The Dark Lord Vez’nan has launched a surprise attack on a new land and tasks his favourite general to lead the charge in the new Hammerhold Campaign in Kingdom Rush Vengeance. It features a new hero, tower, and enemies set across five fully fleshed-out maps, with a few returning series characters racing to the defence.
When you first prepare to enter the Hammerhold levels, you are warned it is a high-difficulty campaign. As it turns out, this is an understatement. For veterans with high-level heroes and more towers, it will be a challenge. If you are just starting out, however, it is an extremely fun, but very tricky, uphill battle.
Unique maps and challenging foes
Each stage has its own unique mechanics to tackle. Wizard’s Landing has permanent archer towers to deal some noticeable damage to your fighters until you take the time to explode them. Hammerhold Street is a superb example of urban warfare with copious amounts of enemy entry points and streets to defend, and Sape Oasis will see how you handle ambush troops waiting in the trees.
Along with new maps come, of course, some incredibly tough new troops. You’ll first be introduced to the standard Legionnaire foot soldiers packing a whopping 280 HP, and it escalates incredibly fast. Magic Carpets will bombard you from the air, Djinni will absolutely ruin your defence by transmogrifying your units and towers into useless objects, and massive behemoths in the form of War Elephants who both soak up and dish out ungodly damage. This all comes before the final showdown with recognisable old face Malik, a tanky boss who can literally demolish your towers and prevent rebuilds on the same plot.
Call in the cavalry
These are the toughest enemies Vengeance has put out, and Malik is unquestionably the toughest boss you could face, so you will need an equally powerful Hero. Enter Isfet, the Undying Warlock, a mummy magician who slumbered for aeons until Vez’nan awoke him.
A rather powerful ranged fighter, Isfet has the incredibly helpful passive of potentially raising any downed enemy as a mummy to fight on your side to face their old friends. Add this to the Dark Tempest ultimate skill that slows enemies whilst dealing up to 400 damage, and a handy debuff in the form of Blood Torment that decreases enemy defence, he is a very powerful ally. The trade-off, however, is we found him to be a bit slow getting around the map, so you have to be deliberate with your deployment.
Entering alongside Isfet is a new tower that would cause Boba Fett to wake up screaming; the Sandworm Hollow. It is on the slow and expensive side, but it became a fast favourite thanks to its rather powerful AoE attack. It’s Call of the Desert skill spawns adds, who, unfortunately, felt very underpowered against Hammerhold foes, but its instant area kill skill Snack Hour makes up for that.
A lot of humour to find
This new DLC is indeed quite tough, but it never gets frustrating. The action is always frantic and fun. You will chuckle at the silly quotes you hear, and despite the simple graphics, Hammerhold is a wonder to look at. It is quite impressive just how good-looking and interesting Ironhides’ art style continues to be, especially when you throw in the easter eggs loitering around the maps.
Not to give too much away and ruin the fun, but Hammerhold plays host to a few new Achievements tied into hidden objects in the maps. Take Wizard’s Landing, the first map. Have a hard look and you might just see an iconic Looney Tunes duo to interact with in a rather specific, hilarious manner. Keep an eye out for these, as the references you can find are pretty amusing.
All the content in one easy place
The Hammerhold Campaign is available for $7.99, or if you subscribe to Apple Arcade, it’s free. It is a bit more expensive than the previous DLC, but that’s because, for the first time, Ironhide has released all its add-on content as one pack instead of individual components. That means you get all the stages, the hero, and the tower for one price for the ultimate Hammerhold experience.
Having played through Hammerhold, we can attest to how fun it is. It is a tough time, but manages to never make the player throw their phone in defeat. Instead, you want to keep coming back to experiment with the new units or laugh at the easter eggs. If you are a fan of Kingdom Rush Vengeance or a rather masochistic newbie, Hammerhold should definitely be on your Christmas list.
Kingdom Rush Vengeance is available to play on iOS, Android, and Apple Arcade.
