Most D&D-based games have you creating a party of adventurers who then go out on adventures, slay monsters, and complete quests. Stronghold has you start out creating a party of leaders instead, who have embarked on a journey to settle a new land. They will recruit new followers, build up castles, homes, farms, training halls, and smithies, and then eventually those followers will have the experience and the numbers needed to take on deadly monsters and their nests! This was one of the first games to have a strategic vision where your units aren't directly controlled by you. Instead, you give more general orders and your units fulfill them as they are able. You'll manage the gold and food for each of your factions, tell them what to build and where, and tell them how much time they'll dedicate to building, recruiting, and training. It's a fun concept with a great soundtrack, definitely worth a play-through. After the first few plays, the game gets quite repetitive and it's time to do something else, but the music is enjoyable, the monsters your characters face are a wide variety, and it's fun to watch battles play out. I wish more games had done this concept at all, there's barely anything else that's ever come close.
This is a beautiful game, and you may wish to buy it just to admire the art. The years have taken some of the shine off this game, at least in my opinion. It moves very slowly compared to games today, and definitely has some flaws. It's not symmetrical nor really even balanced between the 4 factions and there's definitely some ways to cheese the AI. Some of the upgrade paths are clearly better than others. The game makes no apologies about this. It takes time to play even a single, small map. It's not a fast-paced game with tons of action. But it's a classic Strategy RPG and there's very little out there that really competes with it on this ground! Heroes of Might and Magic is a similar vein, but not quite the same path as in Disciples it's not just the hero who gains XP and levels up. The music is perfectly in-line with what's on screen, the terrain is lovely, and the voice acting is mostly really good. Even decades later, this game is more than playable.
If you wished that X-Com had dozens more varieties of earth guns in it, could be played in real-time to move faster, and had way more variety of aliens then this is the game you want to play. It's got various armors and guns that deal and protect against various kinds of damage, meaning that your loadout will sometimes be different depending on which enemies you expect to face. It's got a real-time strategic interface that is easy to use and yet provides some tactical challenges (But you have to tell your soldiers to 'walk' instead of 'run' at the beginning of just about every mission). It has a story that is reasonably well fleshed-out and that affects the game events in interesting ways. And your soldiers will gain levels and compentency in different skills that affect their performance (until they die horribly, but that's squad tactical games for you!) There's little in this game that makes it stand out except that for years before the new X-COM games, this was the only series on the market filling that niche. I had fun playing the whole series a few times, and if you like X-COM and other similar games, then you'll probably like this one, too. Now get out there, soldier, and kick some alien butt! Pros: Good weapon sound effects, weapon and armor variety. Good variety of enemies, challenging gameplay that is usually not unfair (except for balloon fish in base missions). Cons: Amateurish voice acting, mediocre tutorial, no in-game help to speak of, soldiers default to "running" which is definitely not the most generally useful stance. Lots of missions - pretty grindy in the mid-game.
Day 1: I have purposed to play this game entitled "Cultist Simulator" though I imagine it shall be full of nonsense. Most such pretenses are mere noise. Day 2: I seem to have died of overmuch dread. An annoyance, but I shall overcome. I begin my descent anew. Day 3: The Light from beyond the Walls of my DREAMS begins to Fill My Mind THERE IS NOT ENOUGH ROOM AND I EXPAND!! Day 4: I appear to have gone insane from overexposure to the bright lore. Hmph. There is more to this game than I previously believed, but no matter. Day 5: I am apprehended by the Bureau of Suppression. I require more associates, to prevent such injustices. Er, well. Justices. My deeds were dark as the Ragged Lore, but I have only done as I must! Day 6: I have summoned a thing from beyond this world, and it has slain the investigator meddling in my research. I know I can use this body, but for what? And will the rite be ready before the body decays? Day 7: It was far too costly to destroy that Damning Evidence, but it was necessary. I shall miss Ysabet. Day 8: The incantations are almost ready. My englightenment is at hand, and I shall not be denied! Breaking character for a bit, if you read all that and are interested in more, then just buy the game. You're exactly the kind of person who will enjoy it immensely. It's a fun game with loads of potential, and it fails at a tutorial on purpose so that you're just blindly fumbling about on your first few playthroughs, just like your character. I rather wish there was more diverse late game content, but it's probably the best cultist simulator for Cthulian horror ever to exist.
