Many Welps

Here’s a list of things I know about the Conan the Barbarian IP:

• It was a movie starring Arnold Schwartzenneger
• Before it was a movie, it was a series of books.
• There was a 2000s era MMO set in the Conan Universe – Age of Conan – which is apparently still running!
• Oh, and there’s a survival sandbox, Conan Exiles, which was big a few years ago.

I’ve seen the movie once or twice. I haven’t read any of the books. I tried the free to play version of Age of Conan a handful of times but never stuck with it. I apparently own Conan Exiles but I haven’t played it. All this to say, I am probably not the target audience for a cartoony, Conan the Barbarian parody game, announced as an April Fools joke. But here I am, and I can’t stop chopping!

I vaguely knew of this game’s existence from the Massively OP Podcast. I don’t know how or when it showed up in my Steam library so it’s probably from a bundle. Shortly after finishing Wytchwood, I went looking through the “Great on Deck” category in search of something else to play on the Steam Deck. I scrolled past Conan Chop Chop a few times before deciding to just give it a shot. I’m not usually one for action rougelites, preferring games that don’t make you start over when you lose, but it looked like a game well suited for the Deck. I thought I’d do a run or two and get bored but I was hooked!

So what is it? Conan Chop Chop is a 2D, action rougelite, set in the Conan universe. Honestly, it’s kind of generic. You know the type of game, you’ve probably played it before. You collect random items to make a build, you clear out rooms to advance to the next room, you unlock chests for a chance at better items, you fight bosses, and when you die, the run is over and you’re sent back to town. There is permanent progression in the form of unlocking new items with a special currency found during run and hero progression through experience gained towards your Warrior level at the end of a run. When you level up, you unlock skill points that can be used to make your chosen heroes stronger. But at the same time, there’s cartoon Conan with stick figure legs. It is a game that doesn’t take itself seriously but is also strangely compelling. I have been booting it up everyday for a run or two.

The runs aren’t very long, I’ve been averaging under an hour, and consist of four stages. Before you start, you have a chance to buy some items in town to kick off your build before venturing off. Within each stage, there are a set of rooms with enemies. You need to clear all of the enemies before advancing to the next room. Some rooms are optional and lead to chests or merchants where you can get better gear. Some times there are mini bosses down these routes or additional health. Each stage leads to a dungeon which has a few different enemy types and environmental hazards floor traps and spiky walls. At the end of every dungeon is a boss. Once you defeat the boss, you complete the stage, and go back to town where you can upgrade your gear again before moving on.

The stages open up in the same order every run and have the same final boss. Starting with the Darkwood and a fight with Thrak, followed by the desert of Koth where you’ll face the Giant Sand Worm, then the ice mountain of Vanaheim ruled by the Frost Giant, and finally Hyperboria with the Fire Skull. At the moment, I can consistently get through the Darkwood and Koth. Sometimes I get to the Frost Giant but I can’t consitently defeat him yet. I have been to Hyperboria twice but I’ve only faced the Fire Skull of Hyperboria once. It wasn’t a very long fight…

There are a few things that have helped my runs go further. First, I’ve unlocked most of the skills for Valeria which includes upgrades like more health, movement speed, and damage. She also has a skill which stacks bleed damage with every attack which adds even more damage. There are a total of four characters but I don’t plan on trying to unlock all the skills for them at the moment. I’ve also unlocked a good amount of the weapons, charms, armor, and shields. They aren’t necessarily better items, but they do have new effects to synergize with other items for more build variety. My favorite so far is the charm that doubles your bombs and the charm that leaves a bomb decoy behind you after using your dash. Used together, you drop two decoys every dash so there are explosions going off all the time!

I’ve also got better, mechanically, after a bunch of runs. Learning to use every tool at my disposal has been key. The bombs are good for some decent AoE damage on normal enemies and some extra damage on bosses. The bow can sometimes do more damage than your primary weapon, but aiming it can be a little weird on the Steam Deck some times. The biggest thing was learning some patience and using my shield effectively. If you time your blocks right, you can parry attacks which can stun enemies and trigger some effects depending on what shield is equipped. But you can also block through attacks without a parry. Eventually your guard will break but it negates damage until it does. It took me a while to stop trying to kill enemies faster than they can attack and learn to block every once in a while. I ended up having more health for longer which let me go farther into the runs.

I’ve settled into an equipment priority list as well. Enemy health goes up with every new stage so I always make sure to prioritize upgrading my weapon first. Next is armor, because it typically gives you more health which covers my mistakes. The bow comes next. I’ve found that a decent bow can dish out a lot of sustained, single target damage, that is until you run out of arrows. I won’t prioritize this as much if I’m going with an explosion build since bombs and arrows share the same resource meter. Shields are up next, so I can block through more damage and my last priority is charms. I’m a fan of using whatever I find during the stages to use as charms. I’ll rarely buy them in town, unless I have enough money and there’s a synergy I want to try.

I’m kind of surprised I’ve been so taken with this game, it’s not something I would typically seek out. The combination of a relatively short run time and that little mental reward of doing slightly better than last time has keep me engaged with it. I plan on continuing along until I either win a run or unlock all the items. Whichever comes first. The thought being, with everything unlocked, it’s not an item issue it’s a skill issue. By that time, I’ll be ready to put the game down regardless of if I complete the run or not!