LORDS OF THE REALM I +1Clk Windows 11 10 8 7 Vista XP Install

Actual Game

The Game
Lords of the Realm is a wargame loosely based on the medieval period of the 13th century. Realm offers the player opportunity for conquering neighbouring English counties through direct armed conflict or through siege warfare using the appropriate war machines of the era. Careful husbanding of one's economic resources is also required, for peasants must be fed if they are to produce the goods required to outfit a medieval army. Up to 6 human (or 5 computer) players can take part in a game of Realm or two players can also play against each other by modem. CD enhancements include a map of medieval Germany to play on, as well as digitized voices and fly-by sequences.

Introduction
The player takes up the flag of one of 6 rogue barons with the objective of, naturally enough, conquering all of England (or, in the CD version, Germany). It is the royal crown that you and the other 5 barons vie for, and the vanquishing of all that stand in your way is the route to being made king.

Realm starts off like most other games of its type, presenting you with a display of the county that you control at the beginning of the game. Realm is a turn-based game, with each turn involving the management of your land holdings, the movement of your troops and any subsequent combat that may take place. This process is then repeated for each of the other barons before the next turn (each turn being a season) takes place.

Castle building is well-implemented in Realm. Designs can be fully laid-out and examined from several angles, and can be saved for future use. A personal stake is often involved when the computer attacks a castle which you personally designed!

Tilling the Fields - the economic model
The economy of the middle ages, being what it was 700 years ago, is modeled pretty well in Realm. To keep one's people fed, you must have sufficient grain, cows, and/or sheep to last throughout the year in each county under your control. The allocation of these food sources is done by selecting what each of the of 16 fields will produce. It is a good idea to leave a number of these fields fallow, so that the fields won't become overworked and subsequently barren.

The harvesting and planting of grain takes place in the autumn and spring, as appropriate. In addition, the number of serfs required to tend the fields during these periods increases dramatically. You must ensure that you have enough people available to tend to these most important tasks or you may run out of food before the next harvest.

Crop management is the key element to success in Realm. If your counties are running low on food and the autumn harvest is still a season or two away, your peasants will be quick to display their displeasure. Instead of marshalling your armies to attack adjacent counties, starving peasants will have you scrambling to find sources of food to transfer to these have-not counties. Remember, an army marches on its stomach.

Providing enough food for your peasants is not the only concern that needs to be met. Eventually, once your counties have grown in size, you'll have enough people to assign to other tasks. Peasants will have to be assigned to mine stone and collect timber in order for weapons and castles to be built. More people will be available for these tasks during the summer and winter months, as the grain fields don't need as much attention during these times.

Each county has a happiness rating from 0 to 40. The higher the rating, the more content your peasants are. Random encounters such as a plague, heavy conscription, and low food (especially) have detrimental effects on your peasants' happiness. Linger below 5 for too long and you'll lose control of your county. Careful allocation of your food sources is vital to keeping your peasants' spirit up.

Marshalling the Troops - the warfare model
A happy peasantry will be much better able to support an army, and an army will be needed to vanquish your foes and claim the throne of England. With this in mind, the successful baron will ensure that his people are content before he conscripts an army.

Players can muster an army in one of two ways in Realm - by conscription or by hiring mercenaries. Mercenaries make themselves available randomly throughout the game, and typically consist of a group of 50-200 archers, crossbowmen, swordsmen, or knights. Although mercenaries come fully equipped and ready to go, they cannot be combined with other mercenary groups you may have. Conscripting peasants is easier since you can do so at any time. Conscript too many from a given county however, and your populace will be quick to revolt. Conscripted peasants should be outfitted with appropriate weaponry, for they are quite useless with just pitchforks. Armed peasants can be combined with any number of other peasants, and/or one group of mercenaries. This is the main advantage of conscription, for you cannot form a large group of soldiers any other way.

Combat takes place whenever two opposing armies move into each other, or when an army moves onto the town square icon of a neutral county. The actual combat sequence is similar to what was seen in Castles II - units are grouped by type (knights, archers, etc) and face each other over a battlefield. These groups of units can be clicked on and ordered where to move or what to fire upon. The speed of knights can be used to flank an enemy formation, while archers and crossbowmen should be kept at a distance since they aren't much good at hand-to-hand combat.

An ideal army would consist of a group of archers, a large group of swordsmen, and a group of knights. The elements of range, speed and strength can all be used when such forces are combined. This is more the exception than the norm, however, since conscripting enough peasants and equipping them takes quite a long time. The restriction that mercenaries cannot be combined into one group prevents you from forming such an army quickly. Typically your armies will consist of one or two unit types, with mercenaries forming the bulk of your armed forces.

Siege warfare is modeled quite well in Realm. You can either starve the garrison out into the open or have your sieging army build the various devices of the time (catapults, trebuchets, siege towers, etc) to assist in bringing down the castle walls. In sieging a castle, icons representing your soldiers and equipment are placed around an overview of the castle and each turn you are given progress reports on the state of the siege ("catapult attack mildly successfull - light losses", for example). Siege warfare is different from a clash of two armies since it isn't resolved immediately. While realistic, the process in Realm is somewhat unsatisfactory since you don't actually witness any visuals depicting success or failure of your siege efforts. The only problem with this process is that the map on which you place your sieging army doesn't have a scale, so you don't know how close to place your catapults to be effective.

Lords of the Realm will make you keep an unblinking eye on your kingdom, your citizenry and foes to your crown. The game is deep with many detailed tasks to attend to. It is up to you to balance infastructure maintenance with external conquest. And only a balanced hand can win this game.