Sanctum (2011 video game)

Sanctum
Developer(s)	Coffee Stain Studios
Engine	Unreal Engine 3
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows, OS X
Release date(s)	Microsoft Windows April 15, 2011[1] OS X August 13, 2012
Genre(s)	First-person shooter, Tower defense[2]
Mode(s)	Single-player, Multiplayer

Sanctum is a first-person shooter tower defense video game, developed by independent developer Coffee Stain Studios. It has been available for pre-purchase via Steam for Microsoft Windows since March 24, 2011. The successor, Sanctum 2, was announced in 2012 and released in May 2013.

Plot

In Sanctum, players take on the role of Skye, an elite soldier sent out to protect her home town, Elysion One, from hordes of mysterious alien creatures. To be successful in the task, the player will have to defend a "core" on each level. To accomplish this, the player builds defensive structures, and assists their structures by fending off the enemies themselves.

Gameplay

Bridge level with core in the background

The gameplay in Sanctum can be divided into the building phase and the extermination phase. In the building phase, the player builds structures on a pre-defined grid, using the 8 'towers' chosen at the start of the level. These towers include stationary weapons, teleporters for the player's use, and pads that affect enemies moving over them. The player can also upgrade any of the 3 weapons equipped at the start. Building and upgrading both cost points, which are gained when enemies are killed.

In the extermination phase, a wave of one or more enemy types moves across the level towards the core. With each enemy that reaches the core, the condition of the core degrades from 100%; when the condition reaches 0%, the game ends. Unlike most tower defense games, the player is allowed to move about the level during this phase and attack enemies with different weapon types, much like in a typical first-person shooter. Touching enemies will result in the player being knocked back, but no damage is done.

There are 10 types of enemies in the game, 3 of which are air-borne. Because certain towers are more effective against certain enemies, and only a select few towers affect flying enemies, the player must plan for all possibilities when building defenses. To aid the player in this, information about upcoming waves is shown in the pause menu, as well as descriptions of the various enemies, towers, and weapons.

Enemies

This game has a wide range of enemies to fend off from the core. Each enemy has strengths and weaknesses. Some enemies are immune to certain towers while some are very vulnerable. For example, a flying enemy such as a Spore Pod will not take any damage from a gatling gun. Also, some enemies are slow while some are very fast. For example, the Runners are small and fast while the Soakers can withstand a lot of damage but are slow. Other enemies include the Walker, Bobble-Head, Hoverer, and Tank.

Development

The beta was made available to all people who pre-purchased the game on Steam.^[3] The beta only allowed players to play one map in both singleplayer and multiplayer.

Reception

Sanctum received mostly positive reviews from critics. The review aggregation website Metacritic currently estimates a score of 70 out of 100, based on 21 reviews.

References

External links

• Sanctum Facebook page
• Developers website