Interesting little game, but very hard:
http://www.2kgames.com/stronghold2/minigame/
Can anyone beat level 10?
I've gotten up to level 9, with 74% of the castle complete, and there was no way I could've held any longer with my present tactics.
Here's a little challenge: How far can you get in this game WITHOUT pressing Spacebar?
The point of the game is to use your archers to shoot down the enemies who approach your castle... but if you can't press Spacebar, then you can't fire any arrows at all!
So you're limited to putting all your men to build the keep as fast as possible (maybe you can use uparrow+downarrow to "exploit" and make them build faster), as well as Z X C special weapons.
I managed to get to level 7 (96%). I used Z X C, but maybe I could've gotten to level 8 if I was more efficient about it, and I haven't used the up+down trick yet. A "speed run" of this game would actually use as few archers as possible since it gets your keep built faster.
Interesting, I just got 96% on level 8, with the no-Spacebar rule. I think I could've beaten that level if I was just a *little* more efficient.
That's about as far as I usually get playing normally! (Though I have gotten to level 9, but lost.)
maybe you can use uparrow+downarrow to "exploit" and make them build faster
This trick can backfire. Sometimes, when you press uparrow, the worker who gets converted to an archer is NOT the worker who just dropped off his load, so that it gives less (or possibly even negative?) benefit. However, if I have a line of 6 guys dropping off their stones in a row, the trick will work for all of them.
Also, it's risky to do this when there's enemy crossbowmen on screen. I've had this happen:
press up
crossbowman fires at the first worker
press down
press up
crossbowman's arrow hits and kills the second worker who just popped up
In the later levels, I only used this trick when the screen was mostly clear (especially after having used up the 'C' move for the logs).
Wow, I actually got farther than I have playing normally now, using my "don't fire any arrows" tactic.
I've gotten up to level 9, with 74% of the castle complete, and there was no way I could've held any longer with my present tactics.
I have now gotten to level 9 with 84% complete!
Winning Level 8:
http://img98.imageshack.us/img98/9623/8qd8.jpg
Level 9: Screen after losing, shows the low score I got!
http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/8787/9sg7.jpg
I didn't use the up-down trick this time. I am trying to time my use of Z X C more strategically, though.
BTW does anyone know how to make "save states" in a Shockwave file? This game is annoying in that if you lose a level, you have to start all over from the very beginning, and I'd like to be able to keep trying different things on the same level without having to start over every time.
