Songs of Conquest Preview - Page 4
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Article Index
Beyond just skirmish, you can also engage in some campaign action. Right now, the game has two campaigns representing two of the game's four factions, with the intention to have a campaign for every faction before the game leaves early access.
These campaigns are really well-designed and are significantly more narrative-driven than their HoMM counterparts. The only negative thing there is that each campaign only has four missions, and they tend to end once things get really interesting. On top of just new campaigns, I really would like it if the developers expanded the existing ones with at least a couple of extra missions.
Technical Information
Despite this being an early access release, I haven't encountered any major bugs or issues while playing Songs of Conquest. It being a Unity game, once you reveal a large chunk of the map, you may experience some slowdowns (despite the game not using a lot of resources), but other than that, it runs pretty smooth and takes mere moments to save and load.
Initially, the game's pixelated visuals may seem too busy and even somewhat off-putting, but once you get used to them and learn to recognize what everything is, you start seeing them as charming.
The audio design, on the other hand, is unimpeachable. Both the soundtrack and the miscellaneous effects are great. You even get these quick little musical intermissions between campaign missions.
The game's UI could still use some work. While it's admirable that the game basically has four screens - the overworld, the combat arenas, the character sheet, and the spell book, recruiting and moving your troops around, and splitting and combining stacks, feels way more clunky than it needs to be.
And in general, things seem to be a bit too streamlined. It really saps a lot of flavor out of the whole experience when you claim some structure or pick up an item and only get a quick visual confirmation for that instead of some neat little story about a cranky old witch or an ancient idol. I once again blame the HoMM mods for that.
But on a more mechanical side, this streamlining also results in you frequently missing those quick popups telling you what exactly you just picked up, or what the structure you just claimed does. And with the game having points of interest you can visit at regular intervals, but no proper calendar and a team of astrologers to mark it, it can be really tough to keep track of that stuff.
Another thing that's mildly annoying and should be fixed before the game gets a full release is the fact that you can't load a game from a losing battle, and instead have to quit or lose first, and then reload.
Conclusion
I'm writing this preview after spending roughly 40 hours with Songs of Conquest, which includes beating the currently available campaigns, playing a few skirmish maps, and engaging in some hotseat multiplayer. And if you ask me, that's roughly what you would expect from a full game, not just an early access release.
What's currently in the game is familiar yet fresh, fairly well-polished, and most of all, fun. And in order to become truly great, the game simply needs more stuff - more factions, more neutral monsters, more unique combat scenarios and points of interest, more artifacts, more missions, and maps.
If the developers can deliver that, Songs of Conquest can become one of the finest representatives of its genre. And while it's still early, at this point, there's no reason to doubt the team.
