Customer Reviews

Stronghold: Crusader

5 star:		(33)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Anyone who likes real-time strategy (Starcraft, Age of Empires) will love this game too. Especially if you were the kind of defensive player who enjoyed putting up walls and towers more than mobile armies (although both have a role in Crusader).

The economy is significantly more complex than most of the previous games in this genre, so it will take some practice to get good enough at building a stable economy that you can concentrate on warfare. (E.g. training crossbowmen requires: you are popular enough to have free peasants; you have crossbows, and leather armor; having weapons requires an armory to store them; crossbows require someone to make them, who in turn needs wood from woodcutters; leather armor requires a tanner, who needs to get cows from a dairy farm. Any one of these links can be broken, especially during warfare, and suddenly you can no longer make more crossbowmen.)

Compared to their first release (Stronghold), the minor tweaks have improved the game. A mercenary camp lets you build an army at the beginning, instead of waiting until the midgame. Trees and potential farmland are now limited to an oasis (this being the middle east instead of England), which has the effect that there are now resources to fight over from the very beginning.

But don't just take my word for it. Firefly/GOD offers a free demo (of both Stronghold and Crusader) with a few very playable, very fun levels. Get the demo and try it out! You can decide yourself whether you like the gameplay enough to purchase it.

This is the greatest game Ive ever played bar none. When I was in highschool I loved Civilization 2. I recently got a computer and wanted a good game. I bought Civilization 3 and it seemed to have lost something. I cant put my finger on it but it just didnt have the soul. Or maybe I have changed and need more exitement. Well anyway I took a chance on Stronghold Crusader and havent stopped playing since. This game is simply amazing. You build up a castle(kind of like sim city). You have to build houses for the people and cathedrals. The graphics are simply beautiful. The battles are very INTENSE. And strategy changes on each skirmish. What worked in one, dosent get you anywhere in another. This game has the soul I was talking about earlier. I really feel angered when my castle is getting burned down. I take it personal. How many games emmerse you to the extent that you get so involved in the game. I havent ever taken a game so much to heart. Take a chace on this one. Its not very expensive and has kept me at it for many days. Very addictive. And the thrill of beating a lord who has been given you a hard time. That thrill of victory is priceless. Go out and buy this game. NOW!

Endless hours of gameplay is all I have to say. I have yet to tire of this game. You have to be concerned with all of the micro-management of the original Stronghold. You're opponents are more challenging. One aspect of this game that is very challenging is that most areas are arid (desert) regions, so finding areas to grow food can be difficult. Don't worry, that's what makes it more fun. Resources are scarce and enemies are plentiful and vicious. The Wolf, the Rat, the Pig, and the Snake are all back, along with a few new characters to get on your nerves, in a good way.

For those who may have not played the original, you will want to buy this after you have played Stronghold, or you may be disappointed. You don't have to play the original to appreciate this game but it helps.

For those who are new, the idea is simple: keep your people fed, protected, and happy, and they will serve you well. Build an army, make sure there is enough money in the treasury, keep an eye on your rations, maintain sufficient resources on your stockpile, stock your armory with weapons, and eliminate your enemy. It is a wonderful real-time war game, that requires you to focus on more than war.

The regular one-player story mode has about 50 missions, so it will take you a while to complete that aspect. All of the other modes will keep you occupied if you get bored with that, and if you are totally bored, create your own maps and scenarios. I use the term bored losely because it is almost impossible to do with this game.

I am very particular about the games I buy, This is without a doubt the best stradegy game I've ever played. This game is not only good , but will keep you entertained for guite a while because there are so many options to choose from. I agree with some of the other reviewers, I played this game for 8 hours, never got bored,because the time just seemed to past by, highly addictive. This game just keeps you so in to it, you don't want to stop , just remember there are 4 main objectives, to getting you going in this game,taxes,food protection, and religion. Make sure your popularity stay above 70 until you get your castle established pretty well. I kept the tax level to no taxes, until I got every thing going to my advantage, then you can go up to above mean taxes if you wish. Try this game out , I seriously don't think you will be disappointed.

Stronghold Crusader is the best game I have ever played. There are so many areas to talk about. Graphics are beautiful and amazingly well done. Difficulty can range from near impossible to first time on a computer. A very well thought-out setup makes every aspect of the game easy, from signing in to conquering the Holy Land. Fairly historically accurate. Difficult at times but great. Even the music is good. The ability to build and construct a entire city within your keep's walls adds a great element. I have been playing for several months and I am still not the least bit bored. There's no such thing as too easy. You can build campaigns, play campaigns, play or build scenarios, build a massive castle in peacetime, play against easy enemies with a massive advantage in funds or admirable foes with hardly any gold at all, and select a variety of biased or unbiased maps to play challenging quests in. Play historically accurate campaigns or just beat Richard the Lionheart out of you land. Use allies to win, build siege equipment, hire assassins, charge with knights, and set fire to enemies as they wade through ditches of oil. A great game with many aspects and the perfect combination of strategy and RTS. An ecellent tutorial helps new players learn the game in a matter of seconds, and in a week you can be at a high level. Never fear this game getting old or being "used up", because there are endless ways to play. A great game. I haven't played Stronghold, but I think that it is by far beaten out by this one. Excellent.
Seasoned pros at RTS and computer games may find this a little easy, regardless of how hard, but for normal players and even frequent players this game can pose a challenge to even the best of gamers.

The gamer who gave 2 starts to this game obviously has no clue of good games. I agree only on the part that rotation could be better. Thats it, the rest is awesome.

Graphics: 9
Sound: 8
Concept: 10
Difficulty: 9

You have ability to build your stronghold castle the way you want it and this game requires you to think every move you make to crush your enemy, otherwise you'll loose it fast.

Therefore, your success depends on food supplies, religion(building church or temple), tax rates in order to grow your population (HINT). In addition, stone, iron and wood supplies
will allow you to build strong castles with all kinds of towers and add armory and other buildings. The more people you have the faster army you can build and you have to keep them happy(again enough food, good tax rates and bless them with your priest), otherwise they leave your castle and you loose it.

From Archers to Horse Archers, from Swordsmen to building Catapults with Engineers to knock down enemy castle you are in control of your battle.

I have 1MHz Pentium III Dell machine with 384MB of RAM (PC 133) and decent 64MB geForce 4 TI 6200 video card and DO NOT HAVE ANY technical issues especially controling the characters.

The bottom line get it, enjoy and ignore bad reviews. Those people cannot run todays games on 16MB video card and 64MB or RAM. I dont have top-of-the-line PC, however yes I recently added more RAM and good video card and enjoy it since.

Stronghold: Crusader, the follow up to Stronghold, does a good job fixing things that did not make sense in the first game, and bringing a whole new look to the second version. The idea for battling in new terrain is excellent. The challenge is to fight for every spare inch of irrigated land for your food, without it you are dead. The new units such as Arabian Horsemen and Fire-Throwers are excellent. One pick with this game is why is there no level selection? You can only play on one level, and on the first version you could choose between many different levels of difficulty. Also, there should be an easier way to look at the entire playing field instead of just being able to turn on 90 degree angles for viewing. But overall, this game is done well and you will be playing for hours. Almost a perfect comination castle simulation and city/economy simulation. B+

Joseph Dworak

stronghld crusader is not merely an expanison, this could be whole nother game. you have at least as many new units as old, plus four new oponents. you can have aliies now, and trade goods with them. the campiagne is much more challenging then in stronghold,so you shoulld becaome prettty weel oreinted before you play it. the custome game opption is a lot of fun because you set wich aponent you are playing based on your skill level. if you like games where you actually have to think about what you do, and enjoy building up your base before atttacking, this game is for you

I recall having already written a review for this, but I can't see it here ;)

This is a top-notch game. I've played through the original Stronghold twice, and I always had two problems with it:

1) Not enough missions from start to finish
2) Levels too short. I found that often I'd be just getting going on my castle and then the time would end!

This solves both.

The campaign mode on this has 4-5 5 mission mini-campaigns. The reason I'm not positive on the 4-5 is because frankly these are just kind of filler to teach you about new units and what not. Also ridiculously easy (I quit half way through the second or third campaign).

But that's my only gripe. The meat of this game is a 50 back-to-back mission super-campaign. There is no storyline to these, and they are just different missions done sequentially (you see a guy on a map as he progresses along). I'm on mission 30 now. I found that the first 20 were overall fairly easy, but they've started to get harder, and promise to be very challening by the end. These missions are your castle vs. one or several computer AIs each with their own. Sometimes you get an ally or two (they are quite incompetent at the beginning, but do become more useful later on).

My interest in games in recent years has waned, but my wife is away this weekend and, other than eating infrequently, I've done little but play this game both days. I quite simply am not getting bored by it at all; it's like I'm 16 again and it's summer time.

And look how cheap this game is now? Buy it!

I was searching for a good combination of castle sim builder and RTS battle game, and I lucked into this one - so many sleepless nights since! Great graphics, great sound, great music, and it even runs smooth on my clunky toaster oven of a computer.

Highly recommended! Get this game!