Clockspire

Clockspire mashes tower defense with a light resource puzzle and it works better than it has any right to. You place turrets along the inside of a clock tower, but everything runs on rotating gears you have to keep aligned. Neglect the mechanism and your best gun goes dark.

We got genuinely tense in the later waves, juggling gear power against incoming swarms. It's a game that respects your attention. All content is available offline, so you can grind out a tricky level on a long ride without interruption.

The art is steampunk without being cluttered, and the difficulty curve is honest. There's no pay-to-win pressure; you earn upgrades by playing well. That's exactly what we want from this genre.

What we liked

• Clever gear-power mechanic
• No pay-to-win upgrades
• Runs fully offline including all levels