Ironhold Lanes

Ironhold Lanes is the kind of tower defence I keep coming back to. Instead of one path, you shape the routes yourself by building walls, which turns every map into a small puzzle before the first wave even arrives. Getting the maze right feels genuinely clever.

Towers each cover a niche — slow, splash, single-target — and none of them win on their own. The economy is tight enough that you can't just spam the strongest option, so you're always reading the incoming wave and deciding what to sacrifice.

It's not the flashiest game visually, but the mechanics are deep. I finished the campaign and immediately started replaying maps to beat my own defences.

What we liked

• Build-your-own-path maze mechanics
• Tight economy forces real choices
• Meaty campaign with replay value