Golden Oldies: Stronghold

Introduction:

Concisely elaborated, Golden Oldies will consist of a review of a game rich of age (age would be a relative concept). I will review various aspects of the pertaining game to convey my ideas as to why it was memorable, what rendered it unique and why it should be revered. I very hastily conjured a list of 41 PC-platform games that incurred some possibility of being reviewed, and probably will be, however it should be made evident (superfluously) preference will be of personal affinity. Additionally, due to the vast amount of potential games, this will become weekly submissions.

Note: I am still in the process of deciding whether I should review old Nintendo- or Genesis- (Sega) platform games. If any individual is fortunate enough to persevere through these articles, be sure to let me know your opinion, I will include details below.

Now, in the infamous words of Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa (that freaky dude that played Shang Tsung in the first Mortal Kombat film):

‘It has begun.’

GOLDEN OLDIE:

STRONGHOLD

Hmm, did any anti-climax alarm-wails ensue? How could this be a golden oldie? It is not even accumulated enough years to be labeled such, and besides it really did not convene enough to benignly resemble something fun. If any of the preceding thoughts excreted from some gland into your mind, then you, my friend, are in desperate need of a slap on the forehead.

It harbored possibly the most unique, ingenious and sophisticated concepts for a real-time strategy instance that were not contrived by supposedly, ‘equal’ retrospective examples. From basic to more subliminal ramifications, one can adduce its resource system for the imaginative potential it possessed. Meaning: what a sense of euphoria it was NOT journey half-way across the map in search of something that resembles a goldmine, only to find it is already occupied by an opponent (granted, it was a prevalent concept that made the majority of real-time strategies more interesting to some extent). Still, however, it was a welcome and desired change. Stronghold incorporated a system whereby you acquire gold via taxes. The more populated your settlement, the more gold you will accumulate. Logically, it meant that various factors needed to be in balance.

The most evident instance and, possibly, what made Stronghold succumb to more defined real-time strategy (RTS) was that of the means by which you manage your settlement. Plainly conveyed, the citizens that comprises your settlement, has a ‘happy-factor’ measured out of a 100. If this figure were to drop below 50 the citizens would leave your castle, while, logically, if the figure proved more than 50 people will join the population.

So what determines the emotional state of your settlement? Food, tax, crowding, fear factor, religion and ale coverage. This is the most significant aspect of Stronghold, to keep these figures in the positive. However, the most minimal of tax increase, has the outcome of -2 for tax. Therefore compensation is in order, where one solution would be to increase food consumption (and have them whine about how fat they are getting, but they are still very much happy) or the purchase of ornaments, the construction of churches or to provide them with booze, or more felicitously, to ‘produce’ ale.

Everything in Stronghold is dependant on the mood of you settlement. Therefore nothing quite comes close to the sensation of hearing ‘the Pig’s troops are attacking’, and you try DESPERATELY to create a few archers only to hear the following: ‘recruits needed Sire’. This now aptly brings me to the military fundamentals of Stronghold. There is no real variety in units to train, however those you have at your disposal is advantageous in their own respective ways. For example, spearmen can dig a moat; engineers can build multiple siege structures; tunnelers strategically weaken walls (quite brittle buggers those things, which is why one gets a nice warm feeling when you try to instruct a tunneler to dig, only to find a few seconds later, 10 arrows through his corps); and ladder men which is self-explanatory. While these units are effective in certain scenarios nothing ever really comes close to the devastation that archers and crossbowmen are obliged to bring. To elaborate: a gargantuan army consisting of various units, that form quite a pernicious view, relentlessly marches forward to your base/settlement. You have built turrets (defensive platforms, meaning it is not a tesla coil or photon cannon) and gatehouses that have many, many, MANY archers and crossbow-man on top of it. What follows is too poetic to articulate. But briefly pictured, the army will stampede towards you, while the archers and crossbowmen (from elevated grounds their range is awe-inspiring which is another +1 for Stronghold), they will start firing at the barrage of opponents and, depending on how many you have, the enemy will helplessly be picked off one by one. This effect is vivified with more archers and/or crossbowmen (crossbowmen have a longer reload time, and slightly shorter range but their damage is unsurpassed). In the end, huge army, meets 100+ arrows from a screen-and-a-half away, equals sexy time.

The story that underlies Stronghold is quite monotonous and in most cases clichéd, which is why one could construe it as an insipid basis to buy it for. Basically, it comprises of the following: The king was overthrown and what ensued was the invasion of countries. A group of individuals were on a mission to negotiate and end the bloodshed, when they were massacred by unknown bandits. Surprisingly enough, accompanying this benevolent and courageous force of men, was your father (OH NO). Now, you took refuge and seek (quoted from the game itself) ‘to avenge your father’s death’. It is as intricate to the same degree of the deliciousness it possesses.

Soundtrack-wise: Conceived by an apathetic mentality (or something similar), there is no superimposing impression of talent or an attempt thereof and therefore no special mention (note that personally I am fixated on the soundtrack of a game and will therefore almost always refer to it, even if it is, most likely, near absent).

Regarding multiplayer, unequivocally Stronghold was infested with potential. All the adjacent factors that made the single-player memorable and fun, and converge it into a multiplayer experience was to be a supercilious act. It some areas it succeeded, alas only in some. The multiplayer instance was deterred by the lack of maps however it was made completely obsolete due to balancing issues. Imagine deploying a strategy that involved building and training a mass army to attack your opponent. You use the most expensive resources to construct a force purely of the best units the game had to offer, only to have it WIPED OUT by a pack of rabid wolves. Let me reiterate, your entire army of 50+ units is pulverized by a pack of measly WOLVES. Again, your Knight (guy on a horse) can be killed rather quickly by one wolf if the Knight itself say, attacks a wall. So, you need armor, a sword and a horse to train a knight (the Knight unit itself costs 40 gold, never mind the ancillary requirements), and it could be killed by a wolf, which is trained by building a cage that costs 50 gold. On top of that for 50 gold you get 4 wolves (they are actually called ‘war dogs’ but they look exactly the same as the wolves the game recognizes). Considering the above factor alone can rather dim ones perception of a fair and competitive multiplayer match. However it still is playable, if you consider that, that mountainous obstacle is able to be overcome, and it is if you plan accordingly. The above mentioned does however prove a rather interesting endeavor and unintentionally adds to a unique multiplayer game.

At its core, Stronghold successfully fathered unique concepts into the RTS-genre, and intrepidly showed that it could surpass many of its predecessors/competition, even though it never really yielded enough recognition and veneration. Yet, those who really took notice became part of the extraordinary experience it had to offer, and thus it pursued into the hearts of true RTS fans. Wherever it rests, it will always be, opulent and adored.

Just had to include this:
Quote: ‘Greetings Sire, your stronghold awaits you.’

Or, my favorite: ‘I would stay inside and hide just now Sire.’ When inquiring about one’s popularity (that specific quote is said when you reached a popularity of 0).

Quickie:

Worst RTS EVER: Empire Earth

Playing attentively and continuously for an hour and a half and finally declaring: ‘Sweet grape-juice of divinity I’m on my way to epoch (age) 3!’

There are 12 epochs. You do the math. As one of the apex fundamentals the game was marketed on, it had some serious fail baggage.