Unicorn Overlord review: information overload

Unicorn Overlord / Sega

I’m a JRPG fanatic, but 2024 has been oversaturated with excellent games even for me. We started the year off with Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth, Persona 3: Reload, and Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, which meant by March I’d already sunk hundreds of hours into excellent games from the genre. Yet, I couldn’t resist picking up Unicorn Overlord, partly because I’m still a sucker for a JRPG and partly because VanillaWare has an excellent track record with its games.

Unicorn Overlord is a strategy RPG, where you build up to ten armies with five people in each, and wrestle the land from the grip of the tyrant Galarius. As you liberate different regions, those in charge will join your cause, and you’ll be able to expand for the difficult battles ahead. Some liberation levels are small in scope but you’ll still need to work out innovative ways to conquer them.

Unicorn Overlord / Sega

There is just so much to do here, from the Liberation Side Quests to the numerous Overworld Quests, and you’ll find yourself doing them all, even if you don’t care about the spoils. The battle system is deep and complex, and strategy game enthusiasts will find plenty of ways to team build and create new synergies with the unit types and weapons. What’s interesting is that you don’t control your army in battle. Instead, you set them up for success and then your teams will fight for victory independently.

Unicorn Overlord has a complicated rock-paper-scissors style system of strengths and weaknesses, but there are dozens of types of units to remember. It was far more than my brain could compute, but if you build a team with diverse unit types, you can usually push through whatever challenges you face. What’s more important are the leaders. Some leaders like Clerics, Archers, and Shamans will have passive effects where they can help out other units in battle. This means everyone is strongest when grouped together, but sometimes you will need to spread your army thin if you want to prevent yourself from being overwhelmed.

Unicorn Overlord / Sega

Different armor, accessories, and weapons can give you new skills in battle, but if you find this overwhelming there is also a button to auto-equip the best gear. Unicorn Overlord does well to cater to both ends of the strategy spectrum. Beginners can turn down the difficulty, randomly equip gear, and put together haphazard units while still winning battles, whereas experts can get deep into the weeds of team building and optimize their compositions.

As a beginner I was winning, but I wanted to have a better understanding of why I was doing so. I was moving around members of each unit before battles looking for better damage rolls, but it was all trial and error on my part with no knowledge of who is better in the front or back rows. There were long tutorials when each new system was added, but the sheer amount of information made it difficult for me to take in.

Unicorn Overlord / Sega

Despite my lack of in-depth understanding of everything Unicorn Overlord has to offer, I found that I could not stop playing. The quick nature of each overworld task or Liberation Quest, meant that I kept playing just one more until it was way past my bedtime. It’s a satisfying gameplay loop, and I always wanted to make a little more progress towards making my army stronger.

I felt as if I was constantly gaining a new favorite unit. Not only does Unicorn Overlord have a deep story, but each member plays so differently that I was excited to learn just what they could do. Maybe I would have better understood all the strategy behind it if I sank an additional 60 hours into the game, but I left feeling satisfied and I’m more strategy game curious than I ever thought I would be.

Score: 9/10

Version tested: Nintendo Switch