How to play
INKVALE is a tower defence game painted in ink and watercolour. Foes march along the roads towards your gate, and you stop them by building towers on the plots beside the road. Click an empty plot to build; click a tower to upgrade it. Every tower line splits into three paths at its first upgrade, and each path climbs to a fourth tier with two abilities of its own. Every foe that reaches the gate costs lives, and a boss costs all of them.
What sets it apart is colour. Three of the five tower lines paint what they hit. Archers stain foes ochre, mages stain them ultramarine and artillery stains them vermilion. A stain stays wet for four seconds. If a second, different colour lands on a foe while it is still wet, the two colours mix on the spot:
- Blue and red make violet, a Hex. For four seconds the foe takes 35 per cent more damage from everything: towers, soldiers, your hero and spells.
- Yellow and blue make green, an Overgrowth. Vines root the foe in place for over a second and thorns cut it. Flyers and bosses are slowed instead of rooted.
- Yellow and red make orange, a Flashfire. The foe bursts into flame, and the fire spills onto every foe standing next to it.
So the placement of towers matters as much as the towers themselves. Two different colours covering the same bend of road do far more than either does alone. A palette card in the corner of every battle shows the three mixes, so you never have to remember them. Barracks and beast dens carry no colour; their job is to hold the road and brawl.
Your two spells are drawn rather than clicked. The Wash (1) is a stroke along the road: drag the pointer down the road and let go. A wave of water shoves the foes in it back down the road, slows them and stains them blue, which mixes with your archers and your artillery. Ink Wall (2) is a stroke across the road. Ground foes have to stop and hack through it, while flyers pass over. A single click casts either spell along or across the road under the pointer.
Tips and strategy
- Build in pairs of colours. An archer post and a mage tower covering the same stretch will root foes in Overgrowth over and over. Add artillery nearby and every Hex and Flashfire comes free.
- Hex the big ones. Armoured brutes and bosses barely notice arrows, but a Hex makes everything count for a third more. Blue and red on the same foe before your heavy hitters fire is worth more than another tower.
- The Wash is a colour as well as a spell. It paints everything it touches blue. Drag it across a crowd that your archers or artillery are already staining and you set off a mix on every one of them at once.
- Draw walls at the bends. A wall where the road turns, inside the range of several towers, keeps a crowd standing still in the one place where everything can reach it. Bosses smash through walls quickly, so a wall buys you seconds, not a fight.
- A stain dries. A foe can be mixed again a moment after a mix, so fast-firing towers keep the reactions coming, while slow, heavy ones are better for the first colour.
- Call waves early when you are strong. The skull at the start of a road calls the next wave at once, for bonus gold and a shorter wait on your spells.
What's in it
Twelve battles across three acts, with painted story panels between them, ending at the Throne of Blots and the Hollow King. Five tower lines with fifteen paths and thirty abilities, among them roaming beasts that grow from a drake into a dragon or from a bear into a war mammoth. Sixteen kinds of foe and three bosses, including ones that fly, heal, split, silence towers or douse them. A Royal Atelier of thirty permanent upgrades bought with the stars you win.
Eight heroes. Three join through the story. The other five are warriors for hire in the Hall of Warriors, paid for with the coins every battle earns: Tamsin Inkblade (250 coins), Old Hob Gaffhook (400), Vermilia Rook (550), Sir Bramwell Stout (700) and Mother Umber (900). Vermilia's bolts paint foes red, which makes her the hero for colour play. Mother Umber's curse is a Hex of her own. Heroes level up to ten and keep their experience between battles.
Two Wardens is the game for two. One player hosts and gets a four-letter code; the other types it in under Play Together. You each have your own gold, your own towers and your own hero, and you share the lives. Colours mix across both players' towers.
The encyclopaedia lists every foe you have met, and every tower you have built or upgraded to. It fills in as you play.
Questions
How do I earn coins?
Every battle pays coins, win or lose. A win pays 20, plus 8 for each battle further into the campaign, plus 12 for every star. A loss pays 5, plus 3 for every wave you held. Veteran pays half as much again, and Casual pays a quarter less.
How hard is it?
It is meant to be a challenge. Pick Casual, Normal or Veteran by clicking the difficulty on the world map. Normal will cost you lives in most battles if you build without thinking about colour, and Veteran is meant for players who use the mixes on purpose.
How does playing together work?
Choose Play Together on the title screen. One of you picks Host a game and reads out the code; the other picks Join a game and types it in. The host chooses the battle from their own map and keeps the game speed. Only the player who built a tower can upgrade or sell it. If one of you leaves, the other carries on, and any towers left behind become theirs. The connection goes straight between your two browsers, so no account is needed.
Does it save?
Yes, in your own browser: your stars, Atelier upgrades, coins, heroes, their levels and the encyclopaedia. Clearing your browser's site data clears the save.
Can I play on a phone?
Yes. Tap a plot or tower once to see the choices and tap again to confirm. Drag a finger along or across the road to draw a spell. On a phone, a tap on the code box opens a keyboard for joining a game.