Imperium Legends Review: Fantasy Meets Civilization Building

Imperium Legends is a fantastic follow-up to Classics, raising the complexity and expanding the system into fantasy territory. If you loved the original and want more variety, this delivers.

What Is This Game?

Imperium Legends is a civilization-building deck builder where you guide one of history's (or mythology's) great empires from its humble beginnings through its transformation into a dominant force. You'll conquer lands, develop your culture, and race to accumulate the most victory points before the game ends, all while managing a tight hand of cards and facing difficult decisions every turn.

The game includes eight asymmetric civilizations: the Arthurians, Atlantians, Egyptians, Mauryans, Minoans, Olmecs, Qin, and Utopians. Each one plays completely differently, with unique cards, strategies, and thematic flavor built into the design.

Imperium Legends is a standalone game, but it's fully compatible with its sibling titles, Imperium Classics and Imperium Horizons, so you can mix and match civilizations across boxes. Legends also introduces a new card market, and you can use any market with any game in the series, which adds even more replayability if you own multiple boxes.

If you want to see the Imperium system in action, here's my rules teach and playthrough of Imperium Classics (the core mechanics are identical):

What Works

The "one more turn" pull is just as strong here as it is in Classics. The decision space remains crunchy and rewarding. Your next move is never obvious, and you're always weighing several viable paths. Strategic players will consistently outperform less experienced ones, and that skill expression is what keeps me coming back.

The solo mode remains exceptional. Every civilization has its own bot designed to emulate how that faction would play in human hands. They stay true to each civilization's identity and offer a real challenge at higher levels. Six difficulty settings let you scale the experience whether you're still learning or hunting for a punishing test.

What sets Legends apart from Classics is the civilizations themselves. Classics stuck to purely historical factions, but Legends expands into fantasy and mythology. The Arthurians play like King Arthur and his knights. The Atlantians feel like a mysterious underwater empire. These additions open up the system to players who want something beyond strict historical simulation.

That said, there are still historical gems here. The Olmecs are one of my favorite civilizations across all three games. Their mechanics focus heavily on masks, which was central to the actual Olmec civilization. It's a perfect example of how this series weaves theme and strategy together.

The complexity across all eight factions is a step up from Classics, so if you found the original too light, Legends might be more your speed.

After 50+ plays across the Imperium series, I keep returning to this box. That says everything.

What Doesn't

This is a lengthy game. Even solo, with rules you know well, expect two to two and a half hours from setup to teardown. Add in any rules lookups and it runs longer. I rarely finish in one sitting. I'll play a few hands, take a break, and come back later to finish.

Setup is reasonably quick once you know what you're doing, but teardown is tedious. You need to sort all the individual civilization decks back out, and there are a lot of card stacks to organize.

The rulebook that comes with Legends is poor. It's disorganized and frustrating to reference. My recommendation: print off the Imperium Horizons rulebook and use that instead. It's far better and works perfectly for Legends.

Play time scales linearly with player count, which makes three or four-player games drag significantly. I've permanently removed the three and four-player cards from my box. When I have a larger group, I reach for something else.

One more thing: scoring by hand is tedious given how many point sources exist. I use this scoring app every game and strongly recommend it.

Replayability

Extremely high. Eight civilizations with completely distinct playstyles and strategies give you a ton of ground to explore. You can pit each one against every bot, and even after many plays, I still enjoy revisiting favorites to sharpen my approach.

If you own Imperium Classics or Imperium Horizons, the replayability increases further. Legends adds a new card market you can use with any game in the series, and mixing civilizations across boxes keeps things fresh for a long time.

Which One to Start With: Classics, Legends, or Horizons?

If you're new to the series, your starting point depends on how much complexity you want.

Classics features the most famous civilizations in history: Greeks, Romans, Persians, Vikings. I think this makes for the most immediately compelling theme. It's also the simplest and least complex of the three boxes, making it the best entry point for most players.

Legends steps up the complexity and introduces eight new civilizations, including some that don't exist in real history (like the Arthurians and Atlantians) alongside historical favorites like the Egyptians. If you want a bit more crunch and don't mind fictional factions, Legends is a great second box or an alternative starting point for experienced gamers.

Horizons is the largest and most complex. It includes fourteen civilizations, the best rulebook of the bunch, improved components, and an expansion that pushes complexity even higher. Start here only if you're confident you want a heavier experience from day one.

You can check out my reviews of Imperium Classics and Imperium Horizons for deeper dives on each.

Who Should Play This

Imperium Legends is a great fit for solo gamers, fans of medium-heavy to heavy strategy games, deck builder enthusiasts, and anyone drawn to the civilization-building genre. If you enjoyed Classics and want more complexity or variety, this is the natural next step.

Skip it if you want something light or fast. If your game nights usually involve three or four players, this isn't the right choice. The play time simply doesn't work well for larger groups.

Final Verdict

Imperium Legends builds on everything that made Classics great while pushing the system into new territory. The fantasy civilizations add welcome variety, the complexity satisfies players looking for more depth, and the new card market extends replayability across the entire series. It's not for everyone, but for dedicated solo gamers and civilization-building fans, this is an easy recommendation.