Comparison

Tiny Guardians vs Hero's Quest

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Tiny Guardians

This strategy game offers a unique twist on the tower defense genre. Summon diverse guardians with upgradable abilities to protect a protagonist on her quest. Collect cards, strategize against various enemies, and overcome challenging boss fights.

Highlights
  • Tower defense without towers
  • 12 guardian classes with 4 upgradable levels
  • Over 40 diverse enemy types
  • Unique boss fights and special events
  • Story and Challenge Modes with multiple difficulties
  • Collectable illustrated guardian cards
Features
Read full description

From the creators of King’s League: Odyssey comes Tiny Guardians - a strategy TD game with a twist! "I'm giving the game 5 stars, because I love everything about it. I will be playing until the brutal bitter end and loving all of it." - AppGamer (5/5) "I can’t recommend it strongly enough. It’s a unique spin on tower defense that’s easily worth the price of admission." - Gamezebo (4.5/5) "The concept is simple and different enough to separate this one from the rest, and it’s just a nice breath of fresh air when you think about it." - AppAdvice (4.5/5) AWARDS & ACCOLADES ► Taipei Game Show 2016 Indie Game Awards – Most Popular Game ► Casual Connect Asia 2015 Indie Prize Awards – Best Game In Show Audience Choice ► Astro Go Innovate 2014 Showcase – Grand Prize ► Featured in the App Store’s Best New Game ► Featured in the App Store’s Best of April 2015 ► Featured in the App Store’s 15 Cutest Games Collection Prepare to embark on an epic adventure! Summon unique guardians to defend Lunalie against various enemies as she journeys through Prism in search of her missing aunt, the Sorceress. Beware of wild beasts, eerie creatures, molten enemies and mysterious circus folk along your journey. With each unlocked class and enemy, expand your collection of dazzling cards! Various updates and unit classes allow for diverse strategies, allowing a different experience on every try. • TD without towers, a refreshing take on this strategy genre. • 12 guardian classes (with 4 upgradable levels each) are available. • Over 40 diverse enemy types, come up with different strategies to defeat them. • Exciting and unique boss fights and special events in certain levels. • Each level has a Story and Challenge Mode, each with three difficulties. • Achievements are integrated with the Game Center to store all your accomplishments. • Gorgeously illustrated cards to summon guardians. Collect them all! • All the above allow for plenty of strategies! * Retina display support - view all the detailed artwork in high quality! * Universal app: play on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. * iCloud support for you to share your progress across devices. Regarding In-App Purchases: IAPs in the game are purely cosmetic. No additional purchase is needed to finish the game. For more information or if you have enquiries/feedback, drop by one of the below: • Developer site: kurechii.com • Game Site: tinyguardians.com • Twitter: @kurechii • Facebook: facebook.com/kurechii • General: hello@kurechii.com • Tech Support: bugs@kurechii.com

About

Hero's Quest

Embark on an epic adventure as a hero, exploring a world filled with monsters and powerful bosses. Strategize your battles, level up your character, and collect gold, weapons, and equipment to enhance your stats and abilities. Discover new fighting styles and combinations in this roguelite RPG.

Highlights
  • Automatic battles
  • Hero and skin customization
  • Skill tree progression
  • Unlockable areas and bosses
  • Roguelite permanent upgrades
  • Portrait orientation gameplay
Features
Read full description

Hero's Quest is a game where you play the role of a lovely hero, go around exploring the world, and challenge your fighting ability to reach the highest level in the limited energy range. Your mission is to reach the highest level as you can to get a lot of gold coins, new weapons and equipment to improve your stats. Initially, you will have 20 energy points (EP). Trying to maintain or improve this stat so you can get high levels in the game. Every time you beat monsters and Bosses, you will get gold coins. The more monsters you beat, the more money you have and the faster you go on the adventure. The more you win, the faster you level up. The higher the level, the higher your ability to defeat the aggressive monsters encountered along the jorney. During the game, you will gradually discover your abilities and find the most effective fighting style for yourself. That's the magic, it can be very rewarding to play and discover new strategies or relics combinations. Explore the world and challenge yourself to reach the highest levels within limited energy! • Heroes and Skins • Hero’s Quest allows you to choose different characters to participate in thrilling battles, each hero have different bonus stats and wonderful pixel art skins. Heores can also be situational you'll have to chose the most suitable Hero for each scenario. • Skill Tree • Players can chose between multiple passive Skills to shape the gameplay the way they like. Skills are separated into different types ranging ranging from ofensive, defensive or utility skills. • Immersive world • Unlock multiple areas, where with powerful monsters enemies are waiting for you. Battle can be very intense the further you get. Players also need to defeat Bosses with outstanding power to unlock new Maps, Relics and Equipment. • Roguelite action • Roguelite is an evolution of the Roguelike genre, this means you still have to start the game from the beginning when the game is over, but you also have permanent upgrades to make each run easier and esiear while also making you progress further and further. The more you play, the more you progress! • Automatic battle • You'll find monsters along the map and your job is to choose the fights. Your focus should be on strategy, Hero and Relics combinations. Let the game do the rest. • Portrait orientation • Play the game anywhere with only one hand. Music by Aaron Krogh: https://soundcloud.com/aaron-anderson-11 Character Art by Ækashics: http://www.akashics.moe/

Screenshots

Tiny Guardians4 screens
Hero's Quest4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Hero's Quest at Free against Tiny Guardians's $3.99. Hero's Quest also leads on update cadence (fortnightly vs every 5 months). Tiny Guardians's advantage is ads (none vs shown) and review sentiment (90% vs 66%). On rating, ratings volume, in-app purchases and monetization model there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Hero's Quest is free to download; Tiny Guardians costs $3.99 up front. Tiny Guardians sells 11 one-off in-app purchases and Hero's Quest sells 22 one-off in-app purchases. Whichever you choose, the download price is not the number that matters.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 4.8 for Tiny Guardians against 4.8 for Hero's Quest. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 1.1K and 1.3K respectively. Written reviews are what separate them: 90% of Tiny Guardians's written reviews are positive against 66% of Hero's Quest's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Tiny Guardians ships an update every 5 months, Hero's Quest fortnightly. The most recent releases landed on October 16, 2026 and October 10, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard5 real differences · 5 level
Tiny Guardians versus Hero's Quest: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterTiny GuardiansHero's Quest
Price$3.99Free — better
Rating4.8 (1.1K ratings)4.8 (1.3K ratings)
Positive reviews90.1% of reviews — better66.0% of reviews
Number of ratings1.1K1.3K — better
Update frequencyEvery 5 monthsFortnightly — better
AdsNo — betterYes
In-app purchasesYesYes
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree with in-app purchases
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS9.0 — better15.0
Further details — not scored
Size459 MB210 MB
Age rating9+9+
DeveloperKurechiiMurilo Bastos

Customer experience

Tiny Guardians

All ratings1,113 ratings
Positive96.4%
Neutral1.8%
Negative1.8%
Written reviews364 reviews
Positive90.1%
Neutral3.3%
Negative6.6%

Hero's Quest

All ratings1,344 ratings
Positive94.7%
Neutral2.0%
Negative3.3%
Written reviews203 reviews
Positive66.0%
Neutral9.4%
Negative24.6%

User reviews

Tiny Guardians

From 1.1K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Fun and unique gameplay
  • 🎨 Charming art style
  • 🔍 Interesting twist on tower defense
  • 💰 Good value for money

Room to improve

  • 🔍 Gameplay can get repetitive
  • 📱 UI/text too small on newer devices
  • 🐛 Occasional crashes and bugs
  • 🕰️ Slow pacing at times

Hero's Quest

From 1.3K App Store ratings

What we love

  • 👍 Fun and addictive gameplay
  • 🚀 Frequent updates and developer engagement
  • 🔒 No exploitative monetization
  • 💡 Innovative progression system

Room to improve

  • 🔁 Repetitive gameplay loop
  • 🔍 Lack of content variety
  • ⏱️ Slow progression at higher levels
  • 🔋 Battery drain issues

Bugs and requests

Tiny Guardians

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Game crashes at certain levels
  • Objectives not registering as complete
  • Inability to skip tutorial on repeat playthroughs

Requested features

4 requests
  • More levels and content updates
  • Ability to use new units in older levels
  • Additional game modes and challenges
  • Improved targeting and unit control

Hero's Quest

Reported bugs

3 issues
  • Game crashes on startup
  • Infinite loading screen
  • Crit rate bug causing inconsistent damage

Requested features

4 requests
  • Add teleport/skip functionality
  • Implement a reset progress option
  • Improve the equipment progression curve
  • Introduce more enemy/boss variety

In-app purchases

11 purchases

Tiny Guardians

One-time11
  • Archer Alternative Appearance$1.99
  • Paladin$1.99
  • Sentinel$1.99
Show 8 more
  • Knight Alternative Appearance$1.99
  • Berserker Alternative Appearance$1.99
  • Hunter Alternative Appearance$1.99
  • Wizard$2.99
  • Magician Alternative Appearance$2.99
  • Rogue Alternative Appearance$4.99
  • Dancer$4.99
  • Alternative Appearances Bundle$8.99
22 purchases

Hero's Quest

One-time22
  • Tickets - Tiny$0.99
  • Ad Skip - Tiny$0.99
  • Remove Ads$1.99
Show 19 more
  • Tickets Small$1.99
  • Skin: Void Bender$1.99
  • Skin: Shadowbringer$1.99
  • Ad Skip - Small$1.99
  • Skin: Warlock Warrior$1.99
  • Skin: High Summoner$2.99
  • Skin: Elaine$2.99
  • Skin: Blight Lord$2.99
  • Skin: Goddess Yoko$2.99
  • Skin: Asema$2.99
  • Skin: Shadow Piercer$2.99
  • Tickets - Medium$3.99
  • Ad Skip - Medium$3.99
  • Tickets - Large$6.99
  • Ad Skip - Large$6.99
  • Tickets - Super$12.99
  • Ad Skip - Super$13.99
  • Tickets - Extra Large$27.99
  • Tickets - Ultra$54.99

Questions

Is Tiny Guardians free?
Tiny Guardians costs $3.99, and also offers in-app purchases.
Is Hero's Quest free?
Hero's Quest is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Tiny Guardians or Hero's Quest?
Tiny Guardians and Hero's Quest are both rated 4.8 out of 5 on the App Store, from 1.1K and 1.3K ratings respectively.
Do Tiny Guardians or Hero's Quest have ads?
Hero's Quest shows ads; Tiny Guardians does not.
Which is updated more often, Tiny Guardians or Hero's Quest?
Tiny Guardians ships an update every 5 months, and Hero's Quest fortnightly. Most recently, Tiny Guardians was updated on October 16, 2026 and Hero's Quest on October 10, 2026.

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