itch.io

Spent hundreds of runs, but was ultimately able to survive for 5min before unlocking the beam (i.e. starting the 5min run before 30:00, ending before 35:00).

You have a small bug (folks below reported it, but without details): if one scrolls the passives tab down to Impatient / Very Impatient, and then click on the Upgrades tab, the Pierce button, even though invisible, is located right underneath the Upgrades button, and also gets pressed, thus purchasing a very expensive (and rather useless) passive ability.

Also, the build I used above to pass 5:00 was: max runes, max mouse, max seeker, max emp, max sword, hp up, thorns, impatient, very impatient. This build passes 5:00 very reliably (I'd say 4 times out of 5). The very same build without Impatient / Very Impatient almost never gets past 4:50. I think something is not quite properly initialized when Impatient / Very Impatient is enabled, making the enemies ever so slightly weaker.

Upgrading towers after defeating Father would defeat the purpose of the challenge :) So you spend whatever money you have after Father is defeated, and after that to only move towers, but not to buy / upgrade them.

The idea there is to use clovers to clone EMP, and sell them, which gives you extra 3600 to spend.

Another question is whether it's intended that when the summoner is defeated, the game doesn't award money for the remaining spawns. This way, if I have say mostly Ice / Teslas by the time I fight the summoner, most of the spawns would die from the shards / lightning chain, and I'd end up with more money than if I mostly have stones, that kill the summoner before most of the final set of spawns. I made some experiments, and the difference in money made from the summoner wave can be as high as 100+ extra gold depending on how many spaws remain alive when the Summoner is killed.

Took me a while to find it, but the following sequence solves "harder" without losing lives, using restarts, using clovers, selling towers, or unlocking Fire or Energy:

Sling x2 : Crossbow x2 : Acid x3 : Boulder x3 : Fountain x1 : Water x3 : Ice x12 : Stone x10

So the game probably needs an "even harder" mode :) Potentially unlocked together with the Endless mode.

Also would be cool if the final credits sequence recognized the number of remaining unlocks, and whether the towers were sold / moved during the game.

Some other fun challenges:

1. Using only one tower supertype. Earth is enough to solve "harder", but I was not able to solve it with any other kind alone (I suspect that Water is doable);

2. Using only two towers types. Acid + boulder and acid + water are both enough to solve "harder", but the last two waves require a lot of effort;

3. Not building any towers after defeating Father.