Joan of Arc: Siege and the Sword

Joan of Arc: Siege and the Sword

Games like Joan of Arc: Siege and the Sword
Joan of Arc: Siege and the Sword screenshots Successful games will always be copied in some way or another and although I can't tell for certain if that is what the designers had in mind when they made this game you can't deny that Joan of Arc looks and plays a lot like defender of the crown from cinema ware. If you don't know who Joan of Arc is here's a little history, in the 15the century France was devastated in the war with England that lasted almost 100 years and was now being controlled by the English. Joan was a 17-year old peasant girl who lived in the countryside and it was said that she was visited by a spirit who told her that she should help the true heir to the throne. After being accepted by the Charles, the heir, she was given control of an army and she liberated Orleans and Reims and thus enable Charles to be crowned king. It did not end good at all for Joan though because she was later accused of heresy and she was burned at the stake.

After the intro which describes the story in detail he game starts of with Joan leading a small army and the first task is to liberate Orleans where Charles resides. You only have a small amount of troops and there is no way for you to get more. Battles are played out either on the field where you can command archers, foot soldiers, horse riders and canons or when attacking a castle you will command a single soldier where you have to play two mini games. The first is to attack and kill a number of soldiers outside the castle walls with your sword, in the second mini game you have to climb ladders all the way up to the tower while enemy soldiers throw rocks and boiling oil at your. The latter is also played when a French castle is attacked and you have to defend the tower, you are always at a disadvantage though because you are always alone. After liberating Orleans you must take Reims so that the heir can be crowned king and that is when the next part of the game starts. With the true king behind you you can now collect money and involve yourself in politics to get allies, get more armies and finally to drive the English completely out of France.

Joan of Arc plays a lot like defender of the crown except with a France map, it does include more options like diplomacy and a bigger map but it has some inherent flaws that make it annoying at times. For starters each time a French castle is attacked you have to defend it by playing the tower mini game but this can happen more than once in one turn so it can quickly become annoying. The mini games themselves aren't really special and require little skill to complete. Some graphics in the game use scanned pictures but at the time the computers available obviously weren't ready for that kind of thing because they don't look very good. The music and sound are not really worth mentioning, it only contains one really short soundtrack which you will tire of quickly and a couple of sound effects that are the same during all battles. Joan of Arc could have been excellent but because of some of the mentioned problems it is only an average strategy game. Still if you like defender of the crown you can give this game a try.
If you do not no how to play this game, find the Joan of Arc: Siege and the Sword guides here.