I'm only reviewing the single player campaign. I have no interest in playing multiplayer after my experience.

TLDR: If you like the original 2 Dungeon Keepers - hard pass. War for the Overworld changes Dungeon Keeper into a modern, feature-bloated RTS with little more than the look and a familiar voice to connect it to its past.

As a person who recently discovered the original 2 games, I bought this despite reading many negative reviews hoping for the best. I admit, I was wrong. So wrong in fact that this is the ONLY game I ever considered requesting a refund for. If you want a modern RTS that plays similar to Dungeon Keeper and is filled with tons of abilities, spells, etc. then go for it. If you are looking for Dungeon Keeper, then go back and play the originals.

To those who don't know, this is the spiritual successor to Dungeon Keeper 2, because there never was a #3. Dungeon Keeper levels are generally open and you can build a dungeon (base) how you like and play at your pace and win by the method that you choose. Some levels have a timer, but most are generous enough that you can still do things your way. Things are simple. Most traps and spells are used as the situation arises, and most are useful in some capacity. Less is more in this case.

And then there's War for the Overworld (Dungeon Keeper 3). Tons of features, some that are good and fill the gaps missing in Dungeon Keeper, like the ability to repair walls, or use mana to finish building traps faster. The rest feel like a chore to go through and decide when and where to use. Did you remember to build the right potions, and did you remember to use them? Did you spend your sins to upgrade your abilities? Did you select the right ritual? Did you remember to cast it. Can you decide which specialty spell to use and where?

And the frustrating part is because they decided to make this like a standard RTS, there is no time to sit and strategically plan things out, but instead memorize the best min/max strategy, build up fast, and then rush. Half the time I don't know, or care, about the latest 10 things they added this level, because I'm too busy trying to build my rooms and ready a ton of defenses so I can survive the waves of attacks before advancing.

By killing the simplicity, they killed the game. And the old game had issues, but the problems here are much worse because of the pace. I literally need to put all my mana into minions in the beginning to get the rooms I need built before I'm overrun. Also, the trap builders are so worthless you can skip them all together (you can use mana to build them). I have had EIGHT trap builders for several minutes, and no traps were built. And did the right creatures actually show up? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Really, you may build a room and the creatures never show, or one shows up.

Honestly, with millions of games out there and new ones every day, I don't have time to waste another minute playing a game that fails to deliver. It was a good effort, and the game is polished, but there was too much focus on "modernizing" the gameplay and not enough on making it something that fans of the original would like too. Dungeon Keeper in look only.

Hard pass.

I highly recommend Dungeons 3 and Dungeons 4 to scratch the dungeon building itch. This game is a wave defense game with building elements, half-assed instructions, and a cluster♥♥♥♥ tech tree.

Really brings back the nostalgia of playing the classic game it's similar to. Great adaptation and quite fun, eventhough it lacks some of the original characters that I do miss. Still well worth it!