Rating: 4.5
Author: Fezudu

Right off the bat, Songs of Conquest introduces us to one of its main points: its art direction and beautiful pixel art. With detailed settings, characters, and eye-catching colors, it shows just how dedicated its development team is.

The biggest inspiration here is the classic games from the Heroes of Might and Magic franchise. However, Songs of Conquest has its own personality and innovations within that inspiration. Lavapotion has developed its campaign mode well so that players can gradually get the hang of the game and understand its mechanics, with four basic factions, dialogues, stories, and a pace that is good for new players—especially streamers who are trying the game for the first time.

After all, strategy games can be a little difficult to hold an audience for. An excellent reward for me as I progressed through its campaign was watching its beautiful scenes with music telling the story, living up to the game’s name.

A Learning Curve That May Deter Some

Strategy games are always divisive and require time for players to learn their mechanics. It’s no different here. Navigation, exploration, and map management are more straightforward and easier to learn. I already have experience with 4X games, and here I felt that I was less overwhelmed by new mechanics and information to learn.

What I found most difficult—and which I feel may put off new players, especially those who don’t start with the campaign—is its combat. Here, we use our Wielder with up to six groups of soldiers that we recruit. However, if, for example, we recruit 10 soldiers, there will only be 1 Soldier with the number 10 under it, showing that there are a total of 10 units there, representing their attributes. This was a bit confusing for me because sometimes in combat I had a lot of warriors who were decimated by enemies with fewer units than me.

It’s also possible for the Wielder to take part in the fight with their spells and abilities, being crucial to winning in some situations. To be honest, the combat for me was the part I would have liked to have liked the most, but I didn’t find it that intuitive or fun. It’s not bad, though—it just wasn’t to my taste. For fans of Heroes of Might and Magic who like this system, it’s a real treat, allowing for various strategies and mechanics within combat.

Extra Content and DLC Expand the Experience

In addition to its campaign mode, Conquest mode is the big focus for many players. Here we have a good selection of pre-made or randomly generated maps. Choose your faction, color, computer difficulty if you’re playing solo, and enjoy. Especially for playing with friends, either as a team or all against each other, there’s content here for strategy fans to enjoy for a long time.

Something I really liked and which can be very addictive is its map creation mode, where players can build scenarios, share them, and try out other players’ creations. This is perfect for streamers, as it brings extra content and allows your community to participate by exchanging creations.

In its paid content, we have two new factions, very unique and eye-catching in their designs and mechanics.

The first to be released is Vanir, with its Nordic theme and very interesting units that are a bit different from the obvious factions we see in games of this type. I didn’t get to play with this faction, but I did face it in some scenarios, and the developers’ art direction is to be congratulated for its creativity.

The second and most recently released faction, Roots, was certainly the one that caught my attention the most. I personally love playing with creatures and more fantastical things, and here I loved all the units and carriers. They look like plants and fungi mixed with bones—something you’d definitely see in a horror movie.

Their mechanics, from what I understand, are about generating Essences more easily so that their Wielder can use more spells and strengthen units that are close to them and have a symbiotic relationship. For me, it was their most interesting faction in terms of design and mechanics, and I still haven’t learned how to use its full potential, which shows how complex their systems can be.

Unfortunately, these two faction DLCs don’t have campaigns for solo play, which is a shame. It would be great to have more scenes and music aimed at these amazing new races added to the world.

Songs of Conquest: Performance and Accessibility

Tested on its Steam version, the game runs very well, was very light on my machine, and has a total of 14 languages available—which is very welcome for strategy games in particular.

STREAMER SCORE

Performance
Streamability
Engagement
Replay Factor

4.5

Summary

Songs of Conquest is an excellent strategy RPG with lots of mechanics, a well-developed campaign, a great soundtrack, and excellent art direction. Its combat is divisive due to its learning curve, but overall it’s an excellent game for fans of the genre.

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