves''. Playing it in the very last level can crash the game (it is the biggest level with a large number of options for path placement, meaning you could have 10 or so waves pf 40+ walkers each on the screen at the same time, plus all the tower actions). Super Grinder is also 99 waves but with fewer enemies and more enemy variety, including some bosses, which is ironically easier to beat.

* BiggerBad: [[spoiler:The Alien Queen, whom Zacara was attempting to strike a deal with]] in ''Defense Grid 2''.

* FrickinLaserBeams: Laser towers, which are good against the two fast enemies, the Racer and the Rumbler, both because the said enemies keep taking damage from being set on fire by the laser after they're out of their range and because lasers don't have to waste any time pivoting to aim at an enemy when it enters its range.

* SequelDifficultyDrop: ''Defense Grid 2'' is a complete walk in the park compared to the original if you play on Normal difficulty, although obviously the challenge is more comparable if you play on a higher level. On the other hand, you don't ''need'' to play on higher difficulty levels for anything other than SelfImposedChallenge as you can unlock all achievements on Normal. ''Defense Grid 1'' didn't have difficulty levels, but the challenge usually inclined more towards the higher end of the spectrum, especially if you wanted Gold medals.