Gridle

ummm.. this is normal?

33:47 on first try ez

simple yet op way to get A LOT

Here's what I've figured out as far as high level strategy:

Working backwards, you want to get a boss to max level (3b) as soon as possible. To pay for that, you want to get a generator to max level (200m), with the highest value. To max the value, you surround it with 4 task masters, but you need to max the level of the task masters (since they will contribute their own value). The best way to raise the value of the task masters is with leaders.

Here's a more detailed walkthrough of what I do:

Optimal start is generator, upgrade, generator, upgrade, leech. I'm not sure what is optimal after that, but I generally play something like the following to get started. I place a "base" generator in the top left and build off that. Almost all of these other tiles will be replaced though.

After about $40/cycle, I will place one or two catalysts around the "base" generator in the top left. Then it's a slow process to place leeches and upgrade to max level, and place two more catalysts.

I build out the rest of the board, placing max level leeches and adding 5 leaders. 5 seems to be a good balance for cost. Once the board is filled it looks like

The next step is replace the catalysts with taskmasters.

After all four task masters are in place, then I upgrade the leaders to max level (5m).

Then wait, wait, wait for 200m to max the generator (this is two or three minutes of doing nothing). "good" numbers seem to be, you want to have $200m around $1.92m/cycle, and that will jump your income to 8-10m/cycle.

Then place a single boss (20m) (replace any leech), upgrade (50m), and wait, wait, wait for 3b for the final boss upgrade. The game is essentially over at this point, but you have to wait for the boss to double enough. You can speed it up by a minute or two by placing as many other bosses as you can and upgrading to max level (this is what enabled me to finally get sub 24). This is because they normally tick once/5, so if you can stack multiple it will grow much faster.

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Things I'm not sure about:

Generators should generally be upgraded as soon as possible, probably.

The end game seems to only require one generator, due to the growth from the task masters, but it seems like you should probably start with more than one generator, to have multiple low level leeches. I generally have the "base" generator in the top left, but I have a secondary generator in the lower right with catalysts that get upgraded to leaders. This seems like it has room for improvement ....

A leader adds +1 to every square on the board, which is +25 by itself. Each max leach will add +25 to that. This is base every 5 ticks, so I'm not sure if it's better to upgrade these first, or if it's better to place task masters first.

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Overall this is a fun game, I've probably spent around 20 hours playing, would recommend.

Very nice game! A couple of possible improvements, from simple-ish to complex. ;)

1. It would be nice to have level indicators on the machines (e.g. 1/3), and maybe some different indicator (a border?) when it’s maxed.
2. A way to speed or slow the game down (e.g. 2 cycles per second). It would require the “score” to be in number of cycles though.
3. Some kind of save system, including current game state and personal high score.
4. Not trivial, but some kind of leaderboard would be nice.

Even as-is, the game is certainly worth playing.

most OP build

the teal was pink before I switched them

#1 on the slow run board

with 50:16

Great game, but I did discover that there's an issue with either how the bosses are described, or how they boost generators. If you put a boss next to a generator, it doesn't buff it right, it only buffs it +1, not +itself

yeah, beat the game in only 252:08 minutes :-)

the leeches are useless