Never before has a game made me so thoroughly enjoy my entirely voluntary descent into being an incredibly horrible person.

I am the very picture of the RPG player that cannot help but pick the nicest choice whenever given the chance, but over the course of this game, I razed an innocent village, torched farmland, looted temples and historic sites, instigated civil war, committed murder for my own convenience, all so that I might amass as much gold as possible.

I could have stopped. I could have turned away. I could have done differently. I didn't have to do it.

As I ordered my men to shoot down fleeing civilians, shaking in terror, I began to appreciate the magnitude of my own awfulness. A sense of guilt settled over me. Certain choices became harder to make. I did not, in the end, descend fully into brutality. I remembered mercy. I acted as kindly as I could manage.

And yet it was too late. The bodies of the fallen littered the streets. The blood of the Aztec dyed the earth of Mexico. Upon my return to Spain, I was hailed as a hero.

Yet even now, I cannot help but feel that in the end I was the villain.

Truly a marvellous game. I cannot recommend it enough.

This is a game about failure.

Failure never feels good, and rarely does one even accept it. This game has violently dismantled my previous perception of failure in video games, and though I struggled to accept it (and nearly gave up in the process) I walked away with one of my most unique and insightful gaming experiences.

My first lesson came at the end of the first tutorial campaign. I had never lost a battle until the final conflict, the rebel leader. I made it through the first phase with numerous incapacitations. All I had left was the bulk of my researching cadre (my expedition was research themed, focusing mainly on diplomacy at the expense of soldiers capable of prolonged battle), and these few scholars were quickly cut down in the second phase. I grit my teeth and waited for the reload. That didn't happen. In Expeditions: Conquistador, your expedition continues on even when you fail. We all huddled in the market as enemy forces overtook the town, limping back to our ship and escaping to Mexico. I wanted to reload. It felt wrong letting the enemy take the town. I failed. It wasn't a choice I made in dialogue, it was my own incompetence. After a night of sleeping on it, I decided to continue on instead of retrying. After all, I was just a peaceful expedition focused mostly on discovery and diplomacy. It made sense that I failed in battle.

My second test of failure was the worst. It's what made me write this review. I continued on in Mexico with my band of researchers. I made ties with the natives, got married, and continued my pursuit of knowledge in this foreign land. But my small mistakes kept piling up. I decided to fight in too many battles, my injured soldiers piling up. Soon my doctor was injured as well, unable to tend to his patients. People started dying. I started getting angry. Ingloriously and anticlimactically, most my expedition was dead. I had no more soldiers. My wife was dead. All I had left were a handful of scholars unfit to survive in this untamed land. 14 hours in, my expedition had ostensibly ended.

Failure happens in Expeditions: Conquistador, just like failure ran rampant during the historical period it's based on. I led a naive band of scholars to doom, and in hindsight, it makes sense. Bright eyed and bushy tailed researchers aren't meant to survive such a savage land, not without appropriate protection. In my effort to be peaceful I forgot to anticipate conflict. And so I failed. But that's okay.

I was surprised by this indie offering. It's like a combination of X-COM combat, Oregan trail challenges and exploration, with the writing and personaltiy of earlier RPGs like Fallout. This makes for a unique mix.

One of the core features of this game is selecting your party not just for their abilities but for their personality. The various personalities will adjust encounters and inform your game play. You can feel the difference when two other wise identical hunters are seen from the lens of which is more annoyingly pious.

The game also includes an Iron Man mode to keep you honest from save scumming. Which isn't necessary any ways because the designers actually plan for failure. They know you might lose an important or trivial battle and it isn't always lights out or game over like in many other games. For example I actually failed to finish one of the major plot points for the 1st half of the game and things just kept on rolling. Success and deafeat are in equal measures here.

I have three negative points for the game. First while exploring is fun the camera is just too close and so constantly using the map and it's way points is a must for quick travel. My second complaint concerns a small aspect of the combat. Melee combat is much stronger than ranged combat and the guns you brought from Spain have weak damage and a chance to miss. The random encounters on the trail can be very harsh and given enough time you'll get a nasty surprise- also some times the consequences of a choice are not even remotely made clear and so there can be some crazy sticker shock (like instagibs).

Even still this is a good game. I actually think it's worth the $19.99 at full retail and it's very impressive they put this much depth in to a game that pulled in only $77,000 on kickstarter. I finished my first play around 25 - 28 hours doing most of the content in the game. This game has replayability in many of the events and even multiple endings that acknowledge the things that you did during the game and not just at the very end.

Expeditions: Conquistador is an explorative, somewhat open world, turn-based combat game. You play as a Spanish "capitan" of a ship requisitioned by the governor of Santo Domingo while trying to explore the mainland of the New World. For those of you who enjoy games like Heroes of Might and Magic, and the Princess Bounty series, this game will feel right at home to you--with a large emphasis of Oregon Trail (remember that game in the 90's?).

As captain of a ship (that you don't have anymore), you start by handpicking followers for your expedition, judging by roles, personality types, and equipment that they bring with them. There are five roles in the game--soldiers, hunters, scouts, doctors, and scholars--each with their own strengths and weaknesses. Personality types can range anywhere from aggressive to peacefulness, to racism to openmindedness, and many more. Will this person fit into your group of misfits? Will Fernando get along with Teresa? And what will Pedro bring to your crew? Is he worth the extra ration per night? With a well-balanced crew, your chances of survival increase tenfold.

Expeditions: Conquistador leaves a lot of questions you will be asking yourself, and gives you a great sense of adventure you long for in many games. While travelling through the mainland, you find points of interests, complete quests for people, and explore, explore, explore. When you are out of movement points, which happens oh-so-often, and can get very tedious, you set up camp for the night and set tasks for your followers to complete throughout the night. Perhaps some followers will guard the camp from thieves/animals, while others hunt for food, while one person preserves food, or makes medicines. And if and when you get into combat, it's a very challenging, risk+reward style of turn-based combat.

When I say very challenging, I mean it. This game is very difficult--but in a fun way. Every decision you make in the open world can and WILL affect your expedition. Injuries, and even deaths, will most certainly happen. And if you do not treat an injured follower with a doctor, the follower will eventually get worse, and possibly perish. If you succeed with quests, you gain experience and equipment, which you can use to eventually promote recruits to veterans and leaders, and upgrading their outdated equipment.

Expeditions: Conquistador is a fantastic game for its money, and will keep you playing for a very long time (the main campaign will take OVER 20-30 hours on average), and also has decent replayability. As a captain, it is a lot of work to keep your group in good spirits as you fend off natives and other Spaniards as you search for the treasures of the New World. Although at times the game can get a little monotonous with camping, it throws you for loops as the quest advances.

I strongly recommend this game. 8.4/10

A surprise hit in my book and a much belated review, I meant to write this up a while back. Expeditions:Conquistador is the kind of kind of game that sits in your backlog for months and when you finally get around to playing it you realise what you've been missing out on.

There's a solid hex-tile based battle system at work here- employing line of sight, cover and flanking mechanics married with a variety of different mission objectives. In some battles the odds are truly stacked against your team, both in numbers and positioning - every encounter feels fresh and satisfying, particularly when you take down key characters during pivotal moments in the narrative. The game boasts a strong musical score throughout the adventure, helping to set and underline the mood during key moments in the game and it ties together the overall package beautifully.

The events system is where Expeditions:Conquistador truly shines, employing excellent writing with plenty of flavour and flair sprinkled throughout, easily on par with, if not exceeding the beloved triple A darlings of the industry. As you'd expect there are skill checks locking out certain character builds from particular actions. A great deal of flexibility is afforded to the player in how they choose to roleplay their character and you see the consequences of your actions and attitude reflected throughout the game, with allies becoming enemies and vice versa as you strike out across the continent - you really get a good sense of agency as you progress through the game. There's a good amount of narrative branching, particularly in the second campaign, even if some of it is just for flavour it's incentive to revisit the game and see things play out different at a later date.

My only gripes with the game are the camera is too close whilst navigating around the map and it only pulls back so far, panning the camera is also more restrictive that I would have liked. Neither of these issues really hampered my experience with the game. I'll be there day one when the developers release a sequel to this; they've more than proven themselves on all fronts.

I would highly recommend buying this game, if your looking for a fun, well made, turn based exploration RPG, with a fluid, challenging "Tactical Turn Based" combat system. It is definitely worth the full asking price of 19.99, but you might feel a little bit better if you got it on sale for 14.99 or 9.99. It is a solid game, incredibly well polished with only a few very very minor bugs, it has a lot of solid RPG elements and lots and lots of choices, the type of choices that can have serious consequences, but it definitely isn't a massively in depth RPG with an epic RPG storyline that you will find yourself lost in for months. I have put in 92 hours, but in reality only about half of that has been actual play time since I have been playing FF4 on my Nintendo DS at the same time. In addition I have been intentionally drawing things out to try and maximize my enjoyment of my purchase. It is only fair that I note that I found this game to lean a lot more to the "Casual" side of the RPG/Tactical spectrum, if Wasteland 2 was hardcore, Expedition Conquistador is Casual.

As someone who lives or dies by the challenge a game can provide a 20+ year veteran of RPG's like myself, Expedition Conquistador definitely meets my expectations. It isn't insanely difficult like Jagged Alliance Online Reloaded, but the combat is definitely challenging, without being super fancy/complex/tactical. The combat does have a partial/full cover system, but it is hardly the main focus of combat and you will always end up fighting CQB, hand to hand by the time all is said and done. It is still fun and the game has a slough of different randomized combat scenarios that pop up at various times and challenge you to meet a certain criteria in order to complete the combat scenario. In addition, the ability to place obstacles and a wide variety of traps you make outside of combat, before the start of some combat scenarios, is a pretty original and unique feature in Expedition Conquistador, I cannot remember ever seeing anything quite like it in any other tactical RPG before.

The storyline is pretty basic and comes out in bits and pieces, but you are the one who choses how your own story is going to unfold. It is up to you if you want to be a completely genocidal maniac and merc every tribe or roving band of warriors you come across, or if you want to curry favor with the Aztecs by merc'ing the Mayan's (yeah, you heard that correctly, the Aztecs & Mayans on the same world map, hows that for historical accuracy !!! Middle Fingers Up!!!) Other than that, the game stays pretty on schedule from a historically realistic standpoint, there is definitely no magic in this game, the closest thing would be some Healing Water you come across late game, but you only get 3 of them and then they are gone for good.

I say buy it and thank me for my review later, by clicking that little "this was helpfull" box. It is nice to see a new developer starting out so strong, in a world run amok with garbage, 60$ AAA titles. I am definitely going to buy the recently released "Expedition Vikings" in the next couple of days, according to RPG Watch, it is even better.

This game is a turn based, setting/story driven strategy game with minor rpg elements.

Whats good:
- Battle and exploration mechanics work fairly well
- Interesting ressource management system
- Actual impact of your own decision is felt/seen/aknowledged
- Battle is challenging
- Several different ways to play through the game
- Several different endings
- Your Units actually matter (as your decision has an impact on the moral of your units, depending on their own character; racist characters do not take it well, if you are nice to the natives etc.)
- Interactive part is fairly big (as having different units will end with different random events/reactions)
- The character system with exp/equipment/injurys etc. is fairly good and motivating

Whats bad:
- The random factor of battles is at times high, making them either too easy or too hard, if you have bad/good luck
- The pace of the game is fairly slow
- The mechanic breaks down at the end, as you will have more than enough ressources and very strong unites
- Not all unit types are equal. Some excel in the explorative mode (as they are usfull for gathering etc.) Some excel in combat...but some do both or neither. Scholoars are only important to get 1 to tinkering 10 and for some events. While hunters can gather food and fight well.

Additional:
The spanish conquistator setting is very well done. It might not be for everyone, but i liked it :)
Yes its historically inacurate, but i do not believe that that was the aim of the devs to begin with:)

Too long - didn't read:
If you like exploration, combat and a tad bit of rpg in a challanging turn based game set in the times of the spanish conquistators, feel free to buy this one :)

This game is awesome for its kind. It's a strategic RPG that shares gameplay similarities with Heroes of Might & Magic. Except this one is more dialogue and story oriented than building castles and armies. The graphics are pretty simple but it doesn't take away the charm of the adventure one bit! The storytelling is what makes it all interesting. It will constantly require you to make decisions, be it for small matters of social nature or serious issues and military tatics. And it does it so well it makes you feel you're reading an adventure book, even when you fail or makes decision mistakes.

As you can see on the screenshots, the action part is turn based and takes place on tactical hexa-shaped checker boards. Each unit has its skills, and you better put them to good use during combats or specialize them in order to handle any situation. Strong defensive units, sharpshooters, doctors, fast skirmishers or even tinkers to set traps and covers on the battlefield. It feels very rewarding to win a battle because of a right unit composition, preparation or placement.

The RPG elements are there too, from a handful of survival skills to large sets of combat abilities you can give to each of your men. And these men and women also have to be chosen carefully! Every NPC in this adventure has its own convictions, interests or goals. The religious companions won't get along very well with the native culture or those who embrace it. The fame-seeking soldiers won't like your diplomatic solutions to conflicts. Some romances might also happen! It will all depend of your choices and how you want to explore the New World. It is your expedition story that is being told, here.

The only things i could wish from the developpers are more languages support (although it was already very enjoyable in english! But since the game is very text-based, it might be hard for some others to follow), and... SEQUELS! Imagine that game set in the Crusades? or the Silk road? or the Japanese islands discovery? With a good storytelling, these explorations could take place anywhere!

I harbored no illusions about what it meant for us to explore the New World. Exploration is first and foremost a conquerer's act - over nature herself, if not the natives who inevitably resist the tides of change. I was a soldier, with senses long inured to the stench of blood, and I chose my companions accordingly. I needed grim warriors. None pious. We were not missionaries. I wanted the aggressive sorts, those fueled by bloodlust and goldlust. Nevermind I found their racism and greed distasteful. They were exactly what would be necessary in the heart of the jungle.

My choices proved apt, as Mexico was as treacherous as I feared. In those wild lands, we were alone. My predecessor, a man commanding a force of hundreds, had come here and vanished. He had made mistakes. I knew I could afford none.

When my servants rebelled, I slew them to a man. I would not have them slitting our throats as we slept. After defeating a native patrol, I might have spared them. These young men and women were only defending their lands from strangers in shining armor. I left none alive, none to report back to their village about our arms, numbers, and tactics.

Again and again, I had to face the hard choice between surrendering my tactical advantage and attempting a diplomatic solution. Always I chose to strike swiftly and decisively. Yes I killed where peace might have availed me. But what if it had not? What if those peaceful overtures had led to ambush? I had a duty to my soldiers. They looked to me to keep them alive. That is what I did.

Yet the land soon began to work its magic on me. There was a vivacity here that could not be found in Spain's stone streets. The people possessed an earthly wisdom and a refreshingly naive curiosity. Many welcomed us openly, asking about our ways and our lands. They were, it turns out, not so different from us, finding joy in a good meal and a bountiful harvest.

We found common ground with the Totonac peoples, and sided with them in their rebellion against the Aztecs, true barbarians whose temples ran slick with the blood of pagan sacrifice. I allowed the Totonac Chieftain's teenage daughter, Anacaona, into my group to serve as translator. She stayed by my side throughout. I taught her to wield sword, spear, and musket. I shared our language and our ways. She was ever eager to listen to my stories, and each night as we camped in the swamps and jungles, I told her of past battles. Her eyes shone with the fires of these remembered glories, and a hope for her own.

Of all of us, she was the truest and best adventurer. It was she who translated the glyphs on a golden gateway and led us into the legendary El Dorado, that shining City of Gold. It was she who manuevered through the temple of death's diabolical traps, braving a pit of snakes to uncover mounds of treasure. Without her, we would never have found the Fountain of Eternal Youth, which spring must have originated in Heaven itself.

Ah, Anacaona. She became the daughter I had always wanted.

It must have broke her heart when, following our triumphant battle over the Aztec Empire, I turned on her father and slew him in the same garden I had killed the Emperor. I know it broke mine when she chose him over me.

I buried her with mine own hands, outside Tenochtitlan, its plundered temples and palaces alit with devilish infernos.

I had been given a duty and an obligation, and I had fulfilled it to my utmost. I returned home with every companion but she still alive. Our ship held such treasure that it bobbed low in the water, our hold bursting with plundered gems. The king welcomed me home a hero, bestowing upon me lands and titles. My ambitions fulfilled.

Yet as I sit on my estate, watching the sun plunge beneath my tamed fields, I discover that somewhere along the way, my ambitions had changed. The jungle had transmuted them. The glory, the riches, the titles: all hollow now. I would give them all in order to go back and make a different decision. To choose the path of peace, so that Anacaona might have lived.

As a child, I thought the title Conquistador a grand one and never imagined I would hold it. As an old man, I carry it with a heavy heart. I will take it with me to the grave. Murderer. Betrayer. Conquistador.

First things first: Expeditions: Conquistador its NOT a game for everybody. It is a HARD game with LOADS of text and a dense historical and political context. If you dont enjoy reading walls of text and cant handle defeat stay away from this game.

That said, I'll list the pros and cons and at the end give my overall opinion:

Pros:

- Rich, interesting and unexplored historical setting. For lovers of history (like me) this game came as a refreshing breeze.

- Combat is well developed, complex but fun though it gets repetive over time. But its HARD, especially because the tutorial doesn't cover it very well. It took me about 3 or 4 hours of gameplay to effectively understand how to use the medic in battles and I can't say I mastered all the other 10 classes.

- Beautifully written story and quests that makes you feel involved with the game, with your own character and your companions, thus making the huge walls of text actually a pleasure to enjoy. The writters picked up the historical atmosphere and the political complexities of Precolumbian Mexico really well (apart the female conquistadores, seriously?!). Previous historical knowledge about the Spanish Conquest of Mexico is recommended for the utmost fun though the game presents you very well with the minimum necessary for enjoyment.

- Pretty interesting camping and resource micro-management. Not only the mechanics are very good but it also fits pretty well with the whole setting of the game.

- Your choices DO matter! Not much for the story development in itself but for your party morale (covered in the next item)

- Companions are very well written, each with an unique personality and historical background. This influences the way they will react to your decisions. Managing their different personalities and maintaining an overall high morale is essential for sucess in combat, making party management a vital part of the game. I just missed an option to directly talk to a companion, instead of waiting for random events with or about them to pop up.

- Nice Soundtrack. Not really a masterpiece but fits well with the overall climate.

Cons:

- Graphics are simple for a 2013 game. I recon this is an indie game with limited budget but in my opinion they really could've been better, especially in the world map.

- As I've said, this game is HARD. One random event or one small mistake in battle or in camp management can ♥♥♥♥ up an entire gameplay. This can be very demotivating for most players and it is especially painful when added to the bad auto-save mechanics.

- Camera movement and trees. You will spend most of your time in the world map and the top-down camera has its center always locked in your character. This hugely discourage exploring by making it very painful to see things far from your position. Wouldn't be a big deal IF collecting food, herbs etc from the map WASN"T essential to survive (There's a console code that unlocks the camera). Also trees not becoming transparent when you get near them can hide important collectables from your view.

- Bumping into enemies. When walking through the world map, you will sometime bump into an enemy patrol or hunting party. Sometimes you will have the option to not engage them. If you do so, after finishing the event, they still stay in your path and touching them makes the same event pop up again forcing you to fight them or to make a detour for progressing. This is a serious issue as even the easiest looking combat can turn into a complete disaster with one or two small tactical mistakes.

- Autosave: As said, this game is very hard and to add it up the autosave mechanic is very strange. I myself havent yet figured out how it works, so its safer to manually save often. Back in the days of Ultima and Breath of Fire this wouldn't be a flaw, but nowdays, in my opinion, it is.

Overall: Expeditions: Conquistador is a GREAT game for an indie company. It offers a lot of entertainment for it's pricing tag and it was a great efort by the guys at Logic Artists to delivery a solid and enjoyable game. Its cons are hugely surpassed by the pros and makes it a must buy for RPG, turn based combat and/or historical settings fans. Just keep in mind that this game is HARD and has LOTS of text in it before buying.

9/10