Holdfast: Nations At War

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

Very Positive · 90%Very Positive · 90%2020

−50%~~$19.99~~$9.99

US Steam price, checked 5 h ago

The verdict

A chaotic 150-player Napoleonic, naval and WW1 shooter where proximity-chat roleplay is the main draw. Skip it if you want tight melee or gunplay, or can't stand toxic voice chat.

Great for

Players who want goofy roleplay, proximity voice chat and big team battles, ideally with friends or a regiment

Main risk

Janky melee, random-feeling shooting and a toxic, poorly moderated community can sour the fun quickly

What changed in the last 30 days

60 recent reviews

Recent negative reviews blame the Austria update, ignored bugs and cosmetic cash-grabs, melee hitboxes and weak admin moderation. These are a few reviews, so we're only moderately sure.

60 recent reviews

What players love

Hilarious proximity voice chat

Mentioned in ~2 in 5 positive reviews

“the proximity voice chat will leave you laughing out loud. people from all over the world just getting into it and having fun!”
Steam review · 124.2 h played ↗

“It’s like being in the Napoleonic Wars, except there’s dubstep playing and everyone is an escaped mental asylum patient.”
Steam review · 9.4 h played ↗

“The game is very cool, especially when officers yell for us to charge while artillery pounds us and enemy infantry fires a volley.”
Steam review · translated · 154.9 h played ↗

Friendly, fun community

Mentioned in ~1 in 4 positive reviews

“a great game when u like napoleonic wars also the community is funny and kind”
Steam review · 6.2 h played ↗

“I get a good laugh every time I play this game. Combat is fun and the community is great!”
Steam review · 18.4 h played ↗

Regiments and organized line battles

Mentioned in ~1 in 9 positive reviews

“Where this game shines is in linebattle events.”
Steam review · 150.8 h played ↗

“i joined a regiment 43c and got hooked into it and started doing line battles”
Steam review · 26.5 h played ↗

Multiple modes and lots of content

Mentioned in ~1 in 10 positive reviews

“There are three different game types to play.”
Steam review · 53.3 h played ↗

“All of those are the size of updates other studios would have you pay £20+ more for, all free.”
Steam review · 408.1 h played ↗

Active devs with free updates

Mentioned in ~1 in 19 positive reviews

“Highly recommend for the community and attention the dev team gives to its player base.”
Steam review · 318.6 h played ↗

Casual, accessible and runs on older PCs

Mentioned in ~1 in 25 positive reviews

“being much less demanding to run for anyone with an older PC”
Steam review · 295.7 h played ↗

What players complain about

Janky, unreliable melee

Mentioned in ~1 in 4 negative reviews

“Jank melee it feels like everyone is in slow motion.”
Steam review · 16.4 h played ↗

“the melee system is completely broken. You will block directions and be killed through the block anyway”
Steam review · 74.3 h played ↗

“Melee weapons are a mockery of the player, especially playing with a sabre on cavalry.”
Steam review · translated · 6.8 h played ↗

Toxic, racist community and mic spam

Mentioned in ~1 in 4 negative reviews

“the community is infested with racist, islamaphobic, homophobic, and anti-semites spewing their ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ in voice and text in every match.”
Steam review · 640.6 h played ↗

“This is a fun gun that is utterly ruined by a toxic player base”
Steam review · 13.2 h played ↗

Inaccurate, random-feeling shooting and hitboxes

Mentioned in ~1 in 5 negative reviews

“A guy aims 5 feet to your right and you still get shot.”
Steam review · 109.3 h played ↗

“Missing 90% of shots because the game just decides your bullet will just zip off in a random direction”
Steam review · 1.2 h played ↗

Devs neglect bugs and push cosmetic DLC

Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews

“Devs will literally let a game breaking bug sit for four months while they cook up another cash grab (cosmetics)”
Steam review · 2764.2 h played ↗

Cheaters and weak anti-cheat

Mentioned in ~1 in 10 negative reviews

“No Vac, No Anti Cheat system, make of that what you will.”
Steam review · 29 h played ↗

“the game is full of cheaters and teamers”
Steam review · 38.8 h played ↗

Harsh, opaque moderation and shadow mutes

Mentioned in ~1 in 12 negative reviews

“If you are muted by an admin/moderator you will never be notified.”
Steam review · 0.1 h played ↗

“They block everyone, so the game you bought turns into a brick.”
Steam review · translated · 37.1 h played ↗

System requirements

From the Steam store page

Steam Deck: Verified

Minimum

OSWindows 10 64-bit or Windows 11 64-bit

ProcessorIntel i5-4670k or AMD Ryzen 7 1800X

Memory8 GB RAM

GraphicsNvidia GT 1030 or Radeon RX 550

Storage22 GB available space

Recommended

OSWindows 10 64-bit or Windows 11 64-bit

ProcessorIntel i7-8700k or AMD Ryzen 5 3600X

Memory10 GB RAM

GraphicsNvidia GTX 1060 6GB or Radeon RX 580 8GB

Storage22 GB available space

OSWindows 10 64-bit or Windows 11 64-bit

ProcessorIntel i5-4670k or AMD Ryzen 7 1800X

Memory8 GB RAM

GraphicsNvidia GT 1030 or Radeon RX 550

Storage22 GB available space

More games to check

Other games we’ve read the reviews for

See all →

Shotgun Farmers

Very Positive · 93%

+ Goofy fun with friends

− Dead servers, lobbies full of bots

analyzed 5 d ago

Nine to Five

Mixed · 47%

+ Great potential and committed devs

− Impossible to find a match

analyzed 5 d ago

Trepang2

Very Positive · 93%

+ Fast, brutal, satisfying gunplay

− Bullet-sponge enemies and scarce ammo

analyzed 3 d ago

Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun 2

Overwhelmingly Positive

+ Improvement over the first game

− Crashes, freezes and progression bugs

analyzed 3 d ago

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