Players manage their armies as well as their land and population, build and lay siege to castles, and generally attempt to crush their enemies.

It was distributed by Sierra On-Line Ltd. in the UK (Windows) in 1997, DMV Daten- und Medienverlag GmbH & Co. KG.

[1] In the Crucial Entertainment CD release of Lords of the Realm, the game came bundled with a 34-page PDF book of England Under Edward 1 written by Jennifer Hawthorne.

A reviewer for Next Generation deemed Lords of the Realm a must-have title for strategy fans, citing the randomized events, genuine challenge, impressive rendered cut scenes, player-controlled battles, and overall diverse gameplay.

[3] In a retrospective review, Michael House of Allgame wrote, "Whatever faults can be attributed to the game's mechanics or contents are almost uniformly minor and in most instances an error of omission.