Conan Unconquered

This real time strategy game opens with the main character wishing for trained soldiers who can handle the battles that are to come. While this may seem a little melodramatic, a few minutes of game play reveal that he has reason to be concerned. Conan Unconquered throws the player into tough fights right away, and the game isn’t kind to those who aren’t prepared for a fight.

A new challenge for the RTS community

At first glance, Conan Unconquered looks like a typical RTS game such as Command & Conquer. It has all the basic elements. In order to build their ‘base’, players must gather resources and use them to build up an army and appropriate defenses.

This is RTS at its most typical, but the game play is set up to make doing these things a bit more complex. Nearly everything in the game requires a material cost in order to continue maintaining it. The army needs to eat, mercenaries need to be paid, wood is needed to keep up on certain defenses, etc. This effectively limits your base to how much you are capable of maintaining. Unlike other RTS games, you also start out with full access to the tech tree, and simply need to gather the resources to buy and maintain it.

Challenging game play

The campaigns are very challenging. Expect to lose the first several times you play, even on the easiest campagins. Everything is flammable in this game, it’s not always obvious what needs upgraded, and the game is less about having a bigger army, and more about having the right individuals for battle. One of the best features of this game is co-op, where two players can work together to defeat this campaign. It’s easier to keep track of what needs done, maintain resources, and make repairs before the next wave hits if two people are working on it.

Not enough reward

Conan Unconquered has 5 missions with brutal campaigns. This can mean grueling game play and a real grind to get through them—but there’s no reward for doing so. Where most games offer boosts or even vanity items as rewards for completing missions, there’s no real incentive to finish any of these missions. If you simply want to play just to play, then this won’t pose a problem. Others who enjoy being rewarded for their tasks may quickly grow discouraged by this game.

This RTS has been thoughtfully designed by developers who have seen the flaws of most RTS style games and wanted to fix them. With the addition of incentives for winning, this could be one of the best RTS games ever made.

Pros

• Challenging game play keeps you on your toes
• Skill based game that promotes creative solutions

Cons

• Not very rewarding to win