Troll Warrior

A castle full of swordsmen, spearmen and archers stands between you and the gate, and you are one troll. Soldiers come in formations rather than one at a time: swordsmen close, spearmen hold their line, archers work from the wall. Working out which is about to reach you is most of the game.

Blow scatters a rank, stomp flattens what is under you, and the bull charge takes you through a formation instead of around it — each on its own cooldown, so the order is the plan. When a catapult's boulder is coming down on you, a needle sweeps a bar at the bottom of the screen; hit it on the gold and the boulder goes back where it came from, into the gate.

You will not clear it the first time, and you are not meant to. Every run at a new stage pays out gold and a skill point whether you win or lose: the gold buys and upgrades weapons, helmets and armor, the points go into five skill branches, until the stage you could not finish is the stage you clear.

Troll Warrior is free to play right here in the browser — no install, no account.