A lot of things. Most importantly, it is incredibly fun and addictive. We've had the beta for going on three months and we've been hard pressed to stop playing it long enough to review other games. Add to the great gameplay absolutely superb graphics, the most balanced and intelligent economic model we've yet seen, and a truly innovative tech tree that builds on the best of Civilization , and you've got yourself a really amazing game. Sure, Age of Empires is basically a take-over-the-world type game, and yes, it has a problem or two that's still hanging around in the retail release, but those cease to matter quickly once you're five minutes into the game.
You begin with only a tribal council fire and three villagers and must learn where to hunt and fish, gather wood and stone, and mine for gold. Once you have built a basic economy, you can begin expanding your village and researching new technologies that will eventually enable you to irrigate farms, smith iron and steel weaponry, perfect masonry for your city walls and educate your military cadets into deadly legions.
Along the way, you'll have to deal with wild animals, famine, enemy raiders, and a vast map full of uncharted territories. What immediately impresses, though, is not simply the richness of the world and of the work that went into all the intricacies this game offers, but rather the immersive experience of playingAOE. You know those games that you load up "just for a minute" to check out the demo and end up looking up at the clock at 3 a.
This is one of those. First, because you play the game through four different ages stone, tool, bronze and iron , each of which must be reached by accumulating various resources and proving your prowess by building the staple structures of a civilization for a given age.
But don't worry, this doesn't take hours -- once you've learned how to coordinate your resource gathering and construction processes, you'll progress quite quickly. And with each new age achieved, you gain new technologies, buildings, unit types and defensive options. This makes for an RTS experience unlike any other game out there. Sure, other games let you "upgrade" certain units or give access to new units with the construction of a given combination of structures, but none ask for the sort of coordinated thought and strategy that Age of Empires requires.
In a fast-paced multiplayer game, the decision to expend resources toward advancing to the next age vs. If your Neanderthal opponent shows up with a couple dozen club-wielding goons while you're getting enlightened, you're history. But advance your civilization and gain the wheel, advanced ballistics, and engineering knowledge, and those cavemen will be no match for your catapults led by Ben-Hur and his well-armed charioteers.
Second, consider the fine interplay between various resources in AOE: instead of simply mining some abstruse material spice by any other name , Age of Empires requires that you gather wood, food, stone, and gold. Neglect any one of these and you will lose. To win, you will need to send your villagers out to explore the map and secure the best gold and stone deposits with military units and guard towers.
Then you'll need to decide what balance to strike between your hunters and gatherers and your military units -- AOE adds in the additional stricture of a population limit there have been many gripes about this in the newsgroups, but over the course of playing the game better than 30 times, I can tell you that it is not only fair, but adds an excellent additional condition to the strategies within the game.
Now I admit, there have been numerous occasions late in a heated multiplayer battle when I sent a squad of idle miners out to have a lunch date with the local lions, or had them wander a bit too close to an enemy guard tower so that I could crank out a couple more triemes or catapults back at the base, but this too adds to the skill needed to be an adept commander. Finally, the absolute best aspect of the gameplay in Age of Empires is the vast number of options you have as a player.
For one thing, you can set several different victory conditions other than simple conquest. This is not just a game of conquest, which is perhaps what confuses some of its detractors -- yes, it is first and foremost a military strategy game, but it is incredibly rich in its economic and technological model, even to the point of actually drawing on the historical aspects and abilities of the twelve distinct cultures represented in the game. This is not a section you will usually see in our reviews, but there will no doubt be a host of flames from those who think I'm either sucking up to Microsoft or completely off my rocker, or both.
So here's what's wrong with the game, or at least the accusations I've heard:. Bad path finding AI: yes indeed, your average woodcutter is, in fact, dumb as the stumps he leaves behind. In fact, sometimes he'll sit on one and do nothing until you find him and send him off to the next chore. And sure, your chariots will get stuck in a narrow gap between houses in your village if you build 'em too close to the stables or don't leave a good exit path through town. Word is, there's a patch in the works to help correct this where it's actually a coding problem and not a symptom of bad urban planning on the player's part , but do you know of a single other RTS game that doesn't have slightly clueless units?
That's why your troops need a good commander to inspire them. Age of Empires is the inheritor of some of the same excellent ideas from both those titles, but is itself a striking innovator in ways that neither of the earlier generation of strategy titles managed to achieve. The population limit sucks; you can't really build an empire: play a few multiplayer games, then revisit that idea. Would you really like to have 3, units on each side? Games would take forever to complete and there would be zero strategy besides a simple race to the resources and a blitzkrieg mentality.
There are enough one-dimensional slugfest titles on the market. Can't build an empire? Well, true, not in the Civilization sense, but then a multiplayer game of Civilization was the sort of thing that most of us haven't had the spare time for since, say, junior high.
Bottom line: you can't satisfy all the people all the time, but you can definitely tick off the more reactionary elements by not having your marketing department include the disclaimer "Caution: some people might not like this game.
Every tree, rock, bird, and bush is beautifully rendered; the mane on a charioteer's horse ripples in the wind, a lone eagle soars overhead, pausing every few seconds to flap its wings, and the villagers struggle under the weight of the loads of wood and stone they carry back to the village.
There are times, in fact, when you will simply stop to marvel at the realism that was crafted into this game. Age of Empires will stand as the high-water mark for all RTS titles that follow in many categories, but the graphics are without question unmatched. If you doubt this, I encourage you to visit Microsoft's Web site and see the animations and renderings for yourself.
During the Years War campaign, players will defend France, turn the tide of war, and forge the foundations of the French nation. Playing as the Rus and their iconic leaders, players will battle the relentless brutality of the Mongol invasion, unite allies and foes, and force a change of fortune — from subjugation to independence.
Under the unifying rule of Genghis Khan, warring Mongolian tribes came together and forged the largest contiguous land empire the world has ever known. What the Mongols lacked in resources, they made up for with tactics, martial skills, and adaptation. The Mongol campaign takes players through the thunderous rise of this awe-inspiring empire. To start their empires, players will need to explore the world around them to locate essential resources.
Guide your empire through the ages, and when the time is right, strike your enemies with the full force of your empire, claiming victory! Insiders unlock access to exclusive news, updates, and opportunities to provide feedback about future releases.
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