Blog / Release notes
Homework Holdout: tower defense for your homework
Every excuse needs a backstory. In Homework Holdout, the bugs are real, they follow a pencil path across the page, and each one that gets through eats some of your homework. You start every level with 20 pages. How many you still have at the end decides your stars: 18 or more earns three, and 10 or more earns two.
How to play
- Pick a tower and place it on any free square. Hover over a tower with a mouse to see its range.
- Tap a tower to upgrade it through three levels, change its targeting, or sell it.
- Press Send to start a wave. Waves never begin until you say so.
- Drag on the page to scribble. Bugs on the line are slowed by 45%, scratched and revealed. Lines last 7 seconds and use ink, which refills over time.
On a keyboard, 1 to 8 pick towers, Q scribbles, Space sends a wave, and F changes the speed.
The towers
| Tower | Job |
|---|---|
| Pencil Turret | Single target. Hits flyers. |
| Stapler Gun | Fast and short-ranged, but weak against armor. |
| Tape Net | Slows a group and can hit flyers. |
| Eraser Bomb | Lobbed splash damage on the ground. |
| Glue | Sticks bugs in place for 5 seconds. |
| Ruler | A long line that hits every bug along it. |
| Highlighter | A beam that builds up to triple damage, ignores armor and reveals invisible bugs. |
| Gold Star | Speeds up every tower in its range. |
What's coming for your homework
Scribble Mites and Silverfish show up first. After them come Inkblots that split in three, armored Binder Beetles, Paper Moths that fly straight over your path, Invisible Ink you can't target until something reveals it, and Whiteout Weevils that heal their neighbors. The Bookworm is the first boss. Page 8 ends with The Dog, which barks to freeze nearby towers and ends the game outright if it reaches the homework.
Clear page 3 and you unlock Detention, an endless mode for seeing how long a build really lasts.
Tips
- A tower sells for its full price if no wave has started since you built it, so you can test placements for free.
- Sending a wave while bugs are still on the page pays an early bonus.
- Use Extra Credit squares when a page has them. A tower on one gets 20% more range and 25% more damage.
- Bring a mix of towers. Two Hallways, Invisible Ink and Extra Credit are the pages where buying only one or two kinds usually loses.
- Scribbling does nothing to flyers, so keep something on the page that can hit them.
Release log
- First release, with 8 pages and endless Detention.
- Towers renamed, and the Tape Net joined the lineup as a tower that slows groups.
- Hovering over a tower with a mouse now shows its range.
- Glue now sticks bugs completely in place for 5 seconds.
- Scribbling now uses ink 2.5 times faster, so it has to be aimed.