Summoners War

Review by eFreeware

Most mobile RPGs ask you to pick a hero and follow a story. Summoners War asks you to assemble a roster of more than a thousand monsters, then spend months deciding which ones deserve your best equipment. That collecting-and-tuning loop, rather than a single campaign, is the core of the game, and it is the reason the title has kept an audience for so long.

It is a free turn-based strategy RPG from Com2uS, originally released in June 2014 and still being updated, with a 3.9 average across more than 2.3 million ratings and over 50 million installs. If you like the idea of building a team piece by piece and testing it against other players, this is squarely in your territory. If you want a short, self-contained story you can finish in a weekend, the scale here works against that.

The Sky Islands and the war you are dropped into

The setting is a fantasy world of floating islands caught up in a global conflict. You play as a summoner who gathers monsters to their side and pushes back against dark forces, working through villages, battles, adventures and crafting as you go. The developer frames the whole thing as a worldwide war, and the structure supports that: your progress is measured less by a plot milestone than by how far your collection has come.

Monsters come in five attributes: Fire, Water, Wind, Light and Dark. Each one has its own skills and visual style, and the appeal of the roster is that no two creatures are meant to fill exactly the same role. Bosses such as Dragons and Giants sit at the tougher end of the content, and taking them down is presented as a test of how well you have assembled and equipped your team rather than a test of reflexes.

The game is available in 16 languages, including English, Korean, Japanese, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, German, French, Portuguese, Spanish, Russian, Indonesian, Vietnamese, Turkish, Arabic, Italian and Thai. It carries a Teen rating. That combination of language coverage and a long-running global player base is part of why the arena side of the game has the scale it does.

How a run actually plays out

Battles are turn-based, and the strategic layer sits mostly before the fighting starts. You choose which monsters to bring, then lean on 23 types of rune sets, each with its own effect, to shape how those monsters behave. Two players can field similar creatures and get very different results because of rune choices, which is the part of the design I find most interesting in principle.

Growth runs alongside the fighting. Relics are equipment that grant significant strength, and summoning accumulates mileage that guarantees a default 5-star monster, so repeated pulls move you toward something concrete rather than leaving everything to chance. The developer also points to a support system for newcomers and returning players, including support quests and special tasks that promise a 5-star monster, plus Ameria's Luck and Scout Battle for more efficient farming.

Competitive play has several shapes. Arena duels open with a Pick & Ban phase before the real-time tactical exchange begins. Challenge Battle hands both sides the same monsters, so the outcome rests on decisions rather than on who has the deeper roster. World Arena is positioned as the top tier of that competition, feeding into the Summoners War World Championship, the developer's global tournament. Group content includes real-time three-player raids, guild slime hunts and guild PvP, while the Dimension Hole is where you awaken new power and Tartarus' Labyrinth offers another line of exploration.

Why the collection loop holds attention

The pull here is the combination of a very large roster and a build system deep enough to keep that roster relevant. With five attributes and over a thousand monsters, the question is rarely whether you have something useful, but which of several options fits the fight in front of you. Runes and Relics give you levers to pull on the same creature, so a monster you set aside early can become worth revisiting later.

There is also a social layer that gives the grinding a point. Guilds are not just a chat channel; they come with slime hunts and PvP battles that reward coordinated play. Raids for three players at once add a mode where your team has to complement other people's teams rather than stand alone. For players who like comparing builds and trading opinions, that structure gives the numbers something to be about.

The guaranteed 5-star from summon mileage is the kind of detail that softens the randomness of a collection game. It does not remove the long tail of gathering and upgrading, but it means a stretch of summoning always ends somewhere specific.

What the free download includes, and what it costs

Summoners War is free to download and it carries ads. It also offers in-app purchases, with items available for purchase inside the game and some paid items potentially non-refundable depending on the type. The game does not present itself as a one-time purchase.

The access permissions are worth a glance before you install. Notifications, audio and, on older Android versions, storage access are all optional, and you can still use the service without granting them, aside from the specific features tied to each permission. You can revoke or change permissions later through your device settings, or by upgrading or removing the app on older systems.

The game requests notification permission, so if you would rather not see those, it is the permission to think about first. Beyond that, the practical cost question is the usual one for a free collection RPG with purchases: how much you are comfortable spending on top of the download. Treat the purchase option as a known part of the package.

A long-term project rather than a quick diversion

Where this lands for me is as a game you commit to rather than dip into. The breadth of the monster list, the rune and Relic systems, the guild content and the arena ladder all point in the same direction: this is designed to be played over a long stretch, with progress arriving in increments. That is a strength if you enjoy optimizing and comparing, and a mismatch if you want something you can exhaust.

The 3.9 average across a very large number of ratings suggests a broad audience with mixed feelings, which is not surprising for a game that has been running since 2014 and has changed shape many times. The competitive modes are the part I would expect to matter most to veterans, particularly Challenge Battle, where identical monsters put the emphasis on decision-making, and the World Arena, which feeds into the world championship. Newer players have the support quests and the guaranteed 5-star from summon mileage to work with.

The scale cuts both ways. More than a thousand monsters means a lot of variety to explore, and also a lot of names to learn before the rune decisions start to feel deliberate. Anyone who enjoys that kind of depth will find plenty to occupy them; anyone who wants the strategy to be legible in the first hour may find the learning curve steeper than they would like.

A deep roster for players who like to tinker

I would point this at players who enjoy turn-based combat and are happy to spend their time on team composition, rune sets and Relics rather than on a story that ends.

It is a free download with ads and in-app purchases, so the sensible approach is to go in expecting a long-term project and decide early how much you want to spend. If the idea of building and rebuilding teams, testing them in Pick & Ban arenas and comparing notes with a guild sounds appealing, this is a well-established option. If you want something brief and self-contained, the depth here is likely to feel like work rather than play.

What's new in version 9.3.5

A global RPG that has captivated Summoners worldwide! Win battles with your own unique deck and strategy. - Monster skill balance adjusted - Magic Crafting QoL improved - Other QoL improved and errors fixed Got feedback? Leave a review or visit https://customer.withhive.com/com2us and drop us a line!