Critical Ward

Critical Ward is an arcade survival game set in a hospital. You treat patients, build combos and deploy automated medical equipment as contagious patients, disruptive relatives and unpredictable events threaten to wreck your strategy. Each run can grow from a manageable shift into escalating chaos, and a single mistake can wipe out the build you have assembled.

Characters and progression

Choose from characters with distinct abilities and playstyles, including specialists in healing, speed, crowd control and technology, as well as characters whose strategies change the rules of a run. You learn their strengths, complete their challenges and unlock characters and new ways to play through an old-school progression system. Everything is earned by playing, with no microtransactions or paid shortcuts.

Combos and builds

Keep your streak alive and stack bonuses to make a run more powerful. Turrets, prototypes, special items, rising stats and chained effects can combine into increasingly large builds, while the hospital's growing threats make them harder to sustain. Discharging patients makes you stronger, but new problems arrive every second.

Arcade presentation

Critical Ward uses pixel art and direct animations in a presentation inspired by classic arcade games. Its soundtrack drives the pace of each run, which can end with the hospital collapsing. The game also includes achievements, challenges and unlocks, alongside runs designed for high replayability.