The Daily Byte – Conquest of Elysium 3: Conquest of Your Wallet

Overview

Conquest of Elysium 3 (CoE3) is the latest game in the CoE series, which it just now occurs to me that none of you have probably ever heard of. The CoE series deals in turn based fantasy strategy. You move your generals (which include sorcerers, goblin chieftains, captains, senators, etc.) around the map with their armies to wage war and capture resource buildings such as mines.

This game throws you right into the deep end – no tutorial, no instruction manual, you just play. So I started off with the Necromancer army, because we’ve all dreamed of leading our undead hordes to conquer of all Europe…or maybe that’s just me. I quickly found out that I could raise armies of servile undead from villages, temples, graveyards, and gallows, so I sent my necromancer out to conquer as many of those as possible. But, alas, I didn’t know two essential things to my survival:

One: I had to leave troops on said conquered villages, temples, graveyards and gallows or I would lose them… quickly. That hurt.

Two: Necromancers go insane and are perfectly content to sit in the middle of a field surrounded by hundreds of enemies doing nothing.

And that’s the story of how my first game went. Insane necromancers doing bugger all and greater demons laying siege to my castle. What fun.

For my second game I chose samurai orcs, because it’s just the greatest idea ever. Again, I quickly found out that they auto generated troops. I was home. I set out and conquered as many mines and mountains as possible so that I could build a mighty army. Then giant snakes conquered my fortress and I lost…

After another three attempts, I finally got an army to work (necromancers again), but even then, it’s still really difficult, even on easy mode. If you get this game, be prepared for a long haul. But that having been said, once you’ve found your winning formula, you’ve pretty much beaten the game. It just doesn’t seem to have enough content for its hefty $30 price tag.

But still, I like this game. Its graphical style and general aesthetic is reminiscent of the original Civilization, and I like the system in which not all armies have the same resources. The warlocks (elementalist wizards) use gems to summon elementals, while necromancers use Hands of Glory to perform feats of Dark Magic, which creates different resource node requirements for each army (A warlock needs mines, while a Necromancer needs Gallows).

I wasn’t able to try out the multiplayer, due to not being able to find a game, but if anyone has this game, send me a message, I want to try it out.

The Good
+ A real nostalgia trip for people who like old timey strategy games
+ Multiplayer!
+ Great strategic gameplay

The Bad
- Steep learning curve, even on easy mode
- Hefty price tag for such a simplistic game
- I didn’t even know this game existed up until I reviewed it

The Verdict
A good game, challenging and fun, but a bit pricey at $30. Try it!

Conquest of Elysium 3 was released on February 20th, 2012 for PC.