INTRODUCTION

As preface to the production of this mod…

I never thought that my passion for Stronghold 2 would have ever led towards pouring hundreds of hours into gameplay, and in turn hundreds more into diving through the files and breaking apart re-rendering and modifying the game to hopefully be a completely new gratifying experience.

I had never heard of the Stronghold Series prior to seeing “Stronghold 2”. Instead it was pure happenstance that around 2005-2006 my family and I were inside of a “Micro Center” in Illinois that the Medieval Style box-art drew my gaze from all the other games on the shelves. In these early years of gaming for me I had never heard of STEAM or other online based retail shops; so the only way I was ever in interaction with the coolest new titles would be when on vacation in other cities or at the local “STAPLES” office supply store in the town over from my hometown (Best Buy and other big Box stores like Circuit City hadn’t made it across the entire U.S. yet).

As soon as my family and I had returned home I immediately loaded the game onto my laptop, and realized it was barely powerful enough to run. I closed the program and went back into the settings and took it down to the lowest potato level (lowest setting possible), and booted the game back up. While the in-game characters now looked like amorphous amoebas with big thick spiky arms holding onto various weapons and tools depending on their career and legs rooted onto an angular isosceles triangular type bodies, I was unfazed, I blasted through a free-play peaceful play-through to teach myself the basics; learning though trial and error how to balance my kingdom and succeed at profiting while keeping the needs of my subjects in check.

Then it was onto a Military Skirmish. Needless to say, if you have played against Stronghold 2 AI before you may understand, the AI erected its entire castle, balanced its economy, and raised an army which immediately poured out of their homeland on a vicious crusade against my kingdom. This all happened in about 3.8 milliseconds. I decided Skirmish play wasn’t for me.

It was now onto the Campaign. The campaign was everything I had hoped for and more. The story loosely follows a late 11th century Britain, and meshes both comedy and the severity of the times seamlessly. I later learned the developers were very keen on keeping it historically accurate so there wasn’t a single potato farmer present; the fact that potatoes a member of the nightshade phylum wasn’t introduced until the late 16th century after the discovery of The Americas.

In the campaign you assume the role of Matthew Steele as he accompanies Sir William on a harrowing journey to seek out the truth of the status and whereabouts of “The King”

The second mission after a introductory mission has you meeting Friar Jacobs who tasks you with collecting wood and stone to build a bridge to gain access to the local Monastery across the river. Once completed you are awarded sheep and continue to the next mission. The player can now build “Sheep Stables”, and “Weaver’s Workshops” which you’ll use to offload cloth to Flemish traders in exchange for gold. This gold allows you to invest in a small army which you’ll use to defend against your first enemy “Olaf Grimtooth” a Viking Warlord in employ of the Main Antagonists of the game.

These first few missions give the player enough information about the story to easily follow along while both the in game cut-scenes show the happenings outside of Matthew Steele’s Quest, alongside outer cut-scenes that appear in a read storybook format creating a synopsis account of the story.

For 11 year old me “Stronghold 2” was the scratch for the Dark Ages itch. The game-play was both simple to navigate while also being difficult and precise to master. Beating missions gets progressively more difficult as the player progresses which leads to a pinnacle in the rising action where the now “Sir Matthew Steele” is faced with a difficult decision. To remain allies to your colleagues or to break ties and join your enemies.

From here on out the Story-line branches in opposite directions which is shown through the Mission Progress Screen. Both options may have you returning to the same region, but depending on your choice you may be defending or attacking said territory.

For the sake of not revealing any spoilers I won’t divulge too much into the ending of the story, but from personal memory I did originally try to play through the “Good Quest-line” only to find the final mission to be nearly impossible to beat. I then in turn went back to the Mission Progress Screen and aligned to the “Evil Quest-Line” which I found personally to be drastically easier. (Afterwards I did go back and beat the “Good-Quest-Line” after a major reassessment of my strategy)

To Be Continued in DEV-DIARY II…