Stronghold HD

Might be misleading to call this a castle simulator. It's really more of a base-building RTS game--with lots of emphasis on building and protecting the base. Absolutely wonderful game in any case! There's much more of a politico-economic aspect than in other RTS games I've played: various resources to manage, and you have to watch your subjects' morale too (while also taxing them to get the gold you need). It works because you're at a walled-in base (after you build the walls), not scouting and conducting seek-and-destroy missions against a hidden enemy. However, the game does include many features, so you can assault enemy castles as well if you like. The excellent tutorial eases you into the game, and the combat campaign progresses--at first--in baby steps, giving you time to learn and try new things out. There's also an economic campaign, which is surprisingly interesting, though I haven't gotten far in it yet. Besides the two campaigns, there are stand-alone scenarios, which you can edit or customize as you like. There are also historical scenarios--various actual castles you can try defending or assaulting. The audio-visual effects are great, in my opinion. One small downside is that there's nothing like a smooth-scrolling camera; camera angle shifts 90 degrees at a time. But actually you don't even need to use that, as you can just press the space bar to make everything above ground level disappear. That's a very handy feature; it allows you to do most everything from just one angle. The game can be very challenging, if that's what you're looking for. Even on Introductory level, it has been too hard for me at times, and I've had to replay a few campaign missions. I got through them, though; and I've gone back to replay them on the Normal difficulty setting and won there too. Some of the early missions are child's play, but they get tough soon enough. Throughout, there's a bit of humor mixed in. It's not obtrusive, but it's there, and you'll find yourself smiling at the remarks of your scribe, your advisers, and enemy leaders. Though this is a serious enough game, it doesn't take itself too seriously. For me, that helps take the edge off and adds to the enjoyment. Top-notch game. Highly recommended.

with this game I feel like going back 10 years in my life. Back then I used to play Age of Empires I 24h a day and 7 days a week. Stronghold is also a very addicting game and I love it as much as AoE. Stronghold has a very good tutorial and even later in the game every step is very well explained. One of the best games out there!

For me the best way I can describe the game is it's a kind of tower defense, rts, castle simulator. Not only do you defend and attack other people's castles but probably the most interesting part is the way they handle your resources for the game. There is a fairly deep economics strategy part to the game where you collect wood, stone, food, etc. to make and keep your population happy and ever growing.

The title says everything. This was the first game I played on my first PC and it is still as fun and challenging as I remember. This HD version is great, improving the graphics and adding support to modern features while preserving the feel of the game. A unique blend of management and strategy. A masterpiece.

I had never heard of this game until 2015. This is an amazing medieval strategy game in a style similar to Warcraft and other old-school real-time strategy games, one that still works excellent today. The game comes in HD resolution so don't worry you won't have to copy with a resolution of 300x240 pixels or something. Stronghold differs from Warcraft in that the computer opponents do not build anything, attacks are somewhat scripted. There is a main campaign plus lots of extra missions to choose from, so it doesn't get boring too quickly. Only weakness of the game is a poorly balanced difficulty level. Several missions, including some of the main campaign, have virtually unplayable missions even at normal difficulty level. Looking up solutions on Youtube, it seems as if the only way to beat those missions is to exploit bugs in the game and/or the enemy AI. This is ihmo poor game design, and a problem no other RTS has (to the best of my knowledge). Still a great game, and a must have! Overall rating 4.5/5