Siegecraft Commander Review

Review Siegecraft Commander | With Halo Wars 2 on the Horizon, RTS-fans on Xbox One are in for a treat. However, it would be a mistake to ignore Siegecraft Commander, even gamers that are new to the genre will find some enjoyment from this easy-to-learn but challenging game. Read more about it in this Siegecraft Commander review! 

THE GOOD

• Siegecraft is not your typical Realtime strategy game, causing some fresh air in the ancient genre. One of the unique mechanics behind the game is growing your presence in the level. You build defense or offensive towers from your Keep, to build a tower you’ll have to aim and shoot on some eligible place of land, if successful the two towers will be connected with a wall.  The strategy for placement and purpose is very important making it a user friendly but deep gameplay mechanic.
• One thing that makes the game extra strategic is the way connected towers work. Compare it with a domino chain, if a previous tower in your chain is destroyed everything connected afterwards is destroyed too. Causing some impressive chain destroy links, you even have an Achievement for it! (Don’t worry though, it’s not hard to earn it. I got it on the second level)
• The story between the humans and lizards is told with some funny cut scenes. It doesn’t really add anything to the gameplay but it helps to make Siegecraft stand out. The “I don’t take this too serious approach” was a great design decision from the developer Blowfish.
• Another great design choice from Blowfish was the colorful visuals. The game is by no means a visual competitor for Halo Wars 2 but they shouldn’t be ashamed with what they released into the wild. Things look so happily colorful and crisp, even with many towers and explosions on-screen I never experienced any frame drops.

Mixed Feelings

• I’m guessing it is a design choice but I really missed some kind of aiming reticle for your towers. Maybe it would make the game too easy but it caused some unneeded frustration for me. The “blind” aiming improves with playing but it still fails to feel good even after many hours. It doesn’t impact the game negatively but it would have been better if the aiming was more accurate.

THE BAD

• Siegecraft is plagued by quite a few glitches, I noticed it immediately that the game lacks some extra polish, nothing game breaking but expect graphical glitches, animation delays and sound frequently missed cues.  A shame, but I’m confident that the developer can solve this in the future.
• I’m hoping they can fix the online issues, I had to deal with delays and disconnects and haven’t really played or even finished an online game without issues. Everything is in place, even cross-play between Xbox and PC  so Blowfish better fixes it fast, it has potential to become an indie hit.

Score: 74% |  We have a few good RTS games on consoles and Siegecraft Commander can join that list. Some good things get mixed with some questionable design choices but overall the game is fun and worth buying.