T-Rexes aren’t the only twist that Dinolords puts on medieval strategy

"Age of Empires with dinosaurs" is, the developers of the Dinolords recently told me in a cramped Gamescom booth, a flattering description for their upcoming England vs. Vikingsaurus RTS. It’s also not a terribly accurate one. From what I saw of the game, Dinolords is more about the lords than the dinos, having as much in common with Diablo-style ARPGs as it does with classic strategy. And that’s a distinction which might just elevate it out of novelty status.

Technically, y’see, you only ever really control the one noble dude, who’s been put in charge of defending the kingdom after those sly Danes fished out some living dinosaurs from the Greenland ice fields. You push him around, deploy abilities from his little ARPG hotbar, and most crucially, will only ever see the world from the isometric camera locked permanently onto his bonce. You still order the construction of buildings and castle ramparts, and give orders to amassed troop units in defence against the bitey horde – it still plays very much like an RTS in that sense – but your perspective never shifts.

This might, understandably, vex strategy veterans who’ve spent decades having full control of their god’s eye view. But when the time comes to battle, the genre-blending does produce something distinct, if more than a little hectic. When the Vikings come into view, they’re practically already at the gates, and mucking in yourself with sword and bow attacks is as vital as bossing the underlings around.

To fit the tighter perspective, and altogether more hands-on approach to fighting, the command-giving is simplified in seemingly clever and intuitive ways. Giving a specific order to multiple units involves holding down a specific key, free-mousing over the desired soldiers, then releasing; a sequence that can be completed in a blink and requires no additional menus. And while you shouldn’t expect grandiose, full army warfare, there’s still scope for individual moments of tactical trickery.

On more than one occasion, I witnessed Northplay gameplay designer Kasra Tahmasebi send his lord leaping over the enemy vanguard to engage the more dangerous dino-cavalry held in the rear. Not the obvious play, when a squad of infantry were already sword-deep into the castle doors, but one that exploited the lord’s heightened strength and speed to deal with a greater threat. Take the time to steal your own dinosaur eggs (and build the requisite hatchery), and you’ll eventually be able to ride the beasts yourself; I didn’t get to see this exact scenario play out, but it does sound like with the extra agility afforded by riding a velociraptor, you can work around the hero-cam’s lack of vision by more quickly scouting the outskirts of a battlefield.

Enemy raptors can also scale the walls of your town, munching on archers as they go, while Danish T-rexes are apparently bred to specialise in destroying static defences. They’re not just here for laughs, in other words: each dino breed presents a distinct tactical challenge that you’ll need to plan for and counter in different ways, and while your lord is strong, he’s also not quite enough of a Diablo-tier godkiller that you can ignore your more traditionally RTS-y units.

If you ask me, all that battling sounds like it might be too much for my poor brain, no matter how highborn. The town-building side of Dinolords looks positively serene by comparison, and perhaps a little more conventional to boot: you’ve got resources to gather, buildings to construct, and a citizenry to keep happy. Dinolords, meet Manor Lords. Except you’re still navigating the world exclusively as your singular lord, so at first, all that timber and stone will need to be amassed by you personally. Eventually you’ll recruit enough proles to automate things, but you can still muck in whenever you want – a feature I’m particularly keen on, given how many times I zoomed in on my lazy townsfolk in Manor Lords to will them into shifting resources around faster. In Dinolords, I will literally be able to do it myself, hurrying up the transport of goods with my sprinting ability or helping to hammer up a monastery if I deem it to be taking too long. It’s not being a control freak, you understand. I’m just a lord of the people.

Similarly, I find the RTS/ARPG hybrid of Dinolord’s battling more appealing than I normally would for a pure strategy game. Obviously if everything thought this, the genre wouldn’t exist, but I’ve personally never clicked with the likes of Total War (or, indeed, Age of Empires) because I like the feeling of direct action in games, and watching all the tiny men doing the actual action seems more like helpful influence at best. Having my very own lord to throw into the fray could be what bridges that gap.

Besides, being personally involved in your fief’s prosperity still sounds like a good strategy fantasy to me, with or without the comedy sci-fi element. You could end up firing an arrow made from wood you collected, by the fletcher you recruited, to work in the workshop you built, using materials you gathered, and frankly that’s just as cool as any dinosaur. Except the Spinosaurus, obviously.

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