Stronghold Legends: Steam Edition Review Summary

Fantasy elements enhance battles: The game introduces a variety of fantasy elements such as heroes, magic, dragons, and mythical units, making battles more spectacular and diverse.

Nostalgic and reminiscent: The game evokes a sense of nostalgia, reminding players of simpler times and their childhood.

Performance on older hardware: The game reportedly works better on older hardware, such as an old office laptop, and older crack versions are functional.

Unique factions and units: The game features three unique factions, each with their own castles, units, and abilities. New units and heroes come with unique abilities, adding depth to the gameplay.

Classic gameplay with improvements: The classic Stronghold gameplay is still present, with some quality-of-life additions, streamlining, and strategy improvements.

Compatibility and Stability Issues: The game suffers from significant compatibility issues with modern PCs, including frequent crashes, runtime errors, and problems with launching the game. These issues make the game unplayable for many users.

Severe FPS and Optimization Problems: The game experiences extreme FPS drops, regardless of hardware settings, making it poorly optimized and unstable. Crashes and frustrating lags are common, with some users reporting the game becoming a slideshow.

Weakest in Series: Many players consider this the weakest entry in the 'Stronghold' series, citing various issues that make it the worst part of the franchise.

Unit Balance Issues: Some units are excessively strong, leading to an extremely lopsided unit balance that affects gameplay negatively.

Poor AI and Music: The artificial intelligence is criticized for being very weak, and the music is described as hopeless, detracting from the overall gaming experience.

Unique Factions and Units: The game features three distinct factions, each with unique castles, units, and abilities. This includes specific factions like the Ice faction and unique units such as spearmen who can throw their spears.

Gameplay Mechanics and Features: The game includes several unique mechanics such as automatic feasts, pathfinding, and the ability to directly access taxes and food levels. Additionally, features like autobuy and autosell are handy for skirmishes.

Diverse Units and Tactics: New and varied units are introduced, allowing for diversified tactics. This includes units like bats, werewolves, and catapults on werewolves, as well as giants and pike-men.

Fantasy and Mythological Elements: The game incorporates a strong fantasy aesthetic with mythological twists, including heroes, magic, and mythical units like witches and shield maidens.

UI and Technical Issues: There are some technical issues reported, such as problems with fullscreen and windowed mode, and the framerate being coupled to game speed. Players also request the ability to scale up the UI size and change game speed in multiplayer mode.

Severe performance issues: The game suffers from extreme FPS drops, frequent crashes, and significant lag issues, especially during large battles or when moving the mouse. These problems make the game poorly optimized and unstable, leading to a frustrating experience.

Launch and entry problems: Players report issues with the game launcher and difficulties entering the game. These problems prevent users from even starting the game properly.

Game not recommendable: Players find it difficult to recommend the game due to it being broken and preferring older versions like Stronghold 1 and Crusader.

Limited enjoyment with bots: The game is only enjoyable in battles with friends, not with bots, limiting its appeal.