For a while, I was on a lookout for new idle games. I like it when numbers go up. Swarm Simulator is a pretty pure version of it. Numbers keep going up even if you do not have it active. There is a mobile version, but it has too many flashy graphics. I liked the Perfect Tower, but it is not a pure idle game. It needs to be active to make any sort of real progress, but it does allow you to be away while it does its thing. Perfect Tower II is a horrible idle game, on top of being a miserable video game. It is way too complicated. It is apparently slated to finally leave early access later this year. Maybe I’ll check it out again after that, but I hated the late game in early access.
Back in September of 2019, I found a new idle game. I stumbled into a game called Idle Apocalypse. At the time, it had not released all of its expansions, but it was out of beta. Basically it had a lot of content, but no endgame. I started playing, and it slowly got its claws in me for almost five years.
In Idle Apocalypse, Sid needs to destroy the world. In order to do that, he must keep a party of heroes occupied. While he works on his master plan, he enlists you to keep them busy by sending out monsters and demons. You have to build new floors in the tower, so you can build and upgrade creatures. You can never destroy the heroes, but every time your minions die, you get more stuff to upgrade your tower. The tower also has floors that produce resources for you. As you progress, you will unlock the ability to spawn different minions and generate different resources. Each floor has three creatures/resources, but you can only spawn/generate one type at a time from each floor. This makes the game a little more active, since you have to switch up things in order to progress.
The game is good at setting goals for you. Initially, your goal is to gain enough resources to do your first apocalypse. Apocalypsing destroys the world (and your tower). The game resets, and you start over again. However, you gain souls, which can be spent to make the numbers go up even faster. As you apocalypse over and over, your goals will change. Your goals usually align to unlocking the game’s expansions. These expansions introduce new resource types which, surprise, make the numbers go up even faster. Eventually you will reach the end, but the game has a prestige system. You will hit the end of the game, and you are given one last new resource. This resource skyrockets your numbers. To get the full story, you will want to prestige three times, however, there are still more upgrades to be had if you feel the need to continue. I ended up prestiging over 20 times just to unlock everything the game had to offer. To give you some rough timelines, it took over a year for me to prestige the first time. After that, it took a few months. By the end, I was doing it every month.
Idle Apocalypse is not as idley as I would like. The tower does work offline, but only for a few hours. This means I constantly needed to have my phone screen on, and the game active. I was able to set it aside since my minions and resources kept coming, but I would eventually need to check in, do some upgrades, and swap up some spawners.
As I progressed in the game, I started to learn when I needed to be active, and when I could let the game do its thing in the background. Early in the game, I could only keep the game offline for a few hours before it just stops producing stuff. By late game, I could keep the game offline for longer periods, but it never exceeded two days. This never mattered much, because the longest I would have it offline is when I slept. The game requires spurts of activity throughout the day, if you want to make progress quicker. In this sense, it is a bad idle game. However, I found it to be pretty good as a mobile game.
The game is free to play, but I ended up spending over $75 on it. Buying stuff is expensive, but I played the game for almost five years. For $10, you unlock “No Ads.” This is essential, and I think the $10 price tag is reasonable. The Tesla bundle is overpriced at $30, but it is so important if you are going to play the game for the long haul. It unlocks a thing that generates Electricity, which can only be gotten by luck otherwise. I bought some other packs, but they are less essential. I mainly bought them because I wanted to support the game. I suggest playing the game for a month, and if you see yourself playing it more, then go ahead and spend the money on those two things. I got almost five years of enjoyment from the game, so the $75 I spent was worth it to support the developers.
I should mention the other video game stuff about the game. I like the pixelated art style. The sprites and backgrounds look great. There are little pieces of lore hidden in the environment. Although I have the audio off most of the time, the music is great. The story is alright for an idle game. There are a lot of funny quips from Sid, the heroes, and minions. It is a well made game, and the developer’s poured a lot of love into it. It does not receive regular updates anymore, but the subreddit is still active after all these years.
Idle games could last forever. There are an infinite number of numbers, and Idle Apocalypse could have made there numbers keep going up. Instead, it has a satisfying ending. I am a bit relieved to be done with the game, but I will miss it. Maybe I will delete my save and start another five year journey.