Stronghold Crusader 2
Moderate overall intensityWhat's in it
The 'fear factor' system lets the player build cartoonish punishment and torture devices such as gallows, stocks, and stretching racks to keep peasants in line.
Medieval siege warfare in which commanded soldiers hack, shoot arrows, and burn one another; small-scale units bleed and die but combat is stylized top-down with no gore or dismemberment.
Ale is brewed at breweries and served in inns as a core popularity mechanic to keep peasants content.
Themes of siege, famine, and plague appear, including catapulting diseased carcasses to spread sickness inside enemy walls.
Hunters track and kill deer for meat as a routine food-gathering mechanic.
Who can reach your kid
What it is
Stronghold Crusader 2 is a real-time strategy title about erecting castles, set across the Middle East during the era of the Crusades. Players collect raw materials, cultivate crops, produce ale, develop an economy, and construct walled fortresses, after which they direct forces of bowmen, foot soldiers wielding swords, and siege machinery to storm and hold keeps. The fighting is rendered in a stylized way and shown from a top-down perspective: troops battle and perish with faint blood and no graphic detail, while a 'fear factor' mechanic permits the placement of torture and execution apparatus — gibbets, gallows, stocks, and stakes for burning — so a lord may govern the populace through terror instead of kindness. Producing ale and shooting deer for their meat function as routine parts of the economy. The title supports single-player matches versus computer-controlled lords as well as online skirmish sessions featuring both typed and spoken communication.
How it's framed
Framed through the historical setting of the Crusades and carried by a breezy, occasionally cheeky attitude, the title has opposing lords mocking the player in brief filmed segments. The decision to govern via terror or via kindness is treated as an even-handed tactical option, and the placement of execution and torture structures reads as a mechanic tied to popularity rather than something rendered in graphic detail.
Details
- Developer
- Firefly Studios
- Publisher
- Firefly Studios
- Released
- Sep 22, 2014
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