Frequently Asked Questions

A 3D tower defense game for Windows PC. Enemies march along a path that grows across the map, and you hold the line with 22 towers, more than 20 kinds of enemies and 3 bosses. You can also reshape the land: dig, fill and build up hills, because a tower standing higher hits harder and reaches further.

Buy the Founder Edition here on the website, then sign in and open the download page. Got a game key instead? Redeem it on your account and the download appears on the same page.

A Windows 10 or 11 PC (64-bit). The download page has a Windows installer, which needs no admin rights and adds Start menu and desktop shortcuts. Newer versions install over it and keep your saves.

Our early-access edition, $9.99 one time, one per account. You get every test build of the game while it is being made, the online leaderboards, and a free Steam key for the full game when it launches on Steam.

Not yet. It is coming to Steam, and every Founder Edition owner gets a free Steam key for the full game at launch.

The game checks for a new version each time you sign in. When one is out, the Update available button in the bottom-right corner of the main menu turns green. Open Settings > About, choose Download update, then Restart to update. The download is checked before anything is installed, and your saves stay. See what changed on What's New.

Your Blockade Brigade account is where your Founder Edition lives, so the game checks your licence with it (it keeps playing offline for up to 7 days between checks). Signed in, your games go on the leaderboards, and your XP, research, cards and 20 newest saves are kept on your account so you can carry on from another computer. Make an account on the website or right inside the game.

Yes. Tick Remember me when you sign in and the game keeps you signed in for as long as you play, as long as you play at least once a month. Your password is never stored. Sign Out (Settings > Account) ends it on that computer at once.

My Account > Devices lists every computer that stays signed in to your account, with when it was last used. Revoke signs one out straight away, and Sign out everywhere signs out all of them. Changing or resetting your password also signs out every device.

Once the game is on Steam, yes: Steam signs you in by itself, and Link Steam (Settings > Account) ties your existing website account to your Steam account, so your scores and progress come with you. It switches on when the game goes live on Steam.

Use Forgot your password? on the sign-in page and we will email you a link to set a new one. Setting it signs out every device, so sign in again in the game.

An extra lock for your account. Under My Account > Allowed places you list the internet connections your account may be used from (home, say), each with a name and an optional end date. From anywhere else, signing in on the website or in the game is refused. Changes need your password, we email you when the list changes, and if you lock yourself out the blocked sign-in offers an unlock email.

• Standard Game: a map that grows as you play. Reach wave 50 to win, then keep going as long as you can.
• Custom Map: choose the size, terrain, number of waves and more.
• Scenarios: hand-built maps such as Grand Canyon, Islands and Spiral, with a set number of waves and challenges with their own rules.
• Map Code: play exactly the map someone else shared, on its own leaderboard.

Every enemy you defeat earns XP for your account, and bosses pay a big lump. Spend it in Research to unlock new towers (from 10,000 XP up to 200,000 for the biggest) and to improve your towers and options. You also get a one-time bonus of 5,000 XP the first time you finish a game and another 5,000 the first time you reach wave 10.

After each wave you pick a reward card: an upgrade for a tower on your map, a gold card, or another card such as extra lives, rerolls or a tower loan. Don't like the offer? Spend a reroll for a fresh hand. Our gold and reward cards guide has the details.

Now and then, from wave 3, a card lends you a tower you haven't researched yet. You can build it for the rest of that game only, which is a good way to try a tower before you spend XP on it.

Yes. On a map with a set number of waves (a scenario, or a Custom Map that is not endless) you can keep going after you win. Bonus waves count on the leaderboard: a game that won 15 waves and survived 4 more shows as 19 ("15 + 4") and ranks above a plain win. A map's owner can turn bonus waves off for its Owner's Rules board.

Yes: PlayStation, Xbox, Backbone and most others. The left stick moves a pointer, Cross / A clicks, Circle / B goes back, Triangle / Y starts the wave, the right stick moves the camera, L2 / R2 zoom and L1 / R1 turn. Settings > Controller shows which controller is plugged in and what every button does; pick an action and press a button to move it, and Reset puts the standard layout back.

Yes. Tap a tile to place the tower you picked, or drag to see it just above your finger and let go to place it. One finger moves the map, two fingers pinch to zoom, twist to turn and slide up or down to tilt.

Some guns heat up as they fire: the Cannon, Tesla, Lightning, Railgun and Laser (the build menu marks them with a heat icon). Every shot adds heat and the barrel cools back down on its own. If it gets too hot (400°C) the gun shows OVERHEATED, smokes and stops firing until it has cooled to 250°C. A Laser works a little differently: when its heat bar fills it fires one burst at double damage, then rests for a moment. The faster a gun fires (upgrades, fire-rate cards), the hotter it runs. The tower panel's heat gauge shows how hot a gun is and what is cooling it.

• A Cold Snap nearby: a gun standing in its snow sheds heat twice as fast at Cold Snap level 1, plus half again for every level after (6.5 times at level 10).
• Water beside the gun: each side of the gun that touches water cools it more: 1.5 times as fast with one water tile, up to 3 times with water on all four sides. A little cooling pump appears on the gun's base. Towers of one type built side by side share their water, so a whole line of Cannons along a river stays cool.
• Both together: snow and water add up (a level-1 Cold Snap and one water tile give 2.5 times).
• A rest: a gun that is not firing cools down on its own.

No water where you need it? The bulldozer's Dig makes some.

No, the cooling comes from the water itself. The Water Pump is a tower of its own: it stands on water and blasts Infernos, and it hits harder, faster and further for every water tile around it. What cools a gun is a water tile right beside it.

Two ways. It slows enemies (and a critical hit freezes them for a moment), so they spend longer in front of every other gun. And its snow cools the hot guns around it. Select a Cold Snap to see which: the guns it cools glow icy blue (faintly when a stronger Cold Snap is doing the work), and its panel says "Cooling 4 towers · heat drops 3× faster". Only the strongest Cold Snap over a gun counts, so spread them out rather than stacking them. A Cold Snap cannot slow Infernos.

The Support Station never shoots. It boosts every other tower in its range in three ways you build up one upgrade at a time: damage, reload speed and range, each +25% a step up to +100%. You choose which one the next upgrade improves. Select it to see the towers it boosts tinted green. Two stations do not add up: each tower gets the strongest boost of each kind. Standing higher makes its boosts stronger, it also raises a Miner's income and a Power Plant's output, and it never boosts another Support Station.

Yes. Build towers of the same type side by side and each one gets +15% damage and +10% fire rate for every neighbour. Neighbours are the towers on the four sides of its tile (corners do not count), so the most a tower can have is four: +60% damage and +40% fire rate. A neighbour far above or below it (more than about 5 levels of height) does not count, and different types never boost each other.

Missile Silos get more: +25% damage, +20% fire rate and +10% against armour for each neighbouring silo (up to +100% damage with four). Miners beside Miners earn more, and Power Plants beside each other make more power.

Neighbours help in other ways too: connected towers of one type each need 25% less power, and they share their water for cooling.

How to see it: while placing, the tower's ghost shows what the spot gives, such as "2 Cannon Towers beside: +30% damage, +20% fire rate". On a built tower, the panel's stats show the bonus in yellow, as +30% adj.

Cluster towers of the same type: a block of Cannons or Missile Silos hits much harder than the same towers scattered, runs on less power and cools together. Put the block where the path passes close, or bends round it, so they all reach it. Spread out the towers that do not add up: only the strongest Cold Snap over a gun cools it, and a tower takes only the strongest boost from one Support Station, so a second one over the same guns is wasted. Give each of those its own group of guns.

A lot. Every level a tower stands up, on a hill or on platforms, gives it 8% more damage and more range. A tower on bare grass loses 5% damage (not on a platform). Before you build, the tower's ghost shows what the spot gives it: height, neighbours, grass, Support Station boosts and, for a hot gun, Cold Snap cooling. See Terrain is a weapon.

Most towers need power. The base gives 60 for free, and a Power Plant (200 gold, no research) makes 40 more, plus 20 for every upgrade. A tower only draws its full need while it has a target. When you need more than you have, the towers farthest from the base go short first: LOW POWER means it can track but not fire. Build plants before a big wave, or switch off a tower guarding an empty stretch. The top bar shows power used against power you have. Full story: Power and heat.

• Cold Snap + Laser: the Laser grows stronger the longer it holds one target; slowed and frozen enemies stay in its beam longer, and the snow keeps it cool.
• Gravity Well + Cluster Mortar or Missile Silo: the well drags ground enemies into one tight bunch, and mortars and silos in its range fire at the bunch the moment it opens.
• Magnet + your other guns: it tears armour off enemies, so everything that hits them afterwards does more.
• Portal + a strong stretch of guns: it drops enemies back down the path to walk past your guns again.
• Support Station in the middle of your best guns, or among Miners for more gold.
• A row of Cannons along water: neighbour bonus, cheaper power and cooling in one.

More in the strategy guides.

Sign in, allow leaderboards when the game asks about Online features (you can change it in Settings > General), and play. From wave 5 your game is saved to your account as you go, wave by wave, and its score goes on the boards when the game ends: when you lose, when you win, or when you choose End game & post score in the pause menu. Saving and quitting keeps it off the boards, so you can carry on later.

A game that never ended (a crash, say) can still be published from My Account > Unfinished games with Publish now. It goes on the boards at its last finished wave: crash partway through wave 37 and it publishes wave 36. Start the game once first: waves it could not send (no internet, the website down, a crash) are kept on your computer and sent when you next start the game or sign in, so the newest wave is there before you publish. See every board on the leaderboards.

By waves first (bonus waves included), then lives left, then the faster time, then damage per second (DPS).

Every Standard game and Custom Map has a code that builds exactly the same map. Share yours from Share Map in the pause menu or on the game over screen (once the game has reached wave 5). To play a code, choose New Game > Map Code, or press Play next to any map on the maps page. A Standard map played from its code counts on that map's own board, not on the Standard board.

A shared map has two boards. On Owner's Rules everyone plays with the same towers, research, gold, lives and rerolls, and gets the same cards on the same wave, so it is a fair race. Unlocked is for playing the map with everything you have researched. Starting a map from its code asks which one you want, and your own research is never changed.

Beat wave 10 on a map nobody owns. The first finished game that beat wave 10 owns the map: the research you played with becomes its Owner's Rules, and the map's page says "Rules set by" your name. A game counts once it has ended and its score is on the boards (you lost, won or chose End game & post score, or you published it from Unfinished games), so beating wave 10 first is not enough if someone else ends their game before you.

In the game, the top bar shows the map's owner, or Unclaimed · wave 7 / 10 while nobody owns it yet. Make a Custom Map or play a brand-new Standard map to find one that is free. Scenarios have no owner.

Yes, in My Maps (main menu, or My Account on the website). You can choose the allowed towers and their research (up to your own level), starting gold, lives, rerolls and reroll packs, and switch bonus waves, map pictures and a full-map preview on or off. Before anyone scores, a change simply updates the rules. Once the map has scores, saving starts a new rules version with a fresh board; older boards stay on the map's page.

A map's page shows the leader's map as they played it, with every tower in place and each tower type's share of the damage. Click a player on the board to see theirs. A map's owner can keep players' pictures private on its Owner's Rules board; you always see your own.

Yes. Your best game on each map is kept as a replay. Watch anyone's from a map's board, or Load it to play on from any wave with their towers and cards (a loaded game is not ranked). In the game you can also save a video of any wave to share.

Yes. After a game on a map, give it a thumbs up or down, plus stars if you like for overall, difficulty and enjoyment. The map's page shows what players think. Your own rating stays private, and you can change or remove it any time.

In the game under Settings > Account, or on the website under My Account (Account Information for your screen name, Profile picture for your picture). Pictures come from the game's own art: the Clanker, every tower and every enemy. Both show next to your name on the leaderboards, in the forum and in the game.

Every wave a game sends is checked against what the game can really do: time, kills, lives, damage and gold. A score that doesn't add up is not thrown away. It is held for a look by our team before it reaches the board.

Your score was held for a check. It is kept, together with its replay and map picture, and shows on the board once the check is done. If one of our checks turns out to be wrong about honest games, we fix it and put those games back.

Sign in on the website and open a leaderboard. Next to each player's name (but not your own) there is a small Report button: pick a reason (cheating, an offensive name or something else) and add a note if you like. The score stays on the board until our team has looked at it. Reports are private, and the player is never told who reported them.

Our team reviews it. If it is fine, it goes on the board with its replay and map picture. If not, it is taken off the boards for good, and a player who cheats can be removed from the leaderboards.

On the forum's Bugs board (also Report a Bug at the bottom of every page). A pinned guide says what to include. Each report shows where it stands: Open, Pending, or Fixed.

Please do, on the forum's Feature Requests board. Each request shows its status, so you can see when it has been added.

Use the contact form, or say hello on the forum. For quick help, ask on our Discord.

Only what you allow. The first time you start, the game asks what it may send, and you can change each choice any time in Settings > General. Choose "No thanks" and stay signed out, and it sends nothing about you; it only asks the website now and then whether a newer version is out.

If you allow the leaderboards, your screen name, scores, map pictures and best replays are public. Anonymous launch reports and tower stats are off unless you tick them. Map ratings stay private. The full story is in our Privacy and Cookie Policy.