Heroes of History Review: A Civilization Sim with Swagger

Time-traveling taxes, fantasy farming, and city-building shenanigans—yes, you can have it all.

My First Pyramid Was Crooked but Glorious

It started with a sandpit and a few dusty workers blinking in the sun. That’s how my journey began in Heroes of History. Ancient Egypt. Warm, slightly windy, and full of potential. The tutorial dropped me in with little more than a promise: build your civilization and make history. No pressure, right?

Within ten minutes, I had a grain farm, a barracks, and a tiny marketplace that suspiciously looked like a lemonade stand. Still, it worked. Resources trickled in. The little villagers bustled about with their clay pots and torches like they had somewhere very important to be. Every tap rewarded me with progress—crops, coins, stone, the essentials of every good empire.

The pacing was sharp early on. I had goals. I had gods to impress. I was ready to put the "pharaoh" in "fairly competent strategy player."

The Age of Tap and Pray

Once my city was running smoother than expected, I turned my attention to the heroes. This is where the game surprised me. Heroes of History doesn’t just hand you a couple of forgettable NPCs with names like Swordy McStrong. It gives you Cleopatra. And Julius Caesar. And Leonidas. And they each come with stats, skills, and enough ego to fill the Nile.

Recruiting them is a whole side game. You collect scrolls, unlock hero shards, upgrade their stars, equip gear, and then send them out into tactical battles. Some heroes are tanks. Others deal area damage. Some just shout encouraging things and hope that works.

I assembled a ragtag squad of three. Cleopatra, because obviously. Guan Yu, because I love a good mustache. And Hercules, who showed up swinging a club the size of a family car. Together, we stormed our first enemy camp.

The battle system is not overly complex but it does require some thinking. You place your heroes on the field, activate abilities at the right time, and pray the AI doesn’t do anything too stupid. It is the kind of system that makes you feel clever for winning even though the game mostly fights itself.

Rise of the Grind

By the time I reached Era Four (Ancient Greece), I was feeling smug. My city had temples, houses with actual walls, and even a tiny dock. I was clearing fog like a champ and stockpiling gold like an old-school tycoon.

Then things slowed down. Not just a little. More like trying to swim through honey while wearing sandals.

Buildings started asking for marble and copper and glass. These resources required buildings that I had not unlocked yet. Unlocking them meant clearing new territory. That required scout missions and victories in battle. Which needed stronger heroes. Which required gear. Which needed rare materials I didn’t even know existed.

Welcome to the free-to-play midgame.

Suddenly, every action had a hidden checklist. Upgrade the temple? Only if you have twenty copper bars, three scrolls, and a hero who has recently bathed in goat’s milk or whatever the requirement was. The grind had arrived and it came wearing a crown made of timers.

Cleopatra Is Carrying This Entire Civilization

I tried to tough it out. No spending. Just patience. Log in, send my builders to work, start a few upgrades, maybe clear a little fog, and then close the game before the frustration boiled over.

My alliance kept me going. Yes, there are alliances. You can join other players, share buffs, donate resources, and even take part in wars. It adds a nice social layer, and it makes the long wait times feel a little more cooperative.

Cleopatra, my MVP, was now level twenty and wielding a staff that I’m pretty sure was forged in a marketing meeting. She carried me through several impossible battles with sheer area damage and passive healing. The other heroes? Less impressive. Leonidas kept dying. Hercules was weirdly slow. I began to realize that unless you focus hard on a few select heroes, the rest become dead weight.

Event quests offered some relief. Limited-time challenges that let you earn valuable loot if you completed ten very specific and slightly annoying tasks each day. Things like “Win three battles with only ranged units” or “Harvest 200 vegetables while standing on one leg.” Okay, maybe not the last one, but it felt like that sometimes.

The events were fun, mostly. But also designed to push you toward spending. You could finish them without paying, sure, but you would need an Excel spreadsheet, two alarm clocks, and the patience of a stone.

City Building with a Side of Existential Dread

Let’s talk about the actual city. Heroes of History nails the aesthetic. Every era looks distinct. From Egyptian obelisks to Greco-Roman columns to early medieval markets, the progression feels real. Buildings evolve. Streets get busier. Your city starts to feel alive.

But the management gets messy. Some buildings are cosmetic. Others are essential. Some generate resources. Others unlock research. And then there are buildings that only work if you assign a hero to them... who is usually busy fighting somewhere else.

I spent ten minutes trying to figure out why my copper mine wasn’t producing anything. Turns out I needed to manually assign a hero to operate it. The game never told me that. It just watched silently while I blamed the villagers and their suspiciously relaxed work ethic.

City planning becomes a minigame in itself. Space is limited. Terrain is locked behind fog. You have to decide whether to build an extra farm or a barracks or just give up and cry into your grain silo. Optimization becomes the real enemy here, not the AI raiders.

When History Feels Like Homework

There came a point—somewhere around Era Six—when I had to ask myself: am I still having fun?

I was checking in daily. Doing my routines. Collecting my rewards. Upgrading what I could. Progressing slowly. Very slowly. It was all functional, but it started to feel more like a job than a game.

That’s the trick with Heroes of History. It hides the grind behind excellent polish. The visuals are crisp. The animations are charming. The music is soothing. The progression curve is gentle—until it isn’t. And once the wall hits, it hits hard.

There is fun to be had here. Real fun. Especially in the early game. You feel clever. You feel accomplished. You feel like you’re building something. But eventually, the fog lifts and you realize your empire is being held together by timers and limited energy systems.

Final Thoughts Before the Next Era

Would I recommend Heroes of History? Yes, with caveats.

If you love city builders and light strategy games, this will keep you busy for weeks. The historical angle is genuinely refreshing. The hero system is engaging. The early and midgame are strong. And you can make meaningful progress without spending—if you are extremely patient.

But if you are allergic to grind or allergic to spending money in mobile games, the honeymoon phase will end quickly.

There is a good game here. Maybe even a great one under the right circumstances. Just know that greatness might require you to open your wallet or surrender to the slow march of daily logins.

My Cleopatra still believes in me. That’s enough for now.