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Defense Grid: The Awakening

Defense Grid: The Awakening

Defense Grid: The Awakening is a unique spin on tower defense gameplay that will appeal to players of all skill levels. A horde of enemies is invading, and it's up to the player to stop them by strategically building fortification towers around their base.

Released Dec 8, 2008 Developer Hidden Path Entertainment Platforms Windows Tower DefenseStrategySci-fiSingleplayerIndie
View on Steam ↗ $9.99 (US · as of 2026-07-26)

What players say

Steam review score and the most-helpful voices, which may include critical ones. Data as of 2026-05-20.

96.2%positive5,142 reviews
Recommended · 9 found this helpful

“After nearly two decades this is still the pinnacle of Tower Defense games in terms of strategy and consistency. Each new wave builds on the last meaning you can measure the effect of each new tower or upgrade on each new wave. You'll never just get overwhelmed out of nowhere…”

— a player, Steam review · 152 hrs played
Recommended · 9 found this helpful

“I highly recommend this, it's super old but has so much replayability. Tower Defense is never usually this fun, they accomplished something special with this. The quality voice acting has aged very well, funny British AI man is always solid. There is a bug where sometimes your…”

— a player, Steam review · 73 hrs played
Recommended · 4 found this helpful

“[b]Defense Grid: The Awakening (DG)[/b] is the best tower defense (TD) game I’ve ever played. It’s in the rare category of TD games that feature mazing, a level design mechanic that allows the player to shape and alter enemy paths through strategic tower placement. This gives…”

— a player, Steam review · 96 hrs played
Read more reviews ↗

Player activity

Monthly average concurrent players. Live count fetched 2026-07-11 11:43 UTC · history via SteamCharts.

30playing at last check
7124-hour peak
1,674all-time peak
0 250 500 2013 2015 2017 2019 2021 2023 2025 318 avg · May 2013

Achievement stats

Global completion rates across all Steam players — a data view of how far people actually get. Source: Steam official stats · as of 2026-07-25.

87achievements
17.1%median completion
1.2%rarest: Core Container
93.3% of players 92.6% of players 92.5% of players 91.2% of players 90.2% of players 89.6% of players 88.8% of players 85.7% of players 85.4% of players 84.9% of players 83.2% of players 82.4% of players 81.8% of players 80.5% of players 79.8% of players 78.6% of players 75.8% of players 74.5% of players 74.3% of players 74.2% of players 72.0% of players 70.3% of players 70.2% of players 68.6% of players 68.5% of players 65.0% of players 61.5% of players 60.0% of players 53.9% of players 53.7% of players 51.3% of players 50.7% of players 47.9% of players 43.9% of players 40.8% of players 36.2% of players 33.2% of players 28.4% of players 25.7% of players 24.7% of players 21.2% of players 18.2% of players 17.6% of players 17.1% of players 17.1% of players 16.3% of players 14.2% of players 13.6% of players 13.5% of players 11.6% of players 10.4% of players 10.3% of players 9.9% of players 9.4% of players 8.5% of players 8.1% of players 7.4% of players 7.1% of players 6.4% of players 6.3% of players 93.3% 0% most earned rarest
Almost everyone has
93.3%First Blood — Kill 1 alien.
92.6%Hey! That's mine! — Kill an alien carrying a power core.
92.5%Happy Returns — Recover a loose core.
Rarest badges of honor
1.2%Core Container — Earn a Gold medal on all 40 modes in the Containment campaign.
1.3%Clear Skies — Earn a Gold medal in the Campaign Reversed mode of Passage without building any Meteor or Missile towers or using the Orbital Laser.
1.3%Fully Contained — Earn at least a Bronze medal on all 40 modes in the Containment campaign.

Price tracking

US-region pricing (USD), sampled twice daily by our own tracker since 2026-07-11. Steam prices vary by region — always confirm your local price on Steam.

$9.99current · sampled 2026-07-26 08:39 UTC
$9.99lowest since tracking began2026-07-11
US9.99 USD
EU7.99 EUR
UK6.99 GBP
Australia14.50 AUD
Canada11.49 CAD
Japan1,010 JPY
Brazil20.69 BRL
China37.00 CNY

Regional prices at last sample, in local currency — Steam sets each region's price independently.

Brazil≈$4.1 China Japan Canada EU UK US Australia≈$10

Cheapest → most expensive, converted to USD at ECB reference rates (2026-07-24). Relative comparison only.

$0 $10 $20 07-11 07-13 07-16 07-19 07-22 07-26

Latest official news

Developer announcements via the Steam news API — links go to the original posts. More across all games on the news hub.

Jan 17, 2017
Defense Grid: The Board Game

Want to save the cores on your tabletop? Now's your chance! http://kck.st/2j2D55s

Jan 17, 2017
Defense Grid: The Board Game

Want to save the cores on your tabletop? Now's your chance! http://kck.st/2j2D55s

Aug 03, 2016
Defense Grid: The Board Game Stream starting Soon!

https://www.twitch.tv/gene_defect Come hang out with the developers of the board game and of the Defense Grid series!

Aug 03, 2016
Defense Grid: The Board Game Stream starting Soon!

https://www.twitch.tv/gene_defect Come hang out with the developers of the board game and of the Defense Grid series!

Mar 26, 2015
Celebrating Classic Scoring With a Sale

Hidden Path Entertainment released an update to Defense Grid 2 that adds the ability to play with classic scoring. To celebrate this addition Defense Grid: The Awakening and DLC will be on sale starti

Games like Defense Grid: The Awakening

From our knowledge graph — ranked by shared traits, not a black box. Each card says why it's here.

X-Morph: Defense X-Morph: Defense 92.1% · 1,666 reviews shares Aliens, Tower Defense, Replay Value, Futuristic Super Sanctum TD Super Sanctum TD 83.3% · 861 reviews shares Aliens, Tower Defense, Replay Value, Futuristic XCOM: Enemy Unknown XCOM: Enemy Unknown 93.0% · 35,366 reviews shares Addictive, Aliens, Replay Value, Futuristic Anomaly: Warzone Earth Anomaly: Warzone Earth 82.9% · 1,756 reviews shares Touch Friendly, Aliens, Tower Defense, Sci Fi Halo: Spartan Assault Halo: Spartan Assault 73.9% · 2,687 reviews shares Touch Friendly, Aliens, Futuristic, Sci Fi Halo: Spartan Strike Halo: Spartan Strike 76.2% · 875 reviews shares Touch Friendly, Aliens, Futuristic, Sci Fi UNDEFEATED UNDEFEATED 88.3% · 4,198 reviews shares Replay Value, Controller, Strategy, Adventure Sanctum 2 Sanctum 2 89.9% · 7,958 reviews shares Aliens, Tower Defense, Futuristic, Sci Fi

Screenshots

Official Steam store screenshots — click any shot to enlarge.

Facts & details

From the Steam store record, snapshot 2026-05-20.

GenresIndie, Strategy
Player tagsTower Defense · Strategy · Sci-fi · Singleplayer · Indie · Aliens · Futuristic · Addictive · Touch-Friendly · Replay Value · Adventure · Action (SteamSpy community voting)
FeaturesSingle-player · Steam Achievements · Full controller support · Steam Trading Cards · Remote Play on TV · Family Sharing
LanguagesEnglish, French, Italian, German, Spanish - Spain
ControllerFull support
Achievements87
Estimated owners500,000 – 1,000,000 (SteamSpy)
Official sitehttps://www.hiddenpath.com/game/defense-grid/
Minimum system requirements (PC)

Minimum: Supported OS: Windows XP, Vista Processor: 1.8GHz CPU or higher Memory: 512 MB RAM Hard disk space: 1GB available space DirectX version: DirectX 9.0c or higher, June 2008 version or later Video: Video: DirectX 9 video card with shader 2 support such as the following: ATI Radeon 9600 or newer (9600-9800, X300-X1950, HD 2400-HD 4870) NVIDIA GeForce 6100 or newer (6100-6800, 7100-7950, 8300-8800, 9600-9800, or GTX 216-280)