Painted Kingdoms combines real-time strategy with firefighting on lavish maps made entirely of paper

It takes a lot to get me interested in anything tower-defensive these days, and I'm getting pretty grouchy about paper-based aesthetics, too, but "minimalist strategy game" Painted Kingdoms combines these trends to promising effect. It takes place in a living book, where each chapter is illustrated according to a different cultural heritage, extending from Europe to China.

As a roving general-hero, your job is to build a settlement by filling in the blank pages with your magic brush, giving...