Stronghold 3

 PC
User Score
3.0

Generally unfavorable reviews- based on 372 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 53 out of 372
  2. Mixed: 43 out of 372
  3. Negative: 276 out of 372
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  1. Andrew_Paterson
    Aug 18, 2013
    4
    Stronghold 3 is buggier than a big bug full of little bugs. Even disregarding the many graphical glitches, sound cut outs and AI that is stupid beyond belief there is still very little to recommend it.

    It looks extraordinarily dated more like a student project than a professional release. The story is forgettable and the campaign is slow. It advances at the same speed as your troops    Stronghold 3 is buggier than a big bug full of little bugs. Even disregarding the many graphical glitches, sound cut outs and AI that is stupid beyond belief there is still very little to recommend it.

    It looks extraordinarily dated more like a student project than a professional release. The story is forgettable and the campaign is slow. It advances at the same speed as your troops moving across the map; which is to say like molasses on slight grade.

    I have not played a previous Stonghold game so I don't know how this compares but the strategy and economics are pretty thoughtful and entertaining (between crashes back to the desktop). Get the combination and order of troops wrong when you assault another castle and you're going to suffer for it. Similarly if you don't tailor your economy to support your chosen troops you're going to lose.

    All in all this is a game that should have been a lot better than it is.    … Expand
  2. Talos84
    Nov 1, 2011
    4
    could have spent more time being developed. come on firefly. u did some fine graphics work but the bugs and glitches are really bad. the patches are nice but i honestly think u shot yourself in foot with the release in such bad shape. next time wait made do a close beta to find more bugs possible re-think your Q&A team and find some better tester would help you out more. i hope to see acould have spent more time being developed. come on firefly. u did some fine graphics work but the bugs and glitches are really bad. the patches are nice but i honestly think u shot yourself in foot with the release in such bad shape. next time wait made do a close beta to find more bugs possible re-think your Q&A team and find some better tester would help you out more. i hope to see a stronghold 4 but take your time and show us what u can really do, give us a stronghold with a great release. gives a stronghold it can give us score of 90. i know you can do better then this.… Expand
  3. VergilAF
    Nov 11, 2011
    4
    They could do better. As the concept of play is not bad, but failed to create a beautiful game. It is boring, lacks consistency and incomplete, because even in the building free once built the main structures, the game stops. We find ourselves saying: "ok I built everything, now I turn off". A real shame, because the concept is really nice. Fail!
  4. TheGeneral
    Oct 25, 2011
    4
    Incredibly disappointed! The game is not finished, should not have been release in my opinion. Multi player does not work at all at the moment! Huge bugs in game! This game needs a patch to even be playable. Anyone rating the game 10 works for production coz game don't work!!!
  5. ViperZeth
    Oct 30, 2011
    4
    Worst of all the Stronghold games out there. Ive played since Stronghold 1 and did all the campaigns and spend a lot of time on its games. But after the first impressions and first militairy campaign mission I quit already. The camera is always on top, everything feels so..small. I did not really look at the graphics at this point, but I think they are a bit worse than SH: 2 graphics. ManyWorst of all the Stronghold games out there. Ive played since Stronghold 1 and did all the campaigns and spend a lot of time on its games. But after the first impressions and first militairy campaign mission I quit already. The camera is always on top, everything feels so..small. I did not really look at the graphics at this point, but I think they are a bit worse than SH: 2 graphics. Many small annoying things from SH: 2 have gone, but I think Firefly studios made a bit to much gone; Skirmish mode. The once so marvelous mode were you could pick your own enemies and place to start, on a certain difficult mode just for you. Its a shame that that mode has gone, leaving you to Free build without any enemies, militairy campaign with no freedom; its always following the objectives. And also Economic campaign. I only think Firefly left the units, the buildings, the silly but funny fighting scenes were units collapse into each other, and the name into the Stronghold franchise. This is not Stronghold 3, it feels more like Farmholdville 3. A waste of time and money if you are well known to the Stronghold series.
    Also, I think it might be time to change unit voices. It might be not such a bad game for the non-hardcore Stronghold/strategy fans(after all the bug fixes). But for the real fans out there: Stay Away from this game.    … Expand
  6. Rodymetal
    Dec 23, 2011
    4
    I refused to write a review in order to give firefly a chance to fix the game, after so many patches and the release of today's patch (last patch in 2011) I decided to review the game, cause I lost hope in this game, the developers cant fix much really, instead they keep adding useless stuff like new maps & modes for multiplayer (multiplayer itself is still not working well), siege mapsI refused to write a review in order to give firefly a chance to fix the game, after so many patches and the release of today's patch (last patch in 2011) I decided to review the game, cause I lost hope in this game, the developers cant fix much really, instead they keep adding useless stuff like new maps & modes for multiplayer (multiplayer itself is still not working well), siege maps (boring to hell)... After you finish the military and economic campaigns there are no much to do, so you will go for free build, where you will build one time and set and invasion (then you wont play it again for sure) so after that you will jump into multiplayer, you will struggle and waste time in order to start the game, and if you succeed you will lag and maybe crash, thats it the game itself has a great potential but it seems a lot of things are broken and will be hard to fix. Stronghold series is unique and I love it, but SH3 is just so buggy with missing features that were avalable in previous game (skirmish for example)... This will be thier last game for sure, untill some developers will come and make us a nice castle RTS/ Sim..… Expand
  7. Savman69
    Nov 8, 2011
    4
    First of all there is no way that anyone could give this game 10/10 this would be a complete lie!! It obvios to me that those posts have been put in to bump up the review score. I am rating this game as 4 out of 10 as I think a 0 is too harsh.

    As the previous reviews already covered all the bugs I wont bother mentioning them again. Missing Content: I have noticed and moats are not    First of all there is no way that anyone could give this game 10/10 this would be a complete lie!! It obvios to me that those posts have been put in to bump up the review score. I am rating this game as 4 out of 10 as I think a 0 is too harsh.

    As the previous reviews already covered all the bugs I wont bother mentioning them again. Missing Content:

    I have noticed and moats are not included in the game!!! Even funnier is that there is a drawbridge but it opens over nothing?!? Correct me if I am wrong but most European castles have moats. As already mentioned before Skirmish mode is missing and no its not the same as multiplayer!!!! I think the reason is because the AI is not good enough to siege a castle or build a castle (I cant think of a better reason why it would not be in the game).

    I recall there was a mode in stronghold 1 where you have peace to build the castle exactly the way you wanted it and then could click a button to an attack launched at you. This is also gone.

    Limitations:

    I remember reading somewhere that you will be able to build castles the way you want. But in Stronghold 3 the mechanics of castle building force you to build in a certain way. In Stronghold 1 if you wanted a tower with a wall 4 stonewalls thick you could do that. Or if you wanted stairs that run along the wall not away from it you could do that too. But in stronghold 3 this freedom is gone. I think this really breaks the game for me!! Not to mention that troops can shoot through walls.

    You can only build one stockpile and cant expend it so you constantly have to sell stuff to keep it from overfilling. The granary on the other hand does not seem to have a limit?

    Bad balance and issues.

    As mentioned before almost all characters in the game move externally slowly but for some reason unamoured peasants move so slow that its just painful to watch. Spear man with chain armour move almost as slow as the king in full armour. Spear man come with spears they can throw but if you tell them to attack a soldier out of a group of troops they will throw all their spears at the one guy(Total overkill)!!!! Then the enemy retaliates and shoots several of your man. Peasants production is far too slow. Once you have 4 or more shops producing spears you cant actually recruit soldiers quick enough to use up the supply. Multiplayer

    You cant set a password on a hosted game so if you want to play with a friend you have to keep kicking people until your friend manages to connect. Only 4 maps

    No AI so you cant play with a friend against them (And yes some people do like to do this instead of vs players!!!)

    Music

    I am not sure that going with songs that have lyrics was a good choice as they soon start to loop and get annoying. Music without words is a better choice.

    Graphics

    Apart from being quite dark the graphics are ok but I am not convicted that going to 3D with this game was worth the loss of features and gameplay.

    Conclusion

    I think that because stronghold 1 set the benchmark so high it is just really hard to beat but at the same time it was working so there was no reason to change it. All it needed was improved graphics and better resolutions rather than a complete overhaul. I liked how smoothly Stronghold 1 ran and this does not seem apparent in Stronghold 3. If anyone wants to discuss farther or simply does not agree please drop me an email at savman69@gmail.com    … Expand
  8. EE061003
    Nov 14, 2011
    4
    Bottomline:Stronghold 3 is a colossal disappointment for the die hard fans who have been waiting for this game for almost 7 years.Instead of improving and building on what made the original so successful they take many steps backward.First of all let me be very specific Firefly did release their game imcomplete(tat was obvious)with a price tag of 1 would imagine of high profile titles likeBottomline:Stronghold 3 is a colossal disappointment for the die hard fans who have been waiting for this game for almost 7 years.Instead of improving and building on what made the original so successful they take many steps backward.First of all let me be very specific Firefly did release their game imcomplete(tat was obvious)with a price tag of 1 would imagine of high profile titles like call of duty or Bethesda "Elder scrolls" series(i regret each single penny that i lost).The game is broken full of Bugs,unplayable,extremely tiny map and CAN U BELIEVE IT THE SKIRMISH MODE IS GONE..SIGH! I seriously thinkwhat Firefly was thinking while omitting those features in the game...GRAPHICS are the worst part...extremely dated graphics(of one you'd imagine back in 2002)...An imcomplete and incompetant product for 50$(seriousy guys i threw my money off)........STROGHOLD 3 IS A COMPLETE FIASCO… Expand
  9. IamNader
    May 9, 2023
    4
    Graphics are nice but I must tell you that this is a trash in whole franchise - 4/10
  10. bri560
    Nov 3, 2011
    3
    First this game alots of bugs, problems 2 play, this is terrible, was a fan of this game....real pitty.
    The game is very slow, b4 u build something, it take hours. It looks like this game have be made with trainees. The only PLUS in this game, is how they present the game at the beginning, good sounds and music. For the price this is 2 expensive. Money back please.
  11. Heavymetal4life
    Oct 25, 2011
    3
    Such a shame......... Game was talked about such potential an its now Day 2 of release an I have returned the game for my money back. Bug ridden launch of yet another PC title. It feels they release these games for the pure need of sales to get their budget up since they peeked it an had run out of funds, so they sell a unfinished unpolished game to gain revenue so they can fix the issuesSuch a shame......... Game was talked about such potential an its now Day 2 of release an I have returned the game for my money back. Bug ridden launch of yet another PC title. It feels they release these games for the pure need of sales to get their budget up since they peeked it an had run out of funds, so they sell a unfinished unpolished game to gain revenue so they can fix the issues an implement the rest of the games ideas with the new found source of money they receive from sales. Very poor business ethics from the PC industry the past 2-4 years. It is getting really annoying....It is like they want me to just buy a Console an never look back with the type of lack of respect they show us consumer PC gamers. Game tries to show you the light at the end of the tunnel but merely fails horribly. No skirmish in a RTS game is a complete ruin of the style of game it is, where is the replay ability without skirmish???? No Kingmaker makes even LESS replay ability..... What do they expect us to do buy a game for 50 dollars to play a 10 hour campaign if that an then just notch the game off on are list of what to do next? This title is a slap in the face to PC gamers of the genre this title supports, They talk in their Dev videos how they did so much not to fail like supposedly Stronghold 2 did, Well it had its issues at launch I will be honest, but after some patches an time I rather play that game then this supposed "new" an "better" version. They were so negative towards SH2 that they even made the story take off from the original SH1, that right there tells you they do no have confidence in their ability to make games. I warn anyone who buys this game within its first month of launch, for it will take some time fixing the mass of Bugs this game is experiencing at the moment. Wait a few if months for it to hit the bargain bin or hit the sales rack on steam or at Retailers such as Gamestop store or their Online download system "aka" Impulse that for some reason they now changed it to the name of their stores, which on a side note I thought was stupid... I liked Impulse as the name more then the Current. An stay Clear from Origin unless you just HAVE to have a EA game or you will die. (rumors say it has a spyware in the software to take your information an sell it to other companies for marketing purposes, be careful)
    Well I hope this post helps people save some money. I give this game a 3 out of 10 because they attempted to do something at least, even if it was a massive launch PC title failure again. Maybe a few months down the road it will be playable an enjoyable like SH2 became when its issues were fixed an corrected. The only Thing good going for this game is the introduction of a Physics engine making the the destruction of Castle walls an Town buildings look more realistic an the peoples "AI" bodies having a "rag" doll effect to their lifeless corpses. I sure hope some other big titles coming out that I am waiting for do not do this as well, Such as Skyrim from Besthesda.... Especially after how horrible RAGE was an still is after multiply patches to try an fix it, yet still have not. Wish the PC industry would get their **** together... I am really considering going back to Xbox or Playstation, I know they go through their issues now an then but at least with a console I did not spend $2,000.00 plus dollars to make a top end gaming machine just to get crappy game after crappy game released    … Expand
  12. Yourself
    Oct 31, 2011
    3
    Outdated 3d graphics, numerous bugs and no skirmish mode. The first Stronghold is now 10 years old and it's still far more enjoyable than any other game of the franchise (with Crusader being the exception).
  13. Korkenzieher
    Oct 25, 2011
    3
    I guess the glorious days of the Stronghold Franchise are over. Stronghold 3 has HUGE bugs, currently no speed regulation, graphics looks like came out of 2002 - to shortcut this - for my taste... a Nr1 lame game. Stronghold 3 earned a place in my personal FAIL BUY's list.
  14. nitrambor3
    Oct 25, 2011
    3
    I was incredibly disappointed with this game. Even without the multiplayer and AI issues, simple game play is awkward. Resolution is surprisingly bad. Wooden walls won't connect, and leave gaps that can't be closed. There is no good way to see why or what's wrong. When you delete walls, little visual slivers are left which can't be deleted, but can be selected and keep other functions fromI was incredibly disappointed with this game. Even without the multiplayer and AI issues, simple game play is awkward. Resolution is surprisingly bad. Wooden walls won't connect, and leave gaps that can't be closed. There is no good way to see why or what's wrong. When you delete walls, little visual slivers are left which can't be deleted, but can be selected and keep other functions from working correctly. Placing any sort of property gives little indication of why it can't be placed, it would be nice to see a highlight or flash of the offending piece of ground/property. Installation took me two hours, due to numerous download/delay/crash/uninstall/reinstall errors. They were all solvable on Steam support site, but seriously? Two hours. There is not as much notice in popularity, granary, etc. changes. I got caught a few times. When you play some of the economics campaigns you don't have limited time but if you take longer than 100 days you get no points. Seriously? This is only with 5 hours of play on Economics. I haven't even started the combat stuff yet. And seriously, who wants to play in the rain? If you ask me, the new 'look' is hard to see, way too granular and really takes away from the game. I liked a lot of the complexity of the SH2, and am sad to see it gone, at least in economics mode. The small map screen is way too big for the overall screen, it would be nice to be able to minimize/resize it to smaller for those of us without 46" monitors. Overall, I'm just really disappointed that I waited this long, paid this up front, lived through the ridiculous delays and then got this. I guess if you want to make cool looking physics trailers and blow dudes off a wall, this is awesome, but if you want a castle-building good time, go back and play SH1.… Expand
  15. PC_Tester
    Oct 26, 2011
    3
    The skirmish for me isnt a huge problem, however things like selecting troops to attack, weighting of various building types, the terrible mini map, small map sizes, poor widescreen/multi screen support (the list goes on) are just unacceptable for a full price release.

    A very dissapointing release and Firefly should be ashamed of themselves.
  16. Arumen
    Oct 26, 2011
    3
    I am a hardcore Stronghold Fan. I have played every one of them, one, two and crusader.

    My recommendation? If you want to know what Stronghold 3 is, take all of the objects from Stronghold 2, and put them in an exact copy of Stronghold 1, then make the game terribly buggy, unresponsive and just all around sh*tty. First, the game does a have a few things going for it. Castle construction    I am a hardcore Stronghold Fan. I have played every one of them, one, two and crusader.

    My recommendation? If you want to know what Stronghold 3 is, take all of the objects from Stronghold 2, and put them in an exact copy of Stronghold 1, then make the game terribly buggy, unresponsive and just all around sh*tty. First, the game does a have a few things going for it. Castle construction certainly has a few more options (a few) and you do get 72 directions in which you can place buildings, which allows you to pretty much make your city look the way you want and fit buildings into tight spaces. Secondly I really like the story telling method of black and white scenes with the Wolf's voice over it.

    Lastly, the fact that the Jackal is in this game, from the Crusader games, is a highlight.

    Now for the bad... Oh the bad...

    Perhaps the most important thing for any game to have is good control. Control, control control. This game has terrible unit control. Playing the first military mission, where I had a mere 7 units I could barely command all of them. Clicking on enemies is downright stupid because half the time your men will sit and have a tea before realizing the enemy has a sword through his chest. Also on the first mission I experienced the Firefly version of Fog of War. It is basically an invisible cloud that makes a path look totally clear until you walk towards it. Not like normal FoW, where it is darker so you can TELL that something might be hidden, but literally just hiding units from view. Stronghold has never done this before, why now?? I managed to pass the first mission though, and thought, well now I am on to building so I am sure that was just me flubbing around in the beginning. Second mission starts up and I need to gather goods and locate missing soldiers. Once again I assume the game has the invisible fog of war because I can't see any soldiers on the map. I place my stockpile and my granary and start building farms. Then I realize I need wood. I go to the industry panel and...

    "Wth is that?"

    The logging camp is easily the biggest building in the game. I actually played free-play and tried to find a bigger building. No dice. It also seems to produce less than the 1 person huts from before and cost 6.6 times as much. Well it looked kind of cool so I placed it and tried to keep working. Then I was attacked by wolves.

    Many Stronghold fans are familiar with wolves. Many are also familiar with the popularity meter, a unique feature of Stronghold. With the arrival of wolves my popularity dropped to negative 15. This made no sense to me since I was used to the 100 point popularity system that the other games had and now this new system has screwed me over. The wolves killed my loggers, which lowered my population, which made my farmers leave, which drained my food to 0 which gave me less popularity. I immediately rage quit.


    I did try out creative mode too. Castle building is total crap, trust me, I don't need to go into the finer details. Let me just say housing now costs somewhere between 20-60 wood but you don't get to choose, it is decided by how close you are to your keep. Why? Because the game says so.

    This game is a severe disappointment. DO NOT BUY. DO NOT RENT.    … Expand
  17. genlok83
    Nov 15, 2011
    3
    I was lucky enough to return my copy and used the money to pre-order Arkam City instead a much better choice. Even if they do fix the problems won't matter. "you can polish a turd but its still a POS" is just the perfect saying to go along with Stronghold 3. I might buy the game again when its 75-80% off on a steam sale but other than that I am probably done with Firefly. For those peopleI was lucky enough to return my copy and used the money to pre-order Arkam City instead a much better choice. Even if they do fix the problems won't matter. "you can polish a turd but its still a POS" is just the perfect saying to go along with Stronghold 3. I might buy the game again when its 75-80% off on a steam sale but other than that I am probably done with Firefly. For those people giving this game a 10 your insane since that's a score reserved for the best games which SH3 is so far from its crazy. Every RTS needs a skirmish for replay-ability and those that don't have one apparently don't realize its important to a RTS. I remember having so much fun playing 8 player skirmish games in Stronghold Crusader, me against a bunch of Wolves, good times, not anymore though. I was really looking forward to this game especially after that abysmal SH2 ugh, but somehow they made something equally as terrible with SH3. I feel bad for the people that are stuck with this garbage after paying $50.… Expand
  18. Foomasa
    Oct 27, 2011
    3
    Stronghold 3 is one of the coolest most innovative games of its time! That is, if its time was 10 years ago. This game seems to be an exercise in frustration. For example, I was playing the second mission on the military campaign. I was taking my Lord around, and looking for the lost troops as the mission objectives said I should do. In the meantime, I was supposed to be saving up 100Stronghold 3 is one of the coolest most innovative games of its time! That is, if its time was 10 years ago. This game seems to be an exercise in frustration. For example, I was playing the second mission on the military campaign. I was taking my Lord around, and looking for the lost troops as the mission objectives said I should do. In the meantime, I was supposed to be saving up 100 cheese, wood, and apples. However, when I was away looking around the map, I noticed that I suddenly had only 1 peasant left. I thought, "What's going on here? Have I set my taxes too high?" I checked, and everything seemed fine in the "mood" department. I had a big green 35. I turned out that all of my peasants had been killed by wolves that were camping directly in front of my keep. The wolves continued to instantly kill everyone that stepped out. This was fine with me, wolves killing peasants seemed like a natural problem to occur in the time period. The real problem was that I had no idea that it was happening. There was no sound effects to indicate my poor peasants were dying, no voice over from my servant telling me my peasants were dying. This kind of problem should not exist in a modern day RTS. On a side note, the only thing this game has going for it is that the storyline the developers have crafted seemed somewhat intriguing. However, the gameplay is so terrible that I cannot punish myself past the third mission to continue the story.… Expand
  19. Logiwonk
    Oct 28, 2011
    3
    This game's graphics are uninspiring. The interface is clunky. The economics are difficult to balance (how many apple farms do I need for 10 workers?). This game was a waste of cash. Overall it feels like a 5-8 year old game. I got into this to build kick-arse castles - so why am I running an economic sim I have to micromanage while, oh yeah, the CASTLE BITS aren't available forThis game's graphics are uninspiring. The interface is clunky. The economics are difficult to balance (how many apple farms do I need for 10 workers?). This game was a waste of cash. Overall it feels like a 5-8 year old game. I got into this to build kick-arse castles - so why am I running an economic sim I have to micromanage while, oh yeah, the CASTLE BITS aren't available for construction. This game is a disgrace, the worst "finished product" I've purchased in recent memory.

    DON'T BUY IT, IF SOMEONE GIVES YOU A COPY DON'T PLAY IT    … Expand
  20. Sushimo
    Nov 2, 2011
    3
    I'm a old stronghold fan, but this day one purchase has been very disappointing...

    I've encountered many bugs, some of which forced me to reload a game. The unit controls and are very poor at best. The campaign mode lacks imagination, the difficulty is based on what you are allowed to build instead of letting the player use his/her preferred units/buildings. lack of game modes and maps,    I'm a old stronghold fan, but this day one purchase has been very disappointing...

    I've encountered many bugs, some of which forced me to reload a game.
    The unit controls and are very poor at best.
    The campaign mode lacks imagination, the difficulty is based on what you are allowed to build instead of letting the player use his/her preferred units/buildings.
    lack of game modes and maps, specifically skirmish mode, gives the game little replay value.

    Until some patches come out, please, do not buy this game. It's not worth your time or money.    … Expand
  21. mikefromsaskato
    Dec 2, 2011
    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    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
  22. BlackWidow
    Nov 22, 2020
    3
    This game has been sitting in my Steam Library for 6 months or more. So, on this lazy Sunday, I decided to fire the game up. Ugh, what a joke. I loved the other Stronghold games, but this one is horrid. First off is the story. The Wolf? Are you serious? I mean, out of all the stories Firefly could have came up with, they decided to bring back the Wolf? Complete joke.

    Secondly, is the    This game has been sitting in my Steam Library for 6 months or more. So, on this lazy Sunday, I decided to fire the game up. Ugh, what a joke. I loved the other Stronghold games, but this one is horrid. First off is the story. The Wolf? Are you serious? I mean, out of all the stories Firefly could have came up with, they decided to bring back the Wolf? Complete joke.

    Secondly, is the voicing. Once again, Firefly was too lazy or cheap to hire decent voice actors. Most of the AI voicing is copy and paste from previous titles. And the women? They are male voices trying to sound female. What a crock. They did this in other titles as well. I believe Stronghold 2 is the only title that has proper female voice actors. Come on Firefly. Really.

    Lastly are the campaigns. Not much depth here. Either too easy, too bland, or just too boring. Move here, move there, kill this dude, kill that dude, grow some apples, gather some wood; rinse and repeat.

    In closing, the graphics are not too bad, and I love the weather effects and night/day cycle; something I always wanted in the Stronghold games, but even that does not help this game in the least. I'm glad I got the Gold Edition for like 10 bucks, because the game is not worth more than that. Maybe 5 actually. But any ways, try thinking up a better and original story Firefly for the next game. The Wolf was dead in Stronghold 1. I give this terrible attempt a 3. Yuk!    … Expand
  23. Tomcan
    Dec 20, 2015
    3
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  24. goshnya
    Oct 26, 2011
    2
    What the reviews say is sad but true -- this game is buggy, and just plain unpolished. It doesn't have the fun of the first one, nor the skirmish mode of the second one. It's also unbalanced -- for example, a single wolf can kill several soldiers. So it's hard to recommend it at this time, maybe in the future when it's heavily patched.
  25. Hovis
    Nov 1, 2011
    2
    This wouldn't have been a brilliant game if it had come out five years ago, let alone now. Looks dated and dodgy, plays very poorly with slow, unresponsive units and a primitive interface. Even though it's a niche game and offers the reasonably rare selling point of letting you build and run a castle it does it so badly that even if I was jonesing for a castle building game I'd still giveThis wouldn't have been a brilliant game if it had come out five years ago, let alone now. Looks dated and dodgy, plays very poorly with slow, unresponsive units and a primitive interface. Even though it's a niche game and offers the reasonably rare selling point of letting you build and run a castle it does it so badly that even if I was jonesing for a castle building game I'd still give it a miss. Really disappointed.… Expand
  26. adler
    Oct 29, 2011
    2
    Stronghold 3 can be described as full of bugs, stupid developer decisions, and it AI (if it can be called like that at all) robs you blind. There are problems everywhere, archers who can't shoot from towers, when attacking you will need lot of patience to find a place around enemy where cursor changed to attack icon, sometimes you have to click on enemy and most of times you have to huntStronghold 3 can be described as full of bugs, stupid developer decisions, and it AI (if it can be called like that at all) robs you blind. There are problems everywhere, archers who can't shoot from towers, when attacking you will need lot of patience to find a place around enemy where cursor changed to attack icon, sometimes you have to click on enemy and most of times you have to hunt pixel around enemy where it will let you to attack. As for robbing AI, if you have 8 spearmen and you attack 1 enemy spearman, he will kill 5 of yours before falls. Also wolves, at campaign start you can't build walls, wolfs enter settlement they will kill all peasants, farmers, woodcutters, as they cant defend for themselves. You will need to run around with lord hunting wolves around town to keep as much people alive as you can, also one wolf can kill 3-4 spearmen. Game can be unstable, so you will need to save a lot, as there is no auto-save. List of problems goes on and on. And all of this is just about campaign, as there is no skirmish, no kingmaker mode. There is no AI, game just spawns units that are same as yours but AI archers do more damage than players, same goes for men at arms, spearmen, etc. Total garbage.… Expand
  27. Canisrah
    Oct 25, 2011
    2
    I've come online to get this review in early in the hope that I can save other Stronghold fans from making the same mistake I did. This game is an unfinished, buggy mess and I wish I could get my money back. Pre-ordering games just doesn't pay nowadays as developers seem determined to release their unfinished, unpolished, half-implemented rubbish on the paying public. They've had to makeI've come online to get this review in early in the hope that I can save other Stronghold fans from making the same mistake I did. This game is an unfinished, buggy mess and I wish I could get my money back. Pre-ordering games just doesn't pay nowadays as developers seem determined to release their unfinished, unpolished, half-implemented rubbish on the paying public. They've had to make this game on a shoestring budget, and it shows from the beginning with the bugs and the use of black and white drawings in place of cinematics. Mission design is poor, the maps are tiny, the animations are rudimentary and the graphics engine is glitchy.

    The game simply isn't worth playing in it's current state, and it's merely a throwback to Stronghold 2 and not the original and best Stronghold 1. You have to be worried when a castle building game doesn't give your troops any defensive bonus at all for being behind walls - none whatsoever. Many aspects of the gameplay are quite simply broken, and there is no skirmish mode, just a horrible lackluster campaign. The dreadful reviews will start pouring in soon - hold off on that purchase, wait till you find it in the bargain bin, which won't be very long. A sad waste of time and money.    … Expand
  28. Bones313
    Oct 25, 2011
    2
    Remember when stronghold 2 came out? It's more buggy then that ever was.. Graphic errors, no skirmish mode, terrible campaign and lots more to list.. Don't buy this until it's on a 5$ sale or 3 years from now when they fix all the glitches.. Why can't they just remake stronghold 1 or crusader to how we all want it to be..
  29. ptoner87
    Oct 25, 2011
    2
    No skirmish mode. No kingmaker.
    No AI (i.e. computer opponents to play against in any mode, save for what's scripted in the campaign).
    Multiplayer is broken. You literally cannot play multiplayer. Even if you could, there are four very small maps from which to choose. Limited free build mode comprising two maps, both of which are very tiny. To give you some reference, if you took thirty    No skirmish mode. No kingmaker.
    No AI (i.e. computer opponents to play against in any mode, save for what's scripted in the campaign).
    Multiplayer is broken. You literally cannot play multiplayer. Even if you could, there are four very small maps from which to choose.
    Limited free build mode comprising two maps, both of which are very tiny. To give you some reference, if you took thirty wheat farms and lined them up, the first and last would be at the edges of the map.

    I won't comment as to how I like the graphics, because to an extent it is personal preference, but I will tell you there are numerous graphical errors, and castle walls use low resolution, blotchy textures.

    I do enjoy the audio. Music is nice. It's not enough to overcome the game's other faults by a longshot, however.

    The game is very buggy. Some people cannot start the game. Others it crashes for, and still others for some odd reason can only play the game in a foreign language (really). For those of us lucky not to experience these major issues, there still is a whole slew of pesky annoyances and gameplay imbalances with which to contend, to the extent that we're wondering if 7sixty and Firefly Studios accidentally released an early beta version instead of the completed game.

    There are some remedies to Stronghold 2's mechanics that are positive, such as not having to deal with sanitation or criminals, and a better camera UI.
    Your building choices are also more refined, which does mean less indeed, but I think it's for the better. For instance, there's only a church, and no chapel or cathedral. The church has a support structure, the chandler, a producer of candles, which the church requires to perform services.
    The honour system is interesting, I think, but there's no sense in going into it here.
    Housing is nifty in that it changes size and capacity based on distance from the keep.
    Weather and day and night cycles are kind of glitched, but in theory they are pretty cool.

    The game is in major need of some serious patches.
    Even with patches, you'd very likely never see a skirmish mode, as AI is something that takes a very long time to develop, and typically requires coding in the early stages of development.
    There may be a technical reason the maps are as small as they are. If this is true, it's extremely disappointing.

    The short answer is stay away from Stronghold 3.
    Maybe reconsider if it goes on sale for ten bucks, but only after extensive patching.    … Expand
  30. Kevinovski
    Oct 25, 2011
    2
    A nasty surprise for Stronghold fans. This game is very buggy and has an unfinished feel to it. Let me rephrase that: This game has been released in a state it shouldn't be. It's like a fetus gets pulled out of a womb months before its time. This should have never been released in this state.
    Furthermore, there is a lack of skirmish mode, which means you have to deal with the current    A nasty surprise for Stronghold fans. This game is very buggy and has an unfinished feel to it. Let me rephrase that: This game has been released in a state it shouldn't be. It's like a fetus gets pulled out of a womb months before its time. This should have never been released in this state.
    Furthermore, there is a lack of skirmish mode, which means you have to deal with the current campaigns as they are. They are impossibly difficult, not as much to say the game is challenging, but you have the feeling you're not fighting the virtual enemies, rather the bugs you come across. There is no bonus for standing on walls, and your men at arms get stuck when they can't hit their enemies. What is that all about?
    A lot of people say they don't like the graphics, but I think they're the only pro to this game as far as I'm concerned. I think this game is salvageable with a lot of patching, but for now I'd suggest you all wait till it's in the bargain bin.    … Expand
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Awards & Rankings

39
#39 Most Discussed PC Game of 2011
60
#60 Most Shared PC Game of 2011

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
47

Generally unfavorable reviews - based on 29 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 29
  2. Mixed: 14 out of 29
  3. Negative: 14 out of 29
  1. LEVEL (Czech Republic)
    Jan 20, 2012
    40
    Failure of the year – first two games don't deserve such a disappointing sequel as Stronghold 3 did. Few pros cannot hide a pile of bugs and bad design decisions. [Dec 2011]
  2. PC Games (Russia)
    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]
  3. Absolute Games
    Dec 16, 2011
    30
    Stronghold 3 is boring beyond redemption. The blurb on the retail box should have been written along the lines of "We've run out of ideas, our artists forgot how to draw, and our programmers can't produce stable code anymore, but hey, a long, long time ago we made one really great game!"
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