Castle Strike Review

A castle of too many good ideas with too little focus

By Han Wei Chou • UrbanWire
email reporter • email story • printer friendly

Overview

Lately, Real Time Strategy (RTS) games have taken a turn for the worse. Thus far, only Blizzard’s Warcraft 3 has managed to push the boundaries of this genre. Other games as such the newly released Castle Strike by Related Designs Software just don’t spring too many surprises.

Storyline

Castle Strike is set in The Hundred Years War period of European history. You'll command the forces of 1 of 3 countries ( France , Germany and England ) on fictitious campaigns to destroy your enemies. The storylines for all 3 campaigns are pretty basic. Take the German campaign for example, you are a young prince, your enemy attacks and kills your father, you have to take revenge and kill him. It isn't exactly exciting stuff and definitely not worth, excuse the pun, killing for.

Although it wouldn't be fair to say the plot is paper-thin, it pales in comparison to those of other games like Warcraft 3 , Stronghold and Starcraft where love, war and treachery are effortlessly woven into a rich tapestry. What's worse, Related Designs Software didn't even bother to forward the storyline in movies, which is a must for RTS games these days.

Instead, the story is revealed through in-game cut scenes. You just don't identify with the characters through these crudely done cut scenes. To its credit, the game does have a good 3D game engine, but the 1D characters and storyline thoroughly disappoint.

Gameplay

The first impression you get when playing Castle Strike is its strong resemblance to Warcraft 3 and Stronghold, which were good games because they played to their strengths. Warcraft 3 focussed on unit management and battle control while Stronghold emphasised the building and management aspects of a castle stronghold. Castle Strike on the other hand, tries too hard to cram everything into a single game. This results in you having to do a little of everything, which makes the whole gameplay experience mediocre.

The game requires you to take charge of battles, but you can only dictate what formation your troops take. Besides the limited troop command options, your troops also have virtually no special abilities. They even seem generic, as there aren’t many types of units in the game. Even your hero units do nothing more than just give some combat bonuses to your troops. The combat aspect is adequate but really needs work to shine.

The other aspect of Castle Strike is building up your castle. Granted, the game gives you the various kinds of walls, gates and parapets to make your own designer fortress. Unfortunately, your designs will not have profound effects on the strength or security of your fort. The most intricately designed castle offers about the same kind of protection as something you throw together in minutes. The game designers seem to have trouble deciding what they want the game to be, an action oriented RTS game or an empire building one.

Thankfully the game’s empire management aspects do add some tactical depth to the gameplay. You have the option of taxing your peasants heavily (at the cost of their productivity) or easing their tax burden (which shortens the time taken for them to harvest resources and build structures). This novel concept forces you to decide not only how you want to build your empire, but also how you rule it.

Controls

The controls are pretty sharp with this game. Our only gripe is having to learn the multiple small buttons and numerous keyboard shortcuts before you can truly begin enjoying the game.

Graphics and Audio

Castle Strike scores pretty well in this section. The music is suitably moody and complements the theme of the game nicely. The graphics are very good; save for the ugly white or blue spaces that turn up at the edge of the map. The game interface is disturbingly similar to Warcraft 3, right down to the opening menus, but this means that you’ll feel right at home if you’ve played that.

Replayability

The limited variety of units hurts the game a bit. The single player campaigns are also pretty tedious. However, the multiplayer component should keep veteran RTS players happy, letting them go about demolishing each others’ castles.

Verdict

Related Designs must make up its mind. Do they want Castle Strike to emulate the fast paced style of Warcraft 3, or adopt the more strategic style of Stronghold? Castle Strike cannot be both. It would have been a better game if it had gone one way or the other. Then again, if you want to get a taste both variations of the RTS genre, or just want to indulge the megalomaniac in you, Castle Strike might just be what you are looking for.

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Castle Strike will be released in August by Innovative Distribution Pte Ltd.

Minimum System Requirements
Windows ME/98/98SE/2000/XP
Pentium 3 1000
256MB RAM
3D Graphics Card, GeForce2 or similar, High Colour (16 Bit) with 32MB RAM
Resolution: 800x600
700MB Free hard disk space
CD-ROM Drive
Mouse
Direct Sound compatible sound card