Workshop › Tower Defense › Step 1 of 42

Tower Defense: Measure the map

Build towers beside the road and stop the waves before they get through. Walking along a path by distance, turning mouse clicks into tiles, choosing targets, homing bullets, splash damage and waves that grow stronger.

What we are doing

We are building a tower defense game: enemies walk along a road, and the towers you build beside it shoot them. First the measures: a map of 12 × 9 tiles of 40 pixels, with a strip on top for gold, lives and buttons. Then a dark background.

```js
const canvas = document.getElementById('game')
const ctx = canvas.getContext('2d')

const TILE = 40
const COLS = 12
const ROWS = 9
const TOP = 40 // room for gold, lives and the tower buttons

ctx.fillStyle = '#0f172a'
ctx.fillRect(0, 0, canvas.width, canvas.height)
```

What it means

Your turn

Write the code under the three comment lines, then press Run.

Skills: Drawing on a canvas

All steps

  1. Measure the map
  2. A map of tiles
  3. Draw it every frame
  4. The road as corners
  5. Fill in the road
  6. Draw the road
  7. Walking by distance
  8. Enemies on the road
  9. Walk
  10. Off the end of the road
  11. Here they come
  12. Towers
  13. From a click to a tile
  14. Click to build
  15. Where can you build?
  16. Show the gold
  17. Show before you click
  18. Show the range
  19. Pick a target
  20. Fire!
  21. A hit hurts
  22. Homing bullets
  23. Fizzle out
  24. Gold for every kill
  25. Lives
  26. Health bars
  27. Build, then defend
  28. Space starts a wave
  29. The wave is over
  30. Stronger every wave
  31. Closer together
  32. Out of lives
  33. No building after the end
  34. The most waves survived
  35. The game over screen
  36. Play again
  37. The bottom bar
  38. Click to start
  39. A second tower: the cannon
  40. Tower buttons
  41. Splash damage
  42. Build it yourself: sell a tower