Stronghold Crusader HD (2012)

Worth buying? What 300 Steam reviews say.Worth buying? Here’s what 300 Steam reviews actually say.

Overwhelmingly PositiveOverwhelmingly Positive · 98%2013

−80%~~$9.99~~$1.99

US Steam price, checked 5 h ago

The verdict

A beloved, simple castle-building RTS hybrid with iconic voices and music, carried by nostalgia. Skip it if you want working multiplayer, modern polish, or smart AI.

Great for

Nostalgic fans and strategy players who enjoy economy and castle building with skirmishes against AI lords

Main risk

Won't run or multiplayer fails on modern PCs, plus cheating AI and a poorly taught start

What players love

Nostalgic childhood classic

Mentioned in ~1 in 3 positive reviews

“Goated childhood classic RTS, still more fun than 90% of the modern games even without the nostalgia”
Steam review · 291.3 h played ↗

“A game I know from childhood. I'm 40 now and still enjoying it.”
Steam review · translated · 123.3 h played ↗

“I'm 36 now and I can still go into the game and enjoy it's timeless quality.”
Steam review · 101 h played ↗

Iconic voice lines, music and atmosphere

Mentioned in ~1 in 7 positive reviews

“The soundtrack and voice lines are iconic, and the gameplay has aged surprisingly well.”
Steam review · 74.3 h played ↗

“The music and atmosphere are just unmatched. Love all the voice lines and details.”
Steam review · 15.7 h played ↗

Castle building blended with economy and RTS

Mentioned in ~1 in 8 positive reviews

“Perfect combination of castle building, economy management and real time combat.”
Steam review · 251.8 h played ↗

“Amazing hybrid between economy management and RTS. Very enjoyable and easy to learn.”
Steam review · 111.5 h played ↗

“A simulator of building castles and farming stone and iron to sell.”
Steam review · translated · 74.4 h played ↗

Deep, varied tactics and challenge

Mentioned in ~1 in 12 positive reviews

“There was never just one way to win.”
Steam review · 8.4 h played ↗

“A magnificent game with very varied tactics.”
Steam review · translated · 4.3 h played ↗

Memorable AI lords and replayability

Mentioned in ~1 in 19 positive reviews

“Each lord has their own personality and playstyle, which adds a lot of variety and replayability.”
Steam review · 281 h played ↗

“What really made it special was the variety of lords.”
Steam review · 8.4 h played ↗

Runs on anything, simple to learn

Mentioned in ~1 in 19 positive reviews

“even potato pc can run it”
Steam review · 52.2 h played ↗

“play this if you like the idea of Real Time Strategy but think they are too confusing to get into.”
Steam review · 51.3 h played ↗

What players complain about

Dumb, cheating AI and unbalanced missions

Mentioned in ~1 in 6 negative reviews

“Dumb cheating AI that just mirrors your actions by tripling it”
Steam review · 78 h played ↗

“Enemies appear to be able to produce troops without gold making missions impossible.”
Steam review · 82.3 h played ↗

Won't launch or run on modern Windows

Mentioned in ~1 in 7 negative reviews

“refuses to run on win11. tried compatibility mode and admin.”
Steam review · 8.5 h played ↗

“In the steam library it shows as running but nothing happens.”
Steam review · 1104.5 h played ↗

“This port is so bad. Good luck even getting it to load on modern hardware.”
Steam review · 4.2 h played ↗

Multiplayer broken, needs GameRanger

Mentioned in ~1 in 7 negative reviews

“Excellent game, but multiplayer doesn't work unless you use third-party support.”
Steam review · 60.2 h played ↗

“They have no dedicated server. Even asking us to download gameranger if we want to play with friends over the internet.”
Steam review · 0.3 h played ↗

“I bought it hoping to play multiplayer and bitterly found there isn't any.”
Steam review · translated · 0.1 h played ↗

Flicker, alt-tab and display glitches

Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews

“You can't alt-tab, with 10-second delays, and any browser media makes the game flicker.”
Steam review · translated · 31.5 h played ↗

“I can NOT tab out.”
Steam review · 1.7 h played ↗

“can't see the cursor so can't play the game unless u waste time guessing where the cursor is all the time”
Steam review · 0.5 h played ↗

Lost saves and crashes

Mentioned in ~1 in 10 negative reviews

“I lost hours upon hours of progress on the Crusader Trail when the game crashed.”
Steam review · 33.4 h played ↗

“The winning save doesn't save, the game crashes and leaves you with uncompleted missions.”
Steam review · translated · 35.2 h played ↗

Poor tutorial and steep learning curve

Mentioned in ~1 in 17 negative reviews

“The tutorial covers almost nothing so when I started the first mission, 20 new buildings and IDK how many new mechanics were thrown in my face.”
Steam review · 1.1 h played ↗

“Tutorial: how to build a granary. Game: 1000 buildings, confusing mechanics and an enemy army.”
Steam review · translated · 0.5 h played ↗

System requirements

From the Steam store page

Steam Deck: Playable

Minimum

OSWindows 7/8/10/11 with latest service packs

ProcessorIntel Pentium 4 1.6Ghz or equivalent

Memory512 MB RAM

Graphics64MB DirectX 8.1 Compatible

Storage850 MB available space

OSWindows 7/8/10/11 with latest service packs

ProcessorIntel Pentium 4 1.6Ghz or equivalent

Memory512 MB RAM

Graphics64MB DirectX 8.1 Compatible

Storage850 MB available space

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