Bad Hotel: Building a Defensive Tower With Draggable Rooms

The Landlord Wants Your Hotel Gone

Each level opens with a hotel and a starting sum of money. The landlord, Tarnation Tadstock, wants the building destroyed so he can collect insurance money, and his friends carry out the attacks. You place rooms by dragging them onto the hotel; each room carries a price, and if your funds cover it, the room is built at the spot where you drop it. Those rooms are the hotel's only protection. If the hotel is destroyed, the level is lost and Tadstock wins.

The rooms you drag into place fall into six named types with distinct jobs. Rentals generate money, Gun Rooms attack enemies, Mine Launchers create explosions, Hospitals repair units, and Ice Rooms slow enemies down. Short Term Solutions explode on placement, so their effect is spent the moment they are built. Placing a room on top of the hotel works by dragging through the building rather than tracing all the way around it, which lets you add structures directly onto the existing form while Tadstock's attackers press in.

Dragging Rooms Out of Thin Air

Room placement in Bad Hotel begins outside the building altogether. Using the mouse, you drag a room from wherever it is offered and move it onto the screen, and the game does not require you to set it directly on the hotel; you can carry it up into the sky. As you move, a green square marks where the room is allowed to land. Releasing the room drops it at that position, so the placement step is a drag, an aim at a valid spot, and a release rather than a menu selection.

Placement serves the level's single defensive goal: keeping the hotel standing against Tarnation Tadstock's attacks. Every level starts with a hotel and some money, and the rooms you drag into place are the building's only protection against Tadstock's friends. Because the mouse drag both chooses a room and fixes its position, the green square and the drop point determine where that protection sits on the hotel. If the hotel is destroyed despite the rooms placed around it, the level is lost and Tadstock wins.

A Six-Room Defence Catalogue

Bad Hotel narrows the defensive build to six room types, each answering a different pressure in the fight. Rentals generate money, which sustains further building. Gun Rooms attack enemies directly, while Mine Launchers create explosions. Hospitals repair units, Ice Rooms slow enemies down, and Short Term Solutions explode the instant they are placed. Because each type has five levels unlocked as you progress deeper into the game, the catalogue grows in strength over time without adding new categories.

The rules make the six-room set a system rather than a list. Rentals feed the budget that pays for construction, so income rooms support the rooms that fight. Gun Rooms and Mine Launchers supply direct and explosive damage, Hospitals extend the life of units being repaired, and Ice Rooms slow attackers to buy time. Short Term Solutions trade permanence for an immediate blast, spending their effect on placement. Placing a room on top of the hotel uses a drag straight through the building instead of going all the way around.

Levelling Up Your Building Blocks

Bad Hotel keeps its defensive catalogue fixed at six room types, and the variety comes from how each one behaves rather than from an expanding roster. Rentals bring in money, Gun Rooms attack enemies, Mine Launchers produce explosions, Hospitals repair units, Ice Rooms slow enemies, and Short Term Solutions detonate the moment they are placed. Because the categories stay the same throughout, the player learns a small set of jobs and applies them to the hotel's layout as Tadstock's friends press the attack.

Within each of those six types, the manual documents five levels, and later levels unlock as the player moves deeper into the game. The room type does not change when its level rises; the same Rental, Gun Room, Mine Launcher, Hospital, Ice Room, or Short Term Solution simply becomes available at a higher tier. This ties progression to how far the player has advanced, so the defensive set gains strength through unlocked levels while the six-category structure stays intact.

First published Oct 28, 2026.