Lantern
Siege
One of you is the hero. The other is the Duskmaster, commanding the Gloom. Or team up as a tethered duet. Your friend joins free from a link, and the lamps you plant spread the light and fight for it.
Keyboard, gamepad or touch · no account, no ads · $4.99 once for two more regions
Be the Duskmaster, or team up: a friend joins in one tap
Tap Play with a friend, send the invite link or show the QR code, and they join in one tap. Co-op and versus are free in Wildroot Hollow, and they work on every map the host owns.
The Duskmaster
One of you defends the lantern. The other sends the horde.
- The Duskmaster sees the board from above and spends Gloom on brood packs, each with an order (hunt, besiege, smash lamps or ambush) and a warning rune before it lands.
- Packs can only land on dark ground, so every lamp the defender plants shrinks the Duskmaster's board.
- The Duskmaster picks Dread upgrades too. A two-minute interactive lesson teaches it.
- A match is two rounds with swapped roles, and the better turn on defense settles a tie. Rematch in one press.
Tethered Duet
Two defenders, joined by a line of light.
- The Lightline between you lights the ground it crosses and burns creatures that cross it. Walk apart to spread the light.
- Stay close for a Duet bonus, or split up to claim territory. You choose the moment.
- Revive a downed partner by standing next to them, and call things out with the ping wheel instead of voice chat.
- The lantern and lamps are shared, and so are evolutions.
One room code, one invite link, one QR code. Friends and Watchers sit underneath.Play online by invite link, QR code or room code, or play versus on one screen with two players. If a connection hiccups, the game catches the other player up instead of ending the match.
If the host owns the Full Game, everyone in the room plays the paid maps. Your friend does not have to buy anything.
A local friends list remembers who you played with and makes a fresh invite in one tap. There is no matchmaking or ranked ladder: online play is friend to friend.
Light is territory
Creatures in the dark are faster and tougher. The glow around your lantern is the only safe ground, so you spread it.
- Pick a Lamp card and plant it at the edge of the glow. A linked lamp pushes the light further out.
- The lantern can dim but never dies in solo or co-op, so there is always somewhere to fall back to. Nothing forces you home.
- Light 12 percent of the land and hold it, and the dawn comes: the horde falls. Or survive the clock and beat the region's ruler.
- Fight in the dark, heal in the glow, and follow the gold arrow when you wander too far.
The horde hunts your lamps
Seekers in the horde head for the lamps you plant, the furthest ones first. Lamps do not wait to be saved: they shoot, slow, heal and taunt on their own, and a network of linked lamps hits harder than a scattered few.
A network that fights back
- Link them. Each linked lamp nearby adds damage, up to a cap, and a dimmed lantern weakens the network, so keep it lit.
- Choose your fight. A lamp under attack shows an alarm and blinks on the map. Run out to defend it, mend it by standing close, or let it fall and plant another.
- A fallen lamp costs you. Its patch of light goes dark and a pack of Gloom boils up where it stood.
- Lamp cards raise damage, health, light radius, how many you can plant, and how well linked lamps cooperate.
Four lamp evolutions
Take a lamp to level 5, find its matching Lamp card, and it evolves.
- Thorn Battery: a rotating volley of thorns.
- Dawn Font: heals heroes far more and burns the Gloom.
- Bastion Totem: a wide taunt and a damage-soaking aura.
- Tempest Rod: lightning that chains across the crowd.
Level-up cards: Lamp cards only show up once you have a lamp standing.Every level you pick from three cards, and the build is yours: mortars, chain lightning, tornadoes, a sunbeam, shields, minions and lamps. Max a weapon, find its partner, and it evolves.
A quiet pause after each of the first three waves lets you spend embers on the lantern and your lamps before the next one comes.
Something happens mid-run
Every couple of minutes, between the waves and the giants, a small event breaks the rhythm. Each one is a bet: chase it for a reward, or hold your ground.
Falling star. Reach the crater for a Lantern Flame level and a shower of gems. Sleeping Gloom guard it.
Lantern merchant. Spend embers on stew, feathers, oil or a spare lamp, and keep the wagon alive.Then there is the cursed lamp: stand in its ring to cleanse it into a free lamp, or it pulses Gloom. Frostfall adds the Whiteout Caravan and Sunscar adds the Buried Cache. Pickups only collect on touch until you earn the Magnet card; then it pulls them in and levels up.
Then the giants come
A colossus that shakes the ground. A queen who calls her brood out of the dark. Each has its own moves, and each drops two treasure chests.
At the end of the run, the region's ruler arrives for a three-phase fight.
Six heroes, six ways to play
Each starter has its own signature weapon, a passive that changes how you fight, and a role. Five start with a lamp already planted.
In co-op, the right pair earns a good pair bond while you stay near each other, and a few pairs unlock a shared Duet evolution.
Static Charge: sparks chain one extra time, and kills sometimes arc a bolt to a nearby creature.
Dark Hunter: hits much harder outside the light, with burn and an extra fireball.
Packhunter: stronger with a partner, minion or lamp close, and thorns pierce one more.
Bulwark: takes less damage and regrows its shield faster. A point-blank frost pulse.
Warden: siege artillery whose lamps are tougher, hit harder and link their light farther.
Lightrunner: fast on lit ground, and gems come to you from a short distance.
Replays and spectators
Pulled off a great run? Send it.
- Share replay on any results screen makes a watch link that lasts 14 days. It holds no names, only the run.
- Viewers can pause, speed up, scrub, follow the hero or look around, and press a button to play the same seed themselves.
- Hosts can switch Watchers on in the lobby: up to four people spectate a live room, a few seconds behind.
Daily challenge and leaderboard
A new siege every day, the same for every player.
- The daily is a 6-minute run, always in Wildroot Hollow, and always free. The weekly is 12 minutes and rotates between the regions.
- Each has a twist, like a tougher dark or a more fragile lantern, and a leaderboard. A name is optional.
- Every run sets three goals. Finish them to earn cosmetic lantern flames and lamp rings. They change how things look, never how they play.
Six rulers, two per region
Wildroot Hollow is free. Frostfall Pass and Sunscar Dunes are no reskins: each one changes how you play. Every run rolls its creatures and its ruler from the seed, so you never know exactly who is coming, and now and then a drake sweeps across the map.
Deep Winter
The dark is freezing. Light is warmth, and the whole game is moving between the glow and the cold.
- Cold builds in the dark and slows you and your weapons. The light or a Hearthstone lamp warms you back up.
- Five frozen beacons stand in the snow. Thaw one for permanent light and a chest, but it calls a ring of creatures. Thaw all five and you win.
- Blizzards sweep in with wind that shoves you and the horde around.
- Armored dark creatures shrug off most damage until fire cracks them, and the Rime card hits them harder.
- The Whiteout Caravan crosses the storm with a chest, guarded by sleeping packs.
A whiteout in full swing: visibility drops and the wind pushes everyone.
The first beacon thawed: light returns, a chest drops, and a ring of creatures closes in. Five win the run.Shifting Sands
Nothing here is what it seems. Scout, bait, and do not trust the oasis.
- Burrowers erupt from the sand around you in packs, after a shaking mound warns you.
- Real and mirage oases look the same from far off. A real one heals you and lights the ground. A mirage dissolves up close and springs an ambush.
- Quicksand slows you and anything that wades in.
- The Mirage Decoy lamp pulls creatures off you, and the Scarab Swarm weapon sends homing scarabs at the horde.
- The Magmabull ruler charges across the sand and leaves lava behind. A Buried Cache can be dug up, if you survive the ambush.
The ground is shaking: burrow mounds about to erupt.
A lava trail left by the Magmabull's charge.Keyboard, gamepad, or thumb
You only steer, so it works on almost anything.
Move, pick a card, reroll, early flare, pause, fullscreen. A gamepad works too.
- Phone and tablet: hold it landscape and drag a floating thumb stick. Buttons are sized for thumbs.
- Desktop, iPad with a keyboard, or a gamepad: built desktop first, and desktops run the densest horde.
- A loading screen with real progress shows what is downloading, and a run can start with stand-in creatures while the real ones arrive.
Play first. Unlock when you want more.
The free version is a real game, not a timer. The Full Game is $4.99 once, no subscription.
| Feature | Free | Full ($4.99) |
|---|---|---|
| Wildroot Hollow and its ruler | Yes | Yes |
| Frostfall Pass and Sunscar Dunes | 3-minute preview each | Full runs |
| Solo, online co-op and versus | Yes, in Wildroot Hollow | Yes, on all three maps |
| A friend joins your room | Plays the maps you own | Everyone plays the paid maps |
| Six heroes, lamps, events, camp upgrades | Yes | Yes |
| Daily challenge and leaderboard | Always Wildroot Hollow | Same |
| Weekly challenge | On Wildroot Hollow weeks | Every week, including Frostfall and Sunscar |
| Replays, watch links and live spectators | Yes | Yes |
| Ads and accounts | None | None |
One license key opens the Full Game in up to three browsers. The key is checked with Polar and kept in your browser.
Hold the light
Free to play. In your browser. No account.
Questions
Is Lantern Siege free?
Yes. It runs in your browser with no account and no ads. The free version includes all of Wildroot Hollow, solo play, online co-op and versus, the daily challenge and its leaderboard, and shared replays. A one-time $4.99 Full Game unlock adds two more regions, Frostfall Pass and Sunscar Dunes, and the weekly challenge on those maps. You can try each paid region for a 3-minute preview before you buy.
What does the $4.99 Full Game include, and how does it work?
It opens Frostfall Pass and Sunscar Dunes for full runs, and it opens the weekly challenge on the weeks that feature those regions. You get a license key, paste it into the game, and it works in up to three browsers. The key is checked with our payment provider, Polar, and kept in your browser. It is a one-time purchase with no subscription.
How do lamps work?
Lamps are the heart of the game. Pick a Lamp card and a lamp drops where you stand. Plant it at the edge of the glow and it links to the lantern, pushes the light outward, and shoots, slows, heals or taunts depending on its kind. Lamps near each other link into a network that hits harder. The horde hunts your lamps, so you choose which to defend, repair or let fall. Lamp cards raise their damage, health and reach, and a fully upgraded lamp plus the matching Lamp card evolves into a Thorn Battery, Dawn Font, Bastion Totem or Tempest Rod.
Can the lantern be destroyed?
Not in solo or co-op. Creatures can dim the lantern, which shrinks its glow and weakens the healing and the lamp network that depends on it, but it never goes out, and nothing forces you to run home. In versus, the Duskmaster can snuff it out. You win a run by lighting 12 percent of the land and holding it, which brings the dawn and makes the horde fall, or by beating the region's ruler.
What do the six heroes do?
You start as one of six heroes: Sparkhorn, Cinderfox, Thornwolf, Frostbear, Rootkin or Tidewolf. Each has its own weapon, a passive that changes how you move or fight, and a role (damage, support or control). Five of them also start with a lamp. In co-op, some pairs are a good pair and earn a bond bonus while they stay close.
How do I play with a friend?
Choose Play with a friend, then send the invite link, show the QR code, or share the room code. Your friend taps the link and joins in one tap. Co-op (Tethered Duet) and versus both work this way. Versus also runs on one screen with two players, and after a match you can ask for a rematch. There is no matchmaking or ranked ladder: online play is friend to friend.
Does my friend need to buy the Full Game too?
No. If the host owns the Full Game, everyone in the room plays the paid maps for that match. A friend who does not own it is offered the unlock afterward, and nothing is saved on their side.
What is the Duskmaster?
In versus, one player defends the lantern and the other is the Duskmaster. The Duskmaster spends Gloom to drop packs of creatures onto dark ground, gives each pack an order, plants runes and picks Dread upgrades. Every drop shows a warning first. A two-minute interactive lesson teaches the controls, and a match is two rounds with swapped roles, so both of you take a turn on each side.
Can other people watch my run?
Yes, two ways. After any run, Share replay makes a watch link that stays up for 14 days and contains no names: viewers can scrub, change speed, follow or free-look, and start a run on the same seed. In an online room, the host can switch Watchers on and up to four people can spectate live, a few seconds behind. Everyone watching should be on the current version of the game.
What are the daily and weekly challenges?
Everyone gets the same seed, hero and twist, so scores are comparable. The daily challenge is a 6-minute run, always in Wildroot Hollow, so it is always free. The weekly challenge is a 12-minute run that rotates between the three regions; on a Frostfall or Sunscar week you need the Full Game to enter. Both have a leaderboard, and a name is optional. Each run also gives you three small goals, and finishing them earns cosmetic lantern flames and lamp rings. Nothing you earn changes gameplay.
What are the controls? Does it work on phones and tablets?
On a computer, move with WASD or the arrow keys, or a gamepad, and everything else fires on its own. When you level up, press 1, 2 or 3 or click a card, R rerolls, Esc pauses and F goes fullscreen. On a phone or tablet, hold the screen landscape and drag a floating thumb stick; the buttons are sized for thumbs. The game is built desktop first, and a keyboard on an iPad or a gamepad works too. There is also an Android APK on itch.io.
How long is a run, and do I need to download anything?
A full run is 12 minutes in four waves with a quiet pause after each of the first three, then the region's ruler. Quick runs are 6 minutes, and you can win early by holding the light goal. Nothing to install: a loading screen shows real progress, the game fetches only the creatures your first run needs, and the rest loads in the background and is kept on your device.
Is the art AI-made?
The creatures are the studio's Battle Creatures art, which is AI-assisted and directed and edited by the studio. The lamps, lanterns, props and Gloom creatures were made with an AI 3D tool and processed for the game by the studio. Effects and interface are made in code.
Privacy
No account and no ads. The game counts anonymous plays on sviewstudios.com (a play started, a play finished) and keeps your progress in this browser only. Shared replays hold no names or device ids. Challenge scores use an anonymous id and an optional name. If you buy the Full Game, the key is checked with Polar and stored in this browser.
More
Made by Joseph Ting at South View Studios. Creatures from Battle Creatures. Questions? Get in touch.