Forest Guardians (SNES)

Forest Guardians is a homebrew game for the Super Nintendo: a tower defense inspired by Brazilian folklore. Lumberjacks, hunters and tractors march towards the sacred tree, and only the legendary guardians of the forest can stop them.

Place the Saci, the Curupira, the Iara and the Boitata on stone pedestals along the path. Every invader you stop pays coins. Coins buy more guardians. Spend them well: on the last levels you cannot afford them all.

🧩 How to Play

• Invaders walk along the dirt path in waves. Nothing moves until you call the next wave.
• Build guardians on the grey pedestals. Each one has its own price, reach and power.
• Every invader that reaches the sacred tree costs hearts. You start each level with 20.
• Stopping invaders pays coins, and every wave you beat pays a bonus.
• Selling a guardian gives back half of its price.
• Beat every wave to clear the level and unlock the next one.

🕹️ Controls

Button	Action
D-Pad	Jump to the nearest pedestal in that direction
L / R	Previous / next pedestal
A	Open the guardian shop / build
B	Sell a guardian / close the shop
Start	Call the next wave / pause
Select	Speed 1X / 2X
X (paused)	Quit the level

✨ Features

• 10 levels: sunny clearings, rivers with wooden bridges, night woods and a dry sawmill
• 4 guardians from Brazilian folklore, each with a different role: slow, strike, reach or burn
• Lumberjacks, fast hunters, tough tractors and a giant harvester boss
• Original soundtrack with a forró and baião flavour, plus sound effects
• Battery save with unlocked levels and your best hearts on every level
• Double speed, a HOW TO PLAY screen and hidden secrets to discover

💾 How to Run

Download ForestGuardians_v1.smc, a LoROM cartridge image (NTSC, 512 KB, 2 KB battery save). Open it in any Super Nintendo emulator. It was tested in Snes9x and bsnes, which are also available as cores in RetroArch.

🏆 Achievements Suggestions

This is the suggested set. All 27 achievements can be earned in a single playthrough.

• Clearing Keeper — Clear level 1, Clearing.
• Old Trail Warden — Clear level 2, Old Trail.
• Mossy Hill Watch — Clear level 3, Mossy Hill.
• Riverbank Ward — Clear level 4, Riverbank.
• Bridge Keeper — Clear level 5, Twin Bridges.
• Waterfall Sentinel — Clear level 6, Waterfall.
• Night Woods Patrol — Clear level 7, Night Woods.
• Moon River Guard — Clear level 8, Moon River.
• Sawmill Shutdown — Clear level 9, Sawmill.
• The Last Stand — Clear level 10, Last Stand, and save the forest.
• The Forest Is Safe — Clear all ten levels in a row from START GAME without a single game over.
• End of the Harvest — Stop the giant harvester.
• Untouched Grove — Clear any level from level 5 on without losing a single heart.
• Perfect Guardian — Clear level 10 with all 20 hearts.
• By a Thread — Clear any level with exactly 1 heart left.
• Mother of Waters — Clear level 4, Riverbank, with no guardian other than Iara.
• Fire in the Night — Clear level 7, Night Woods, with no guardian other than Boitata.
• The Sawmill Burns — Clear level 9, Sawmill, with no guardian other than Boitata.
• Whole Folklore — Clear a level after building all four kinds of guardian in it.
• Few but Brave — Clear level 10 with no more than 6 guardians on the field at any time.
• Fast Forward — Clear a level from level 7 on with every wave played at double speed.
• No Regrets — Clear level 10 without selling a single guardian.
• Thrifty Spirit — Clear level 10 with at least 300 coins left.
• Scrap Metal — Stop 25 tractors in a single level.
• A Thousand Stopped — Stop 1000 invaders in one sitting.
• Whirlwind (Easter Egg) — The Saci never stops spinning, not even on the title screen.
• Backwards Footprints (Easter Egg) — Some guardians reveal their secrets to the patient.

📝 Version

v1 — October 2026