Castles Ranked

[Elriadon]

So, I ranked all of the castle designs in the game according to my opinion. Feel free to share your own rankings.

S Tier

Bohemian Castle - Nothing can beat this one when it comes to looks. It's awesome.

Burgundian Castle - It just looks so fancy. Some people said that it's too fancy and looks more like a palace or a mansion, but I don't think it quite reaches that level. I prefer the Bohemian one overall, but it's close. This one actually looks better than its real-life counterpart.

Eastern European Castle - I just like this one. My favorite out of the base game castles. It reminds me of Malbork Castle.

East Asian Castle - While I generally prefer the european castle designs, I feel like I can't put this one lower than this. It's a really great japanese-style castle.

A Tier

Sicillian Castle - I really like this castle and the layout with the central courtyard.

Polish Castle - Ok, whenever I looked at the screenshots of this one before DotD released, I felt like I'm looking at an upgraded Krepost, but it looks much nicer in-game. I like how well it fits with the Eastern European set.

Central European Castle - This one is probably the closest one to the "standard fantasy castle", pretty iconic.

Central Asian Castle - The whole "Persian" architecture feels very interesting and exotic and I like those blue domes in particular. A rather strange, but really appealing castle.

Western European Castle - I'm not really a fan of this style of a Norman castle, they look very utilitarian. But it has some really nice details and after some thought, I will keep it in low A tier.

B Tier

Middle Eastern Castle - It is simple looking, but has a certain charm. A pretty good looking castle, love the destruction animation with tops of the round towers falling off.

Mediterraean Castle - Whenever I look at this, I think of the Greek Fortress from AoM. Overall, it's good at representing what it's supposed to, I'm just not a fan. I prefer the Sicillian one.

C Tier

African Castle - Whatever simple charm the Middle Eastern Castle had, this one lacks it.

South Asian Castle - Very underwhelming. I don't know, I feel like there's potential for a much better Indian castle design than this one.

D Tier

South East Asian Castle - I'm really not a fan of this one. It looks more like a wonder or a big monastery. Looking at the pictures of actual Khmer castles, I get what they were going for, but I don't think it worked out. And those steep staircases on the sides look silly. But it has a pretty cool destruction animation, so there's that.

Native American Castle - This isn't a castle, it's a temple. It looks like a smaller version of the Aztec wonder. As a Castle substitute, it just looks silly. It would be like if the Western European Castle model was the Frank Wonder and you were thus shooting arrows out of the St. Vitus Cathedral. I know it's difficult to have a castle building for these civs, but this one feels way too out of place even for AoE2. Also, it already looks like a ruin, it should be painted, then it would atleast look cool.

[mrmagma]

Interesting review. As a resident of the Czech Republic, I certainly can't protest. It should be said straightforwardly that Bohemian castles are closely related to German, Austrian, Swiss, etc., in short, Central European style. Many architects of these castles came mainly from German countries.The Germans were more experienced and skilled in many ways, especially in the beginning, and later the Czechs often surpassed them. So I like this Central European style very much, I consider it to be domestic. Perhaps near every Czech town and village one can find a castle or a ruin of a similar castle. I have to agree with the castles of Western Europe (British Isles, France). They are rather austere and simpler in appearance, although they certainly fulfilled the function as well. Eventually many of them were converted into chateaux, especially in France (castles on the Loire River). I can't comment on the rest of the review as I played the old Age of Empire, now I'm back mainly for Jan Žižka and the Hussites. However, I like that the creators chose a castle typical of each nation. For the sake of interest I'm attaching a link to the pages of other Czech (i.e. Central European) castles, which are also interesting. I like castles with only one distinctive tower, whether Donjon or Bergfried, then various palaces and other towers unevenly and irregularly spaced, lots of defensive elements including machicolations. So again Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Bohemia, Slovakia. Otherwise, as someone with a picture from KCD, you know what I'm talking about.
https://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seznam_hrad%C5%AF,_tvrz%C3%AD_a_z%C5%99%C3%ADcenin_v_%C4%8Cesku

[mickeyjim2]

I won't include all of them, but I will say my favourite is the Central Asian castle, and my 2nd favourite is probably Burgundian, Bohemian and Polish castles in a 3 way tie. Tbh the newer castles will obviously be more detailed than the older ones, but my least favourite is the Middle Eastern one which I think is pretty boring and un-detailed. Western Europe one is my 2nd least favourite for the same reason.

Side note on the stairs in the SE Asian Castle. You may think it looks silly, but I can attest that its pretty accurate. When I was on holiday in Thailand I visited a few Buddhist temples. My God those stairs were brutal.

[Maunomanly]

personally my favourite is the middle eastern, mediterannean and sicilian castle

[Elriadon]

Originally posted by mrmagma:

Interesting review. As a resident of the Czech Republic, I certainly can't protest. It should be said straightforwardly that Bohemian castles are closely related to German, Austrian, Swiss, etc., in short, Central European style. Many architects of these castles came mainly from German countries.The Germans were more experienced and skilled in many ways, especially in the beginning, and later the Czechs often surpassed them. So I like this Central European style very much, I consider it to be domestic. Perhaps near every Czech town and village one can find a castle or a ruin of a similar castle. I have to agree with the castles of Western Europe (British Isles, France). They are rather austere and simpler in appearance, although they certainly fulfilled the function as well. Eventually many of them were converted into chateaux, especially in France (castles on the Loire River). I can't comment on the rest of the review as I played the old Age of Empire, now I'm back mainly for Jan Žižka and the Hussites. However, I like that the creators chose a castle typical of each nation. For the sake of interest I'm attaching a link to the pages of other Czech (i.e. Central European) castles, which are also interesting. I like castles with only one distinctive tower, whether Donjon or Bergfried, then various palaces and other towers unevenly and irregularly spaced, lots of defensive elements including machicolations. So again Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Bohemia, Slovakia. Otherwise, as someone with a picture from KCD, you know what I'm talking about.
https://cs.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seznam_hrad%C5%AF,_tvrz%C3%AD_a_z%C5%99%C3%ADcenin_v_%C4%8Cesku

Oh, I know, that weird orthodox church and those red brick buildings are a disgrace for Bohemians (the latter is something more fitting for the baltics and northern europe), but atleast the castle and wonder fit.

Originally posted by mickeyjim2:

Side note on the stairs in the SE Asian Castle. You may think it looks silly, but I can attest that its pretty accurate. When I was on holiday in Thailand I visited a few Buddhist temples. My God those stairs were brutal.

Yeah, I can believe that for a temple, but such a steep staircase looks silly for a castle. The building looks like some weird temple, the khmer castles I looked at didn't look like this. If you look at the Khmer wonder, which is the Angkor Wat, it looks pretty similar to the SEA Castle. Kinda a similar deal to the NA Castle, except less obvious.