Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)What I have learned of this game is from only playing the demo. It is a shame the game is not sold in USA. I bought a copy yesterday in eBay, from an English vendor: Game Wholesale LTD, at a very good price, under $15.00 including everything. (See final comments at bottom, after playing the full version).
Game scenario and period is Western Europe, at some moment of the Hundred Years' War, which involved England and France as main contenders. This is roughly the beginning of 15th century, the time when Joan of Arc lived, fought and died.
This game does not seem to follow the epic approach of Medieval Total War, which spans four centuries of European history through the whole Western world and even part of the Eastern as well. It seems to have a more local approach, as the one of the local lord struggling against his neighboors, but I repeat: this is the demo taste. You have to build a castle and its village, manage the peasants and set an army that, in its biggest size, barely reaches 200 men. This, without doubts, looks like a local warlords contest.
The interface of building and managing is quite simple and intuitive, yet quite deep in technology developments. Village buildings are constructed by peasants in real-time, and when not constructing something, peasants are working as lumberjacks, miners or stone carvers. How manage the share of each activity in labor force, can be easily done by the control mentioned by another reviewer. Close to this control, there is a slide bar that permits you set how many peasants, as a total, will be assigned to gather resources. If you leave some villagers unassigned, they will be ready to automatically go and start constructing any new building you place in the village. However, village daily life lacks the richness and rather complex economic relations of castle settlements in "Stronghold" series.
Castle structures: walls, towers, and the like are very pleasant to see, and they are "live", meaning that can hold soldiers, in the "Stronghold" series style. Negative point is that you don't need workers to build them up. Once you define the layout and click the "Execute" button, walls and towers are erected by "magic", again following the "Stronghold" fashion.
The most attractive part of the game is the impressive 3D graphical implementation. I can't remember any other Strategy game where you can zoom in the "camera" and look in the face of any of more than 200 units on the terrain, and yet what you see is a well designed, "cartoon" like, archer or swordman, like the characters in a Role Playing game. Buildings and terrain accidents are good looking also, and if you zoom close enough to castle walls and towers, you'll see the bricks perfectly defined.
Unit's behavior is well designed. Artillery needs a crew to man the equipment, two men a piece. Any soldier can become a gunner, but if detached from the gun, he starts to fight as what he was before become a gunner. This is a nice feature, because sometimes you'll need more the men for close combat than the long range and slow guns. Cavalry units, lancers, can dismount and fight as foot soldiers, but can not man artillery. Some times enemy kills the horse but not the man, and he can keep fighting for you. Conversely, some infantry units, like spearmen and swordsmen, can mount and ride a horse. Very nice too. Artillery pieces can sometimes loose the crew, but the equipment itself remains usable. To reinforce your fire power, all you have to do is send some available soldiers, or recruit and deploy additional ones, and instruct them to man abandoned cannons, yours or your enemy's, in places where a combat had place previously. Of course, your foe can do the same thing.
Final Comments: After buying and trying the full version, I should say this is a tactic game, rather than a strategy one. Population limit, in the Custom Map mode, is set at 125, military and civilian included. I almost don't remember any other RTS game than AoE first version with so low units max number.
Given the relentless military action (enemy will attack you early in the game), you have to manage very carefully your army in order to defend your own castle and village, while trying to assault enemy castle. Only exception under the 125 limit, is the chance to hire some heroes, mighty knights with special skills. They can be found after you develop the tournament feature in the "Town Square" building. These knights are the only units who can deploy organized formations at the field, grouping around 40 infantry units.
Mix long and short range units, add a monk for healing, bring on proper artillery support (cannons or light ballistae) and enough reinforcements near behind to refill the ranks, and you have a good chance to defeat the enemy in open range and get close enough to his castle to set siege.
Some flexibility under the 125 ceiling is allowed too with the artillery equipment. You can buy any number of pieces, regardless of the population limit. Doing so, you can have some infantry units performing a dual role, fighting as foot soldiers when needed, or manning cannons and trebuchet in the other side.
The game Custom Map does not contain other accident than the castle and village of your foe (or foes, you can choose until three AI enemies). There is not towns nor roads.
After playing a couple of Campaign episodes, I realized there is not historic or epic drama. Just leading a bunch of soldiers through the map and fighting your enemy wherever you meet him. So, I detoured to the Custom Map.
There are three nations to pick at: French, English (Hundred Years' War enemies) and German. Each one with its special buildings and units. Regarding units, always there are a lot of choices to pick. You have common archers (short bow), spearmen and pike men. Beside archers you can have crossbowmen and/or long bow archers (depending of the nation you pick). Pike men can be upgraded to halberdiers. French have mace men, paladins and crusaders. English have axmen, and German have swordsmen. On top of that, you have harquebusiers and lancers. Almost any close range infantry (spearmen, swordsmen, axmen, mace men, and paladin) unit can mount and ride a horse. However, lancers are the first choice to mounted soldiers.
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Castle StrikeCastle Strike opens up classic medieval action where you'll face deadly enemies and untrustworthy allies. Become a brave hero plotting a course in this dangerous time. Navigate a medieval world filled with treachery, betrayal, battles and ambushes -- win the war and conquer a nation! Create new maps for new battles for up to 4 players, using the Random Generator
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