$24.99The Scouring Old school RTS, fast and ruthless
Command an army or fight as one hero, tearing through bases, dungeons and undead nights with friends or rivals.
Is The Scouring worth it?
The Scouring is worth it if…
- you miss the era of orcs versus humans and want a modern take on it
- you like fast RTS matches where micro and quick decisions decide the fight
- you want to play a hero with abilities while the AI handles your base
- you enjoy building a base with friends and surviving night raids together
- you like tinkering with custom maps, modes and AI scripts
Screenshots
Classic RTS, played fast
The core is the formula you remember: send workers to gold and lumber, raise farms and barracks, train an army, and tear down every enemy building to win. The pace is quicker than the old games it echoes. Starting gold runs out fast, so you push for new mines and extra town centers early, and the fighting rewards sharp hands: flanking, focusing targets, and micro down to individual units. There are neutral creatures on the map and dungeons to clear for resources, items and experience, so even a quiet minute is spent deciding where to strike next.
Every unit earns its keep
Units here are not disposable. Each one gains experience, levels up, and can even carry a healing potion if you think to give it one, so a veteran swordsman is worth protecting like a hero. Food works differently too: farms need peasants working them, and your whole army eats constantly, so starving the economy to spam troops backfires. You can pull peasants off the fields for a resource rush, then put them back.
Be the hero
In Hero Mode the split changes: you control one powerful character with abilities and gear, while the AI runs your base, resources and army behind you. You fight like an action RPG, gaining levels, collecting items from dungeons, and customizing your build, then rally your AI-built forces to the fight. It blends the two genres cleanly: the strategy happens whether you watch it or not, and your job is to tip the battles. If you would rather swing a sword than manage a lumber camp, this mode is the one to try first.
Nights worth dreading
A day and night cycle changes the map: daylight gives your units better vision, and after dark, waves of undead come for your base if you enable them. Skeletons pour in, led by a necromancer who keeps spawning more, so even a quiet match against the AI keeps you on edge. Workers can fight back, which turns a panic defense into a real decision. It is a natural fit for playing with friends: one of you holds the walls while the other rebuilds the economy, and surviving a bad night together feels like the point of the whole game.
Can you play it solo?
Can you play it solo?
Yes. Singleplayer matches let you fill the other seats with AI opponents, and the classic mode works well against the computer. The AI is a reasonable sparring partner: beatable on hard if you play cleanly, but not a pushover. Hero Mode is also built around solo play, since the AI manages your base while you fight.
What makes it different from other RTS games?
A few things. Every unit levels up and is worth keeping alive, food works as a live economy where farms need workers and your army eats constantly, and Hero Mode hands base management to the AI so you can fight as a single character. Add destructible battles, units climbing ladders onto towers, and night undead raids, and it plays like an old school RTS with its own ideas layered on.
Do the factions play differently?
Not much, for now. Humans and orcs mirror each other closely, in the spirit of the oldest games in the genre, with the differences coming from spells and from the maps you play on. If distinct asymmetric factions are what you are after, that is not the selling point yet.
How does it run?
Very smoothly. The engine holds its frame rate even with hundreds of units on screen, battles stay readable, and the controls feel responsive. You can watch a busy replay at fast forward without a hitch, which says more about performance than any benchmark.
