Release: 6/21/2002
Genre: Strategy, Real-Time, Historic
Developer: FireFly Studios
Language: English
Size: 739 Mb

Stronghold is a historic real-time strategy (RTS) game developed by Firefly Studios in 2001. The game focuses primarily on conquest and expansion through military pursuits, but also provides space for economic strategy and development. There is both an economic and a military campaign to be played and both are discussed in the game manual. The game takes place in Medieval Britain around the time of AD 1066, though, since there is not always a time limit, scenarios can continue hundreds of years beyond that date.
Features
In order to survive, the player is required to construct a castle, build the individual buildings, and build castle walls and towers. The player is also left to determine which buildings are vital and which can be left outside the castle (worst case scenario) to be destroyed in the event of an attack. There are also options to create soldiers to defend the castle, and to eventually attack and defeat an enemy.

In order to create a stable economy and gather resources, the player is required to maintain a positive popularity level with his peasants; failure to do so will result in peasants leaving the castle and subsequent economic collapse. Housing is required to attract new people and house the current population. Having too many houses can result in too many peasants to feed, which ultimately leads to the collapse of the stronghold.

There is a limited amount of peasants the player can have at one time, directly proportional to the amount of housing. The player continue to produce peasants at a rate proportional to popularity - a negative popularity results in people leaving, while a positive popularity results in new people coming. By association, the actual rate of incoming people is directly affected by how popular the player is: a high popularity results in new peasants pouring in, while a lower (but still liked) popularity results in new peasants at a slower speed.

Popularity can be maintained by keeping adequate housing, keeping low taxes, setting high food rations, having a supply of ale and encouraging religion. Popularity can also be affected by the creation of structures to inspire fear or love: facilities of torture and execution will increase worker efficiency but reduce popularity and military units' effectiveness, presumably due to bad morale, with the inverse being happy facilities: parks, statues, and shrines will increase popularity and combat effectiveness, but reduce worker efficiency.

The game differs from many other similar games as the player is required to process and refine raw resources through a number of facilities before they can be used for a certain purpose. To create an army, a player must not only have free peasants, but must process the resources required for their weapons through appropriate workshops, rather than simply spend the resources required at a barracks. For example, some resources, like wood, require only a peasant to chop down a tree and turn the logs into lumber. The lumber can subsequently be used for buildings, or can be taken to a military workshop to be refined into a bow.

System requirements
Windows 95/98/ME/2000/XP
Mac OS X
Windows: 300 MHz Processor
Mac: 350 MHz Processor
Windows: 64 MB RAM
Mac: 128 MB RAM
750 MB HDD space
8x CD-ROM Drive
DirectX 7 compatible 4 MB Video card
DirectX 7.0 compatible sound card
56 Kb/s internet connection for online play