Hell of a strategy

Doom and Civilization might not seem like the luckiest of relatives. But Solium Infernum, an underground classic for PC from 2009, contains a combination of the blood and demons of id Software's FPS games and the political-tactical one of Firaxis' most famous strategy games. Now, well over a decade later, the game is getting a massive remake, and first impressions of Solium Infernum suggest that the strategy game with its plot twists and psychological twists next year will not disappoint.

The basic premise of the game will be the same - Lucifer, the ruler of Hell, disappears, so his minions, the "supercruel", quarrel and fight for the throne of Hell. Visually, Solium Infernum is a classic, almost romantic vision of hell, based on the works of Dante and Henry Milton, where instead of fire, brimstone and raging hordes of roaring demons, we have tall towers made of white marble, organized units of soldiers and praetors and, of course, a completely distorted social order, which is a combination of the conclave and the Roman senate, and the super-cruel are more like selfish, corrupt politicians than bloodthirsty beasts.

The game reflects a very special style, a little reminiscent of the strategic Civilization or Age of Empires, while the vibrant clash of red, black and sulfur orange colors is reminiscent of Doom. Different from what we are used to from strategies, the map is also somewhat in line with Dante's Inferno, since the geography of Hell is not limited by the physical rules of reality - your enemy may be gathering his army in the west, but if you move far enough, you will find the same units gathering in the east. One equally applies to movements to the north and south. Hell therefore resembles a planet on which one is more or less constantly surrounded by enemies.

The player can choose the role of one of five supervillains, each with a different level of five different abilities - military strength, Machiavelli's wits, dark magic, resource-gathering abilities and political influence. To win the game, you must use all of these abilities and use them to either gain a higher reputation or "prestige" from your opponents, or capture the hell capital of Pandemonium and then defend it for the next five turns. You are aided in your endeavor by the Kusters, who are of course angry with Astaroth due to his defeat against the most powerful infernal general, so they offer some support to his opponents in the form of spells, but therefore demand a tax in the form of money and resources at the infernal conclaves. You can accept or reject the offer, and each decision naturally has its consequences, as your opponents or competitors also negotiate with the Kusters, and what happens depends on the results of these negotiations - there can be a general clash with them, individual battles in the form of an independent mini-game, where the best soldiers of each army fight, or you can accept insults and return to your positions intact but humiliated.

Solium Infernum requires the player to have political skill, a good instinct for when to fight and when to negotiate, and a frenetic use of something that could be called the doctrine of mutually assured destruction, as we witnessed during the Cold War era - if you send your army over me, I'll be my titan on you, and of course there is a third party in the game, the Kusters, who have the same ultimate goal, but also the desire to turn Hell to their advantage.

You will be able to play Solium Infernum against artificial intelligence, live against other players, and asynchronously, where it will be possible to play against other players independently of time. This means that instead of having to have four or five people online at once, you can log in when you have ten minutes, complete your round, and then log out again. Kind of like an old fashioned game of postal chess. The game is then passed to your opponents who make their moves when they can and so on and so forth. This makes the game more accessible, but less dynamic, and the upside is that you get extra time to plan. When Solium Infernum is on the market, it will also be possible to get a cork board, notice pins and several meters of colored string and even a pair of plastic devil horns. You'll be able to attach the whole thing to a wall or place it on a table and get a kind of "off-line" strategy map on which you can play out different scenarios that can then be used in the actual game.

Source: League of Geeks

AI translated