I've loved Castles II since first playing it back in the 90s, I'm pretty eager to see what the original was like also.
One thing: the game description mentions France, the game is actually set in a fictional generic European country called Bretagne, not France.

Yep me too this is to me the great thing about this site a classic game that needs love to be able to enchant a whole new breed on players.
Only played the 2nd one once and got the " close friend of the king but you remain wondering what if... ending"
But i do recall it being a lot more diplomacy based than the first.
The first one was fantastic and played it too death on the amiga ( so much I had to but it twice due to disc wearn tear)
I seem to remember if you choose the realistic setting you do fight with France like Henry the fifth( dispite the fact the game is based on edwards attempt to subjugate the welsh celts with an agressive castle building program). And you claim Bretagne..which is what France called Brittany just like in real English history ( 100 years war)
( It has been a while so I could be wrong...But I do recall the game does include the famous incident when the king of france sends you tennis balls and you say you will reply in CANNON BALLS!!!!! ( see Henry V for more on this )
You can choose the fantasty setting as well so you get all the dragons and wizards etc and I think that was a little more fun and a little less dry.
About the game for those who have never tried ii.
At its most simplist level you build a castle, buld an army and make sure its stocked with enough food in case of a siege ( once the castle is complete you will AWAYS have a seige attack as they test your castle for weekness).
Survive the siege , and you more on to another area and attempt to do the same. As the game goes on you get attacked by better seige apparatus, like dried pigs ( where used to undermine the walls and make them fall down) and catapults etc.
As the game goes on you will get requests from your other castles usually just send us you troops. ( always a bitch when you send them and a month later you get attacked and your castle is lost)
The battles are not really complex strategy wise, mostly set up archers and maybe send the troops out if things are getting closer to your walls. Nevertheless the can still be exciting if you are forgiving and take into account the ravages of time.
But the real interesting part of the game is the messengers ( which you can turn off...but you do lose a lot of the fun). Every month one person will come and have a talk with you, sometimes these are little things like an acting troop wants to play but one of the cast has been excomunicated, this leads to a choice.
1. Let them all play
2 . Let all but the excomunicated play
3. Tell them all to leave
These choices lead to your standing with the lords, the church and the people.
On the other hand some of the stories can be quite long messanger-wise. For instance the battle with France can be 10 plus messagers. And there is no gurantee they they will come one after the other.
( A good example to show this was the bishops coming to ask if I had let the actor play nearly 2 years after the event)
Overall I think this is one to buy if you like strategy, $5.99 for the first one would be a steal $5.99 for both is a pretty shiny gift.
Had a quick look up and castles 2 is indeed set in Bretagne/ Brittany
[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castles_II:_Siege_and_Conquest]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castles_II:_Siege_and_Conquest[/url]

Definitely looking forward to this. I had it on CD just when CD based games were first coming out. I think it was the gold edition or whatever GOTY thing there was back then for Castles. Great game. Gonna buy it when it is available for sure.

Castles II was quite awesome for its time.
Castles II: Siege and Conquest was from 1992, 1st release on the AMIGA, its older than some people i work with!
i have to disagree with this part of their comments,
its definately not wor 5.99. i saw an orignal copy on ebay about a year ago for $1, thats is exactly how much this old game should be priced at.
its definately a good old game, and i would love to see it re-released on this site, for maybe $2 tops.

well if it did cost $1 I would still have to pay shipping so that would be more than 5.99 for one game ( and it would not run on vista since its old and probbaly dont like new video cards and processers)
Anyway its both games for $5.99..so that just under $3 each ( will you pay the extra dollar!!!!!)
Personally I think the work GOG.com have done to get the bitch running on vista is worth the extra dollar.
To get it running on my computer without farting about with autoexe files and config files
To run at the correct speed without having to cripple my processor
To have the lovely history of castles documentry
yeah I think it is worth $5.99 for both
Its less than a pint of wierd imported weissbeer that I have been known to drink when the moon is full
the whole things a moot point anyway......for $5.99 is what it will cost.

Castles 2 alone is well worth $6.
Anyway, has the game been tweaked to work with XP and Vista natively, or will it be a DosBox release?

I'm sure I visited Bretagne on vacation when i was little...

So could someone clarify something for me?
Castles 1 looks like a straightforward game of building castles, then defending them against sieges, which sounds awesome. However, several reviews I've read say that having a castle makes combat MORE difficult in Castles 2. Could someone clarify whether Catles 2 has straightforward siege combat or not? What are the other differences?
Also, are these games turn based or real time?

Real time combat in both and real time castle building in the first one. (that is you will see the castle being built in front of you in the first one..compared to the 2nd one where you spend more time looking at a large map of NW france making desisions) you could spent tiem watching it being built but your attention is always needed elsewhere.
In the first you only really battle celts and orges ( dependent on if you use the fantasy setting) , while in the second there is a number of factions so you do get more battles as you take more land
From what I remember building a castle in the second one is more to cement your hold on a territory so you rarely do it on the "frount line" where they is battles between rival armies.
And in castles 2 siege combat (attacking) needs all mannor of seige equipment that takes time to make so perhaps more fiddly compared to the first where you ALWAYS are defending the castle.

I've been playing Castles 2 for years, and I think maybe once I've successfully defended a territory from an attack, castle or no castle. When you're attacked, you fight with 50% of your troops, while the enemy invades with his full force.
Also, can anyone answer me on the dosbox issue?

It's DOSbox.

In Castles 2, defense isn't so bad since you gain a bonus to defense. However, your best bet for winning a defending battle is to have a castle with lots of archers (8-10, meaning 4-5 units due to having half your guys). and footmen to take out enemy archers. Also, once Knights become a factor, you'll want to (depending on whether or not they have siege units) place all of your ground units at the fastest-opening breach you'll predict. in otherwords, if there's siege units, place your troops in front of the wall that'll be knocked down. If there's no siege units, place them in front of the doors (invading knights go for doors FIRST).
Really, if you can take out half your opponent's units in a siege before losing, you did your job. Counterattack with knights and you'll usually do quite fine.
To bust down a castle, just bring a truckload of knights and two siege units (catapult and ballista). You won't need the archers as much since you're just going to capture the keep, and archers inside towers are almost invulnerable to arrows (and knights can't reach them, hence footmen to kill them).
The problem with attacking a castle is that it spreads your troops out and leaves them more individually vulnerable. You have a much better chance of wiping out your opponent on open land, especially if you have a good mix of troops (ratio of Infantry/Archers/Knights should be 2/4/4). Infantry take meat-shield damage, knights should arrive RIGHT after the infantry engage enemy knights (so that your knights aren't targeted) and archers should be peppering the enemy right away. To avoid your archers being exposed, all troops should be "compressed" by shoving them towards a boundary (select all of a particular troop, then try to place them at the bottom or top of the screen and they'll pack together).
Basically, weaken your opponent by attacking them on open ground first. Once their troops are decimated, then attack the castle-fortified lands.
Also, be happy, stay happy- happy troops kill more happily.