Sword of Convallaria is a brand new tactics mobile game that allows for extremely specialized characters. Read our early impressions review to see what it did well, what it didn't do well, and if it's worth buying.
Sword of Convallaria Review Overview
What is Sword of Convallaria?
Sword of Convallaria is set in the continent of Rodinia. There, the Kingdom of Iria enjoys the blessing of a bountiful source of Luxite. It is a mineral of significant strategic importance due to being imbued with magical properties. Envious of their lands, other nations scheme behind the scenes, inciting political unrest, religious and racial conflicts, and other such means to undermine Iria’s power.
It is a tactical RPG where battles are set on a grid-based map. Each stage features interactable objects, different terrains, obstacles, traps, etc. Despite how troublesome these may seem, players can opt to use them to their advantage by pushing enemies off cliffs, setting the terrain on fire, leading enemies to traps, etc.
Sword of Convallaria features:
⚫︎ Turn-based grid combat system
⚫︎ Terrain hazards
⚫︎ Unit specialization
⚫︎ Character gacha system
⚫︎ Auto-play function
⚫︎ Character bonding
⚫︎ Room decorating
For more gameplay details, read everything we know about Sword of Convallaria's gameplay and story.
| Platforms | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Steam |
 Google Play |
 App Store |
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| Free-to-play | |||||
Sword of Convallaria Pros & Cons
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
 Characters Can Be Specialized Decent Gacha Rates A Real Mobile Game |
Everything Is Time-Gated Horrible Gacha Pity System |
Sword of Convallaria Overall Score - 70/100
Sword of Convallaria is what you get when you take an excellent concept and weigh it down with an assortment of small issues that add up to something huge. Although the gameplay is certainly fun and the artworks are visually pleasing, the fact that the entire game revolves around consumable resources and the gacha system having such a terrible pity system really hurts it more than it should considering all its other caveats.
Sword of Convallaria Story - 6/10
While I appreciate the care that went into developing the backstories of each character, the main story constitutes a lot of predictable tropes and the ever-lazy time travel plot hack. Even if you disregard that, the rushed pace and unreasonable developments that happen as the narrative progresses really makes the overall experience a guilty pleasure at best.
Sword of Convallaria Gameplay - 7/10
Sword of Convallaria is a great tactics game conceptually. A lot of fights revolve around being conscious of your surroundings and making use of the objects around you. On top of that, the specializations each character can assume gives the experience a good amount of depth. It is, however, severely hamstrung by its inflexible interface. You can’t even rotate the camera or change viewing angle. Its reliance on terrain navigation also gravely impacts the Auto-Play’s performance, as the AI seems to be blind to all things that aren’t strictly friend or foe.
Sword of Convallaria Visuals - 8/10
Pixel art will always have a place in gaming. Moreso if the game attempts to make as much use of them as Sword of Convallaria does. The excessively explosive animations from skills do wonders for increasing its appeal to the masses. Its character artworks are also quite gorgeous. Unfortunately, the character artworks are only really relevant in one part of the game (the menu), and the stage design reeks of emptiness if you ignore all the exploding barrels and blockades.
Sword of Convallaria Audio - 7/10
Punchy sound effects, great voice acting, and immersive background tracks. It should be the recipe for success for any game. However, there are a lot of scenes that assume complete silence for some reason. The voice acting is also exclusive for the highest-rarity characters outside of story cutscenes. Privilege of rarity, perhaps?
Sword of Convallaria Value for Money - 7/10
While I would love to give this a score higher than I would usually assign to HoYoverse games due to its decent SSR rates, the fact that the developers decided to set the hard pity for event banners at a mind-boggling 180 pulls makes targeting a specific character an exercise of resilience, patience, and masochism. On top of that, the vast majority of its contents require the use of either an exorbitant amount of stamina, which takes an entire day to completely replenish, or a consumable key that you can only obtain twice a week.
Sword of Convallaria Review: A Silver Standard
Ah, here we are with another gacha game in Sword of Convallaria. It’s not like we get too much of them these days, but there’s definitely something about gacha games that make them seem like there’s too many in the market. Is it because of how dangerously addicting they are, despite their predatory practices? All I do know is that I’m addicted to them myself (help).
Unlike other high-profile gacha games that have been released recently, Sword of Convallaria is a turn-based tactics game with a grid combat system. Think Disgaea, and you’re halfway to conceptualizing Sword of Convallaria already. It’s actually a welcome change considering the last time we got one of these was Brown Dust 2 if I remember correctly.
Unfortunately, it’s just not as good as Brown Dust 2, at least on release.
It doesn’t have a small number of glaring issues, either (aside from two rather significant ones). The reason why it feels so mediocre to play is due to a rather long list of minor problems instead.
Reasons include: its controller support is mediocre at best, only Legendary characters are voiced outside of cutscenes, the localization is a hit or miss, its auto-play AI is dumb as bricks, it has a pretty terrible economy, etc. I could go on and on, but at that point, it would be better to list them down in bullet points instead. Unfortunately, this review is in essay form, so you’ll just have to find out the other issues yourself.
If you’re still willing to give the game a try at this point.
Aside from those, the two major problems with Sword of Convallaria definitely has to do with its stamina usage and gacha pity system. For the former, it’s due to the game’s overreliance on consumable resources in order to allow you to actually play the game. As for the latter, it’s just… one step away from being one of the worst pity systems I’ve ever had the displeasure of experiencing.
Like, what kind of game actively discourages you from playing it in the first place? At the very least games like Genshin Impact, Zenless Zone Zero, Wuthering Waves, etc. have activities that utilize their core gameplay that don't use up stamina. But in Sword of Convallaria, especially early on, you’re forced to stop once you run out of stamina with no way to replenish them outside of the scarce freebies they give away. Or, you know, spending money.
As for the gacha, it’s already terrible enough that they’re using a coin flip mechanic to decide if you’ll get the event character. But since they also decided to separate its soft and hard pity counters, it’s very possible for you to pull multiple non-rate-up characters before you strike gold. It’s almost as if the game is telling you to spend more money than what should be passable for a gacha game.
It’s not all doom and gloom, fortunately. Sword of Convallaria does have a lot of good things going for it. All of its artworks are stunning, and the gameplay requires more than two brain cells and a dumb auto-play AI in order to achieve perfect wins. However, none of these are worth all the trouble of eventually reaching the point where its stamina system and gacha pities will frustrate you daily.
It’s highly likely that the developers will address at least some of the game’s issues down the road. But as it is right now, Sword of Convallaria can only aim for a silver medal at most for its efforts.
Pros of Sword of Convallaria
| Things Sword of Convallaria Got Right |
|---|
|
Characters Can Be Specialized Decent Gacha Rates A Real Mobile Game |
Characters Can Be Specialized
Most mobile games are so used to releasing characters that can only fulfill one role. After that, it’s up to the player to adjust them according to their needs via equipment. However, Sword of Convallaria’s characters can be specialized down to the skills that they have access to.
This is done through their skill trees. They may look linear at a glance, but the game actually forces you to choose only one or the other for every tier. Your selection is permanent, by the way, which kind of sucks. However, it also forces you to really think about how you want to use that character in the long term. For example, you can choose to either make Gloria a powerful character with strong attacks and great bulk. Alternatively, you can also set her up to be a support that carries half a dozen buffs into battle.
Hopefully, though, the game gives you the option to reset your character’s skills in the future. People can make mistakes. Right?
Decent Gacha Rates
Back in my day, a 2% SSR rate can be considered low. But nowadays, it’s already a remarkable improvement compared to the much more prevalent sub-1% rates that are dominating the market. Maybe it’s because gacha players are addicted to self-punishment.
Normalize +5% SSR rates again, please.
A Real Mobile Game
We live in a time where mobile games that feel like real mobile games are becoming a rarity, at least among the more high-profile releases. That’s a great thing, though. After all, the reverse is much worse. A good example of that is Snowbreak: Containment Zone’s aneurysm-inducing interface on mobile being near-impossible to enjoy compared to its much more intuitive controls on PC.
As a turn-based tactics game, Sword of Convallaria is extremely easy to play with your fingers on mobile. It even has an auto-play feature in case you’re too lazy, or just looking to finish your dailies. However, the lack of camera controls does present a problem with fine targeting. Unfortunately, that’s going to be a common occurrence due to the amount of platforms and climbable doodads the game has.
Cons of Sword of Convallaria
| Things That Sword of Convallaria Can Improve |
|---|
|
Everything Is Time-Gated Horrible Gacha Pity System |
Everything Is Time-Gated
Mobile games have the habit of restricting your activities through a stamina system. Its main aim is to keep players coming back for fear of overflow, and thus creating more opportunities for the game to lead them into their shops. Ignoring that, it would have been fine if not everything costs stamina or a different consumable resource. But not only is that not true for Sword of Convallaria, the amount it demands for every stage is nothing short of absurd.
What’s even worse is that the only mode that doesn't require stamina, Spiral of Destinities, requires an even harder resource to gather. In order to opt in, you must have keys at the ready, and these are only given sparingly throughout the course of an entire week.
It’s almost as if the game is telling you to stop playing every day.
Horrible Gacha Pity System
Even though Sword of Convallaria’s gacha rates are what you can consider "decent" in this day and age (what a time to live in), the same cannot be said for its pity system. For reference, I consider miHoYo’s 50/50 system with the soft pity at 90 pulls as the bare minimum of acceptable gacha schemes. On the other hand, something like Gundam UC Engage’s 50/50 system with only a hard pity at 200 pulls is at the bottom end of what should be considered.
Sword of Convallaria falls somewhere between the two with its 90-pull soft pity, 180-pull hard pity, and a 50/50 system on getting a SSR. However, it differs from miHoYo’s system in that its soft pity and hard pity are counted separately. What this means is that unlike in games such as Honkai: Star Rail and Zenless Zone Zero where the rate-up character is guaranteed if you lose the 50/50 coin flip, you can absolutely pull multiple non-rate-up characters in Sword of Convallaria until you trigger its 180 hard pity.
Is Sword of Convallaria Worth It?
If you have nothing else to play, sure
While Sword of Convallaria’s artworks are certainly gorgeous and its core gameplay pretty solid, you should consider its excessive reliance on stamina, gacha pity system, and lackluster story very carefully. While it’s not the largest reason to stick to a gacha game, it does comprise a significant percentage of why others tend to stay. But unless the developers decide to add quality of life improvements to the game and other necessary fixes, it might be better to just consider this as a secondary option.
| Platforms | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Steam |
Google Play |
App Store |
|||
| Free-to-play | |||||
Sword of Convallaria FAQ
Is it difficult to reroll in Sword of Convallaria?
Considering that the game accepts guest accounts on mobile, you can get away with rerolling multiple times without using up emails. Plus, rerolling only takes a short amount of time.
Who is the best character to roll for in Sword of Convallaria?
Gloria is definitely the best character to aim for at the moment. Not only is she a powerful support, you can also build her as a damage dealer. She is also the only event banner right now, so you can opt to wait for others to come your way.
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Sword of Convallaria Product Information
 |
|
| Title | SWORD OF CONVALLARIA |
|---|---|
| Release Date | July 31, 2024 |
| Developer | XD |
| Publisher | XD |
| Supported Platforms | Mobile, PC |
| Genre | RPG, Strategy |
| Number of Players | 1 |
| ESRB Rating | TBA |
| Official Website | Sword of Convallaria Website |
