• Summary: Stronghold 3 is the third installment in the award winning castle-building series.
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 29
  2. Negative: 14 out of 29
  1. Dec 24, 2011
    80
    A traditional strategy with many elements which are too old. Fans of the series may like it still. [January 2012, p.72]
  2. Oct 25, 2011
    74
    The folks at Firefly knew what they had to do to win back Stronghold fans, and they mostly did it: Everything that annoyed people about Stronghold 2 is gone, and some great new features have been added. Nonetheless, Stronghold 3 needs a few patches and maybe a price cut before it can starting winning new fans for the franchise.
  3. Nov 28, 2011
    45
    You may play a feudal lord in Stronghold 3, but the tedious micromanagement and bugs make you feel like a peasant.

See all 29 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 35 out of 149
  1. "People are coming to your castle," the scribe would say now that Firefly has released patch v1.10. There have been alot of positive reviews with this patch. Its been a successful comeback and it is quite relieving for those who couldn't play the game in the beginning due to those ghastly bugs. Though there are some superflous reviews of the same comments stating that the game is too pallid without a kingmaker, this won't bother the true Stronghold fan because with this latest patch, the game won't feel like a beta version. It is now stable and playable with it's full performance. ECONOMIC The economic campaign might prove very difficult to those who are new to the series. Collect 600 bread, 6000 Honor with very limited space, you can hear the wolves howling nearby and your armory is empty. What to do now??! Some aspects of the Economic can appear simple and dull when in fact it is very difficult. Building placement can be daft since the borders take ample space for a small building. Especially since House size is still dependant on the distance to your keep. The Economic region of the game has an incredible plot but...repetitive gameplay. If you enjoy collecting the same resources every mission this might be for you. There is minimal combat with a few wolves and bandits in every other mission but it is still fun to play. There are new useful features in this particular patch that includes Auto-sell. Lets not forget to mention that you don't need to spend wood in the beginning just to place a market at the start to save yourself from any economic troubles. Market is no longer needed so place a wood shop or two and some farms and start your game! There have been alot of praises in the forums that things in the game run smoother now that peasants walk faster and produce more food! One of the things you'll notice among your first mission with this patch is as soon as you place a wood shop, the peasants are not walking like turtles anymore. They're so much faster that you no longer have to put those extra 10 farms just to speed things up when you only need about 5. Noticable and helpful tweaks from the patch are how fast bread production is. I nearly had to place 10 bakeries just to speed up the process. Well FEAR NOT!! This problem has been resolved along with Honor meter out of sync. COMBAT: I was just simply fascinated when I completed the story 10 years later. Firefly managed to keep the story true and even the release date of the game similar to the original. If you havn't played Stronghold 1 I advise you to stop reading and play Stronghold 1 first before you step into Stronghold 3. You'll just be blank and thoughtless not knowing what happened when the past is mentioned. The combat missions are fresh each one after another. There will always be new tasks and stronger foes in every mission. Night time seiges are rare. There will only be about 3 of them. If you enjoy night time seiges as much as I do you can try out the freebuild! Stronghold 3 players might notice that there will be alot left in their stockpile since the peasants are faster. Every mission I play I always have weapons left that I never got to use and more resources than what I need. Sell it all with Auto-trade! I would always have to put about 6-8 weapon production buildings when now all you need is 2-4 (depending how far weapon production buildings are to your stockpile and how far the armory is.) It is good to see some extra materials every now and then...and a little extra gold. Unlike stronghold 2 that you can pretty much build an army without a church or entertainment, its partially mandatory in Stronghold 3. There won't be one building you havn't used after you finish the game. You need almost everything at your disposal to survive 30-60 minute waves of armies. Knights are coming to your walls and you don't have pitch. You need peasants but there's 10 more seconds for another to spawn. Its time to lower your taxes and boost church services in order to balance out your peasant spawn time. Spawn time might not be a problem in the economic campaign since you have church, entertainment and decorations. Its a differen't story in military campaign. There will be buildings to help but it might be more demanding if you place military buildings since you see platoons of men-at-arms on the mountains marching to your walls. If the offputting reviews are deterring you from purchasing another Stronghold game well you can pretty much ignore them. Those reviews are outdated. The same people who bashed the game are the same people now praising the game with this new patch. They're now playing the campaigns and whispering to one another what happens in the story. I conclude this review with a recommendation of the game and to say its worth a try. Expand
    • 1 of 2 users said yes
  2. I have really only made an account to comment on this game (which in my opinion is quite important because of its implications for firefly). My first comment is where on earth is skirmish mode and kingship my two favourite things about stronghold two. My second commnt is on the quality of the campaign, at heart the campaign has the right ideas but it hasnt worked on the little things I had expected would come out of games at this era like sketches instead of videos in my opinion is ridiculous and some of the glitches really annoy me because they come out of nowhere but however apart from a few small mistakes the campaign isnt that flawed. The multiplayer on the other hand sums up all my problems with the game it is slow ineffective and practically impossible to use WITH TINY MAPS FULL OF GLITCHES. I mentioned at the start the implications for firefly what Iam saying here is the failure of some aspects of the game could bring an end to the stronghold series which in my opinion would be disastorous as i have stronghold 2 i bloody well love it so in short firefly NEED TO FIX THIS GAME. Expand
    • 4 of 4 users said yes
  3. This game is broken. I desperately wanted to love this game, but after half a dozen attempts that all ended with swearing a blue streak at the game, I know that, barring a complete overhaul, this game should be considered Dead on Arrival and avoided like the plague. Many other reviewers have listed the numerous problems, including an insane difficulty, an utter lack of explanation, a lack of queues for attack, combat that borders on torture for the player, and castle-building that is incomprehensible (both in the building's relationships and in a seemingly random refusal to allow for building). I love castle games, but I wouldn't play this game if it was FREE, and they'd have to pay me a fair bit to put up with it. It has potential, but unless they pull out a complete overhaul similar to the Enhanced Edition of The Witcher, this game should be avoided by all. Expand
    • 9 of 9 users said yes

See all 149 User Reviews