Recent reviews by vykoso

You do not need to work around anybody’s schedule and playing with randoms is easy. You do your turn before the timer runs out (from 24h to a week per turn). Other players submit theirs on time - it doesn’t matter if someone’s turn was done in the 1st hour or 23:59th minute. If you want - Steam shoots you notifications when the next turn is ready to play.

You have a limited number of action slots ( 2 initially but you can get as many as 6 over the course of a match ) per turn, and you make strategic decisions with every move - No adjusting a tax slider from 14.5% to 14.76%. Limited number of actions also helps to speed up the turns - you cannot queue a long line of orders that you then keep readjusting as the situation changes.

You are scheming your way to the throne of Hell. Each match has a set turn timer and the victory conditions are clearly defined (There is 1 main victory condition and 3 alternative ways to steal victory) - You are not building an empire or managing a logistic network - There is no chance for someone to be so far ahead that they could be as well be playing SimCity.- If anything, being clearly in the lead paints a huge target on your back , and you can get disqualified from the main victory condition, or just outright eliminated by other players. You have to be the most sneaky crab in the bucket - Hell is other people after all.

The visual side of the game is well above what you usually get in the genre. Not only does the game have actual graphics unlike many turn-based strategy games, but also the art direction is solid and the style is consistent with the theme and across all elements - the clear and stylish visuals make it not only more pleasant to play, but help you remember the events of the match as you log back in.


Regular match AI doesn’t seem to pose any challenge, but there are single player scenarios with more specific victory requirements that should provide some variety. The main focus of the game is Multiplayer, and the asynchronous mode should make it easier to get started, even if you have never managed to play strategy games online.

If you are not touching MP out of principle - first of all, asynchronous is a game changer give it a go, secondly wait for the patches to either improve the AI or add either more scenarios, or perhaps add a scenario editor so that the community can do its thing and provide the game with more longevity.


As far as I can see the game doesn’t seem to have a way to penalise quitters, so joining some sort of discord or other group might be necessary long term to ensure commitment until the end.

A little bit on the easy side, but all the effort put into the writing and general feel of the game draws you in. Kinda reminds of the browser flash startegy games, but on steroids. Don't expect to sink hunderds of hours into this, but you should get your money's worth. Keep an eye out for whatever this creator puts out next.

This is the finest MULTIPLAYER wargame. It is not a full fledged 4x, It's about war only but does it on a biblical scale. Single player is more of a sandbox to learn and test ideas for MP rather than a main point of Dominions.

The learning curve is more of a wall menacing with spikes, and many aspects of the UI and general technical aspect betray that it is a passion project of a person with a complete disregard for modern game design philosophy. Hand typing server IP and ports, UI that is partially accessible only through mouse and partially only through hotkeys ( press shift + / for the hotkey list on almost any screen) is annoying . But it's all worth it.

Once you get over the initial and secondary confusion you will experience something marvelous. The mythological theme is unique and well executed. Between choosing your nation, designing a god for them and then carefully guiding your research you will have an army, an empire that only you could have built. And then you will smash that against enemies that came up with their own mindboggling builds and adjust your formations and spells to deal with that.

One thing I love about this game that you may hate is the very way that battles are resolved. You script your armies and commanders on one turn and then if there is a battle, on the next one you receive a report and playback of the battle with no way to interfere. This means that a busy guy like me doesn't have to coordinate with other busy people in all the different time-zones to have a war where I can plan everything and then sit back and enjoy the show without the frantic clicking. Thanks to that I don't have to have multi hour sessions but rather I can commit as much time as I want, between multiple days, if the timer allows it. On the other hand if you are a minmaxer and micormanager who wants to handhold every single one of your soldiers you will probably hate it. After all the first causality of every battle is planning.

The game doesn't use the Steam DRM so I usually play it without booting up the client hence the low playtime.

I've never played that much good old turn based strategies. I've never beaten Civ on highest difficulty, never made it to the end in XCom ironman. I've never played PBEM before. And here I am, with no rose tinted glasses. with no acquired taste, telling you - this is THE game.