← Back to the game

Version history

You're on production · build v0.16.0

VersionReleasedWhat's new
v0.16.0Nov 10, 2026
  • Five Keeps: the game has a new name and a new home at fivekeeps.com. The old address takes you there, but stars and settings start fresh.
  • The Engineer: a new hero whose rivet gun runs hot, and whose Overclock makes a tower fire twice as fast and soaks up her gun's heat. Her bot, Pip, plays beside you in her own voice.
  • Flyers fly, and the Tesla Coil brings them down: Wing Rats, Wyverns, Wraiths and flying bosses climb high and only come down at the objective. The Tesla Coil is the anti-air tower, and Siege Cannons no longer hit flyers.
  • One new thing at a time: on the Bridge and Mirrorlake, Wing Rats get a wave to themselves before the first Portal Keeper comes.
  • Restart from the pause menu: the level, or in a campaign the whole run. With friends, the party agrees first.
  • Menus start where you're going: Enter or A presses the likely next step, and a controller's Start and B work on every menu.
  • Lore, Feedback and version history: every hero has a Lore page, a Feedback button sits on the main menu, and the build line shows what's new in each release.
  • Fixes: Wolfstooth Pass's east road is clear, the portals of an overrun ending open on open ground, nobody lands behind the Bridge's hay cart any more, New here lists only monsters that really come, the bastion tops on the Winter Spire and the Gate no longer flicker, and odd addresses open the game.
v0.15.0Nov 6, 2026
  • The Long Winter (open from Nov 9): a second campaign of five levels, marching north through the snow to break an endless winter. Hold Hollowmere's Great Hearth against Snagtooth and his wolf sled, the sledge ring on frozen Mirrorlake against Rimehorn, the signal beacon of Wolfstooth Pass in a blizzard against Hoarfang, and the Runeforge of Deepdelve Hold against the Bone Thane, then make a last stand at the Winter Spire against the Queen of the Long Night that ends in dawn. Campaign on the main menu now opens a picker of the campaigns.
  • Holding the line: in The Long Winter you win a level by holding it. The portals flicker and collapse one by one, the monsters left break and run for them, and a March on banner names the next level.
  • Weather: snow, blizzards, night skies, the aurora and fog banks.
  • A win feels like a win: a big gold VICTORY, the level's own success line, stars stamping in one by one and a fanfare.
  • First Looks: in a campaign run, the first monster, coins, tower, boss, flyer and Portal Keeper each get a short cut scene, once a run: the world stops, every camera turns to it with an outline and a pillar of light, and a voice says what it is.
  • The results wait for everyone: no timer moves the party on; the screen says who it's waiting for.
  • Every level has one hand-made layout again, with The Retreat's original roads, pads and scenery back on the Farm, Bridge, Gate, Town Hall and Castle. Map numbers are gone. The Farm has a third tower pad, up on a knoll, and a windmill.
  • Touch: iPhone and iPad Safari no longer zoom the page in a match, and the 3D view fills the screen after you turn the phone.
v0.14.0Nov 6, 2026
  • A privacy policy and terms of service.
v0.13.0Nov 2, 2026
  • Learning to build: facing a tower pad shows a pop-up with what to press and what it costs, and the build menu keeps the mouse pointer inside it while you pick a tower.
  • On the Farm, a short cut scene shows the party where to build as soon as it can afford its first tower: the pad is outlined, a pillar of light marks it and a voice tells you, even with no bots.
v0.12.0Nov 1, 2026
  • Knight: Crushing Blow is as quick as the Mage's Fire Bolt, lands where you click and cleaves the crowd in front of you.
  • Taking a hit flashes the edge of the screen red, with a thump and a small kick of the camera.
  • 45 seconds before every level's first wave, with a bigger pop-up to call it early (before wave 1 that pays nothing; between waves it still pays). The level's intro card stays up until the first wave starts or you close it.
  • Ground monsters are solid: you can't walk through them.
  • The Gate: a landing and parapets on the stairs up to the tower tops.
v0.11.0Nov 1, 2026
  • The Farm: Gloop has less health, so a party with both towers can beat him at any size.
  • When a browser's graphics fail, the game says so clearly instead of showing a broken screen.
v0.10.0Nov 1, 2026
  • New players start as the Mage, beside a Ranger bot, and the hero picker reads Mage, Ranger, Knight.
v0.9.0Oct 31, 2026
  • Knight rework: hold to charge the sword for one huge blow, a faster Crushing Blow that hacks back and forth, a harder-hitting Whirlwind and a quicker Shield Block. The charge sound waits a moment, so ordinary swings stay quiet.
  • The Mage is the area hero: the Fireball hits for less (105, was 160) but still sets the whole pack burning.
  • Bots chat: they talk to each other in quiet moments and react to your big moments.
  • Run turns off when you stop or back up.
  • The campaign results show each level's gold saved beside its stars.
v0.8.0Oct 30, 2026
  • Replay: after any level, won or lost, the party can vote to play it again. In a campaign a replay starts with the gold you arrived with, and its result replaces the old one.
  • A clearer results screen: stars and gold saved first, then a card for each hero with damage, kills, towers, revives and downs.
  • Every new lobby starts with a bot.
  • Charged shots look charged: the Mage's orb catches fire and the Ranger's arrows crackle with lightning.
v0.7.0Oct 30, 2026
  • Phones and tablets: play by touch, sideways. A move stick under your left thumb, drag the right side to look, and buttons for Jump, Run, both skills, Build, Revive and the menu. Push the stick past its rim to sprint, hold and slide a skill button to aim, and tap the wave box to call the next wave. Light aim assist, and touch settings for look speed, button size and opacity, a fixed or floating stick, left-handed play and vibration. Your first touch match shows what each control does.
  • Add to Home Screen for full screen and landscape on iPhone and iPad.
  • Back after a drop: if your connection drops or you reload, you go straight back to your place in the match.
  • Reviving: a marker over downed teammates that you can see from far away, and a big prompt and progress bar while you revive.
  • A Graphics quality setting (Auto, High, Medium, Low), and a choice of Twin-Stick or Single-Stick controller layout.
v0.6.0Oct 29, 2026
  • Bot teammates: fill empty seats in Quick Match, Private Game and Solo with bots. They walk and run like heroes, fight like a decent player, pick up coins, go after Portal Keepers, revive downed teammates (people first) and use their powers where they count.
  • Bots talk: they speak as Brask, Wren and Tuck, each with their own voice, look and banter, call out what matters with a marker on it, and show captions. A Bot voices setting turns them down or off.
  • The menu says Paused when the game is paused.
v0.5.0Oct 28, 2026
  • Build and upgrade menus: a bird's-eye view of the pad with the tower's range ring, a card for the tower in focus, and what the next level adds, with new powers called out. Upgraded towers float a Roman numeral (II, III, IV).
  • Coins fly to you: coins near a standing hero are pulled in, and you pick them up from 50% further away.
  • Heroes: Net Shot and Rift Walk bank a second charge, the Ranger's fully drawn shot hits one monster very hard, and the Knight runs at twice his walking speed.
  • When you're downed, a bigger countdown says when you'll be back on your feet.
  • A simpler wave display, and the Frost Spire says it gets Deep freeze at level 3.
v0.4.0Oct 28, 2026
  • Portal Keepers: a new monster that opens a portal beside the road and sends reinforcements through it until he's brought down. He comes to the Bridge, the Gate, the Town Hall and the Castle.
  • Stars: each level won earns 1 to 3 stars, for the objective's health and the gold you saved.
  • Gold carries over in a campaign, from each level to the next, so saving early pays off at the Castle. A level played on its own starts with set gold.
  • Call the next wave early, even while one is still running, for bonus gold.
  • Seeded maps: every match picks its roads and pads from a seed, and a single level's map can be shared and replayed.
  • Every level retuned, ending with a ten-wave Castle.
v0.3.0Oct 27, 2026
  • Campaign: play the five levels in order, back to back, with the same party, in Solo, Quick Match or a Private Game.
  • A new home screen: choose Campaign or Single Level, and pick your hero in the lobby. Calmer menus, and the Monsters and Towers book is the Lore book in the corner.
  • Hero reworks: the Knight is the fastest hero, with a Shield Block that holds back the monsters in front and lets go into a Whirlwind and a leap. The Ranger's Net Shot comes every 5 seconds, and the Mage is the slowest hero with a Rift Walk every 7.
  • Faster attacks for every hero, a click made during the cooldown is queued, and skill cooldowns show as a bar.
  • Controller menus move one focus at a time.
v0.2.0Oct 25, 2026
  • Five levels: the Farm, the Bridge, the Gate, the Town Hall and the Castle, each with its own map, objective, towers, waves and boss. Pick one in Quick Match, Private Game or Solo.
  • The siege: monsters that reach the end of the road stay and bash the objective until heroes drive them off.
  • New here: each level opens with an intro card showing its new towers and monsters, and the first sighting of each new monster gets a callout. A Monsters and Towers book from the main menu tells you about them all.
  • Level endings: win and the party falls back to the next level; lose and the level is overrun. The Castle is the last stand.
v0.1.0Oct 24, 2026
  • The first release: the castle tower defence game, now online for 1 to 4 players in first person, on one map with 25 waves. Play a Quick Match, a Private Game with a code or invite link, or Solo, and friends can drop in mid-match.
  • Three heroes: the Knight, the Ranger and the Mage, each with two skills. The Mage throws quick Fire Bolts or charges a Fireball that sets monsters burning.
  • Towers are built, upgraded and sold from the ground on stone pads, with one shared gold pool. Monsters drop coins that heroes pick up, and the range stones on the castle's tower tops show every tower's reach.
  • Monsters fight back. Downed heroes can be revived by a teammate in a second, or get back up after 20 seconds.
  • Run on stamina, climb the castle's stairs to stand on its towers, and play with mouse and keyboard or a controller.