A guide to territory strategy
Games like Slay: which one should you play?
Dominex, Slay, Antiyoy, Konkr, and Island Empire all make a small army and a limited treasury matter. The useful question is what you want around that battle: daily maps, a campaign, diplomacy, or friends.
Find your fit
Start with the kind of challenge you want
In Sean O’Connor’s Slay, joining territory funds stronger armies, while cutting a rival apart can bankrupt its troops. Dominex credits those rules as its inspiration; Konkr explicitly credits Slay too. Antiyoy and Island Empire explore related territory-and-economy ideas with their own systems. Shared ingredients do not mean identical rules.
| Game | Choose it for | Consider first |
|---|---|---|
| Slay | The original rules, island conquest, and multiplayer in supported editions. | Platforms have separate editions; check the one you plan to buy. |
| Antiyoy | Campaigns, random maps, and, on Steam, user levels and optional diplomacy. | Classic, Online, and Steam features should not be treated as interchangeable. |
| Konkr | A free browser campaign with rival relationships and bandits. | Politics and bankruptcy add rules to learn beyond the shared economy. |
| Island Empire | Mobile campaigns, farms and walls, and local multiplayer for up to eight. | The Android listing includes ads and in-app purchases. |
| Dominex | Daily solo boards and personal goals in your browser or on iPhone and iPad. | No multiplayer, authored campaign, or cross-device saves. |
The recommendations are our interpretation of the documented features, not a ranking of quality.
The original
Slay
Choose Slay if you want Sean O’Connor’s own version of the territory-and-upkeep rules. Its central tension is committing to troops you can keep paying: combining units increases their strength and maintenance cost, and you cannot sell them back. Splitting a rival’s land can do what a stronger army would otherwise have to do. Official overview.
- Platforms
- The official site links Windows, iPhone/iPad, Android, and Kindle editions.
- Maps and modes
- Island conquest; Steam lists solo play and online multiplayer. The iOS edition also has custom maps and internet play in its version history.
- Cost
- Paid editions. The iOS listing includes additional map purchases; a free older Windows version is linked from the official site.
- Before choosing
- Check multiplayer and map options for your edition. The sources checked here do not make a clear offline guarantee for every platform.
Edition details: Slay on Steam · Slay for iPhone and iPad.
Campaigns and player-made levels
Antiyoy
Choose Antiyoy if working through a collection of scenarios matters more to you than mastering a small set of boards. Antiyoy Classic’s Android listing describes a campaign of more than 150 levels, random skirmishes, and a map editor. It is free and the developer explicitly says there are no ads. Antiyoy Classic on Google Play.
- Editions compared
- Antiyoy Classic on Android, Antiyoy for iPhone/iPad, and Antiyoy on Steam for Windows. Antiyoy Online is a separate edition, outside this comparison.
- Maps and progress
- The Steam edition lists more than 180 campaign levels, 1,500 user levels, a daily Calendar mode, random maps, and an editor.
- Rules and modes
- Steam lists solo play, optional diplomacy, and replays. The iPhone/iPad listing advertises hotseat multiplayer for up to seven. Features vary by edition.
- Offline and cost
- Classic’s Android listing is marked offline. Steam has a free demo and paid full game; its listing does not specify offline requirements.
A daily map is not unique to Dominex: Antiyoy’s Steam edition offers one too. Its campaign and user-level collection give you another way to choose the next challenge. Antiyoy on Steam.
A browser campaign with politics
Konkr
Choose Konkr if you want the economy to interact with rival relationships. Its rules describe opponents that hold grudges and react to a growing threat, with expressions above their towns showing their attitude. Unpaid troops become roaming bandits that steal income. Bankruptcy therefore leaves an active problem on the board. Konkr’s published rules.
- Platform and cost
- Free browser play. The developer says the existing browser features will remain free.
- Maps and progress
- Campaign expeditions, community scenarios, generated Conquest maps, and an editor are documented in the changelog.
- Control
- Solo play with undo and a limited rewind to a previous turn. Its political behavior and bandits change the decisions you must account for.
- Offline
- The changelog documents offline support. We have not verified which content stays available after disconnecting; load the game before relying on it offline.
Sources: About Konkr · Modes and updates · Play Konkr.
Mobile campaigns and local multiplayer
Island Empire
Choose Island Empire if farms, defensive walls, and playing with other people appeal to you. Farms increase income, while walls give you another way to defend territory. Those building choices are a concrete difference from Dominex’s unit-and-castle rules. Official overview.
- Platforms
- Android and iPhone/iPad, linked from the official site.
- Maps and modes
- Campaigns, weekly challenges, random maps, a map editor, and local multiplayer for up to eight players.
- Presentation
- Pixel art, music, and unlockable civilization skins.
- Offline and cost
- Both mobile listings advertise offline play and optional extra campaigns. Free to download; Google Play labels the Android app as containing ads and in-app purchases.
For a game to pass around locally, this is a stronger fit than Dominex, which only has computer rivals. If an ad-free experience matters to you, check the current purchase options first.
Sources: Island Empire on Google Play · Island Empire on the App Store.
Daily solo boards and personal progress
Dominex
We built Dominex around connected kingdoms, separate treasuries, and the consequences of a border capture. Choose it if you want to return to a solo contest, improve your results, and see your progress by map and difficulty. Stats records wins, losses, streaks, and fewest-round bests in the browser and iOS app.
- Platforms
- Browser on phone, tablet, or computer, plus a native iPhone/iPad app. Android uses the browser.
- Maps and modes
- Four Core maps and four generated daily boards use a fixed 35 × 24 grid. Every match is you against five computer rivals.
- Free and Premium
- Four Core maps, one rotating daily map, and every difficulty are free on both platforms. No ads or account. One lifetime Premium purchase in the iOS app opens all daily maps and custom-map saving and play. There is no web checkout.
- Offline
- The native app plays offline. In the browser, load the game online once for Core maps, today’s daily maps, and saves; open Stats, the editor, and help once online to use those screens offline too.
The limits matter: there is no multiplayer, diplomacy mode, authored campaign, or cloud sync. Your saves and records stay where you play. Stats is personal progress, with no leaderboard.
Sources: Browser maps and progress · Dominex rules · Privacy · Current App Store version.
Where to start
Pick the reason you want another turn
If it is the next authored scenario, start with Antiyoy or Konkr. If it is a match with people in the same room, look at Island Empire. For the original rules and its supported multiplayer editions, start with Slay.
Choose Dominex if you want a daily solo board, a small set of Core maps to master, and a personal record of how you are doing. In the browser you can try the full match loop without a download, account, or card.
Four Core maps, one daily map, and every difficulty level are free. No account or card required.
How we compared the games
We checked the official developer pages, rules, changelogs, and store listings linked beside each entry on . These describe features, rather than prove how an edition performs on every device. Reviews and Reddit discussions add attributed perspectives, with their original dates. This small selection is not a representative survey or proof of player consensus. We have not measured relative AI strength, match length, or ease of use, and do not claim one game wins those comparisons.
Platforms and editions are named where features differ. An unverified feature is not treated as absent. Prices, content, and availability can change; check the linked listing before buying. Recommendations reflect our judgment about fit. Competitor names identify the games; all screenshots on this page show Dominex.