Previews

Hands-on with Guns 'n' Glory WW2 for Android, iPhone

World warriors

Hands-on with Guns 'n' Glory WW2 for Android, iPhone

Guns ‘n’ Glory was a bit of a surprise hit for mobile veterans HandyGames in 2010, managing to rack up over two million downloads in the last few months of the year.

A number of updates introduced ideas garnered from fan feedback via the company’s Facebook page, and the Germany company is back in the moving tower defence saddle with a rare sequel - Guns ‘n’ Glory WW2.

During my hands-on, I noticed that once again the emphasis is not on stationary defences that slowly get overrun by the unending hordes of enemies, but rather on moving your team dynamically on the battlefield to react to the various waves.

Don't mention the real war!

Don’t go in expecting an historically accurate recreation of man’s bloodiest war, however. Nor go in expecting any actual Nazis (German gaming laws ban those images for obvious reasons). Instead, pick yourself up, soldier, for a dosage of good ol’ USA versus the German non-Nazis.

The initial 12 levels that will come with the game (more updates are planned in the future) take place over both green fields and snowy landscapes, with each containing three separate bases that need to be defended.

Unlike the original, you’re now able to build more troops once the levels are underway, meaning there’s a lot more variety in the number of approaches you can take.

Blocking off a road with a host of tanks may sound suicidal, but when you’re trying to fund a few more troops to defend another flank, it can save your skin.

Tanks for that

Both sides come with their own selection of units, with three of the four types - infantry, anti-tank, and tank - essentially the same apart from visual differences.

The special troops for each side, however, do vary, with the American outfit featuring a frenzied flamethrowing madmen (complete with muffled shouts of joy through his mask), while the Germans have the blonde pig-tailed medic.

Special airdrops are also available for both sides in the conflict, which allow you to place mines on the road, airstrike a tank column before they know what’s happening, heal units, and repair your buildings.

The cartoony-look of the original has been retained, with the game now able to be zoomed-in at will, along with higher-resolution artwork for tablet devices. A particularly neat touch is the way the skeleton ghosts of the infantry salute you as they float up into the sky - it’s dark, sure, but still amusing.

Another welcome addition to the game is the ability to speed up the action when you’re confident your defences will hold. Handily, this speed-up ceases if an enemy starts attacking one of your bases, so there won’t be any occasions where you find yourself losing a game because of it.

War bonds

The gameplay emphasis appears to have switched, too: blasting through the levels is no longer the main objective. Guns 'n' Glory WW2 focuses more on repeat play, with a three-star grading system, three difficulty levels, and a whole host of upgrades for your units between battles.

Although you earn the coins used to upgrade your troops in-game, there will also be the option for the lazy / rich to purchase more via in-app purchases. HandyGames has assured me, though, that it isn't mandatory to buy extra coins to progress, and that the game can be happily completed without ever having to make a purchase.

We’ll see if Guns ‘n’ Glory WW2 will score a direct hit on our review defences when it lands on Android and iOS beaches later in the summer.

Will Wilson
Will Wilson
Will's obsession with gaming started off with sketching Laser Squad levels on pads of paper, but recently grew into violently shouting "Tango Down!" at random strangers on the street. He now directs that positive energy into his writing (due in no small part to a binding court order).