For the next entry in Electric Thumbs, my Android gaming series, I thought I’d look at the tablet game I’ve spent the most time playing: Kingdom Rush.

I first heard of Kingdom Rush after I saw it in a Humble Mobile Bundle. I’m generally not a big fan of tower defence games; after playing Kingdom Rush, however, I started to realise maybe I hadn’t played the right one yet. This entertaining, addictive, and colourful Android game consistently kept me coming back for just one more stage.

Like almost all tower defence games, Kingdom Rush is dead simple to explain. You build a variety of offensive and defensive towers to stop advancing enemies reaching your base. You can upgrade the towers and command a hero with special abilities to help you on the battlefield.

Part of my goal with Electric Thumbs is to highlight games that are best suited to tablets. To me, Kingdom Rush represents the ideal tablet game. There are generally four criteria I judge Android games by: Easy to pick up and play. Easy to put down and come back to. Intuitive touchscreen controls. Unique tablet experience.

Each stage doesn’t last very long to complete; I think I spent at most 20 minutes from start to finish. However, unlike some tablet games there’s actual skill and strategy involved in Kingdom Rush. Even if you’ve got the perfect tower setup one or two slipups can ruin your round. My preferred strategy soon became to load up on elven archers and decimate the advancing hordes.

The game’s presentation is fun, engaging, and well-polished. I particularly enjoyed the fantasy setting, with a mix of knights, elves, and dwarves. Even though the unit catchphrases are shamelessly pulled from pop culture I never grew tired of them. In fact, I found the game so much fun that I kept coming back until I finished the main campaign. I even went out and bought the other two games in the series, Kingdom Rush Frontiers and Origins. The gameplay is nearly identical but there are new units and enemies so the sequels kept my interest throughout.

While there are in app purchases in Kingdom Rush, these are purely optional and I never felt tempted by the new Heroes. For under £1 you can’t go wrong; I got several hours of enjoyment from Kingdom Rush and I’d buy it again in a heartbeat.