Age Of Empires / Age Of Mythology

[jeffnz 23]

I played the first AOE when I was 8 so I don't really know what it was about, besides laser infantry and nuke troopers. I played AOM around 2010/2011 that was pretty cool. The way stuff takes ages to build makes it quite different from CnC. Also, building a wonder for victory - yay! Did any of you play all the games as they were released? I was too young and stupid. I don't know anything about AOE II or how it differed from the original.

[Plok 320]

I don't know anything about AOE II or how it differed from the original.

AoE2 was set in the Middle Ages (up to the age of colonization in the Conquerors expansion) instead of ancient periods, and had a somewhat faster gameplay. AoE3 went into the New Age, throughout the colonization of the Americas and a little beyond that.

[TaxOwlbear 20]

AOE2 is still popular considering its age (no pun intended) and has an active community. It did in fact get an expansion with African civilisations only a couple months back.

[Plok 320]

AOE2 is still popular considering its age (no pun intended) and has an active community. It did in fact get an expansion with African civilisations only a couple months back.

A whole year ago, actually. A Southeastern Asian civilization expansion was released less than a month ago.

 

All this for the HD re-release, of course, made by the Forgotten Empires team.

[Stygs 25]

Yeah, AoE2 was (and still is) a great game.

Its gameplay is fun and the highly detailed 2D sprites have aged far better than the low res 3D games from that time.

Also an great campaign and a map editor that is simple, yet offers TONs of options. Quite possible the first game aside from the CNC series that got me interested in mapping and modding.

 

My only problem with the current steam version is the low res intro and the controlls as I cant seem to find/memorize a lot of hotkeys... But that seems to be a common problem for old games. xD

 

 

I remember playing AoE1 long ago (a while after the Conquerors addon for AoE2 was released) and beeing disappointed by its grafics (Aoe2 was really a big step forwards), but the gameplay was good.

 

Also got AoE3 on steam, but I dont think I ever played it.

Edited January 8, 2017 by Stygs

[jeffnz 23]

Yeah, AoE2 was (and still is) a great game.

Its gameplay is fun and the highly detailed 2D sprites have aged far better than the low res 3D games from that time.

Also an great campaign and a map editor that is simple, yet offers TONs of options. Quite possible the first game aside from the CNC series that got me interested in mapping and modding.

 

Even AOE 1 had some type of scenario editor, at the very least you could make custom maps.

 

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In Age Of Mythology I believe it is possible to get into the Mythic Age in about 15 minutes but it leaves you in a bad state with poor defences and a poor economy. The economy of AOM was fantastic: if you were Norse you needed wood (mainly) and if you were Egyptian you needed gold to be your main resource. It was easy to unbalance things.

 

A friend in one of my past jobs didn't like any RTS that was "too futuristic". I think that 'futuristic' would describe most RTS games

 

Hey I just remembered there was something called Rise Of Nations and there was another one that I forgot the name of. Did any of you play those non-AOE titles extensively? I was in my mid-teens at the time and I struggled with Tiberian Sun. We had 3 neighbours next door (all male children) and the eldest one was quite nerdy, he hated first-person shooters but was a fan of Sins Of A Solar Empire (a game I know by name only).

Edited January 9, 2017 by jeffnz

[Stygs 25]

I think the other one was Empire Earth, basicly AoE with more ages and in 3D.

 

Never played EE or RoN (aside from the demos in some gaming magazines back in the day), as I kinda liked the medieval setting and later switched to Medieval: Total War. And frankly the scope of that game just made anything else seem boring in comparission.

[jeffnz 23]

Yes that's the one ... my neighbours had Empire Earth

 

Empire Earth is a 2001 real-time strategy video game developed by Stainless Steel Studios and released on November 23, 2001. It is the first game in the Empire Earth series.

The game requires players to collect resources to construct buildings, produce citizens, and conquer opposing civilizations. Empire Earth spans 500,000 years of world history, which is divided into 14 epochs, beginning with the prehistoric age, and ending with the nano age.

------------------------------

Rise of Nations is a real-time strategy computer game, developed by Big Huge Games and published by Microsoft Game Studios on May 20, 2003. The development of the game was led by veteran game designer Brian Reynolds, of Civilization II and Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. The game has taken several concepts from turn-based strategy games such as territories and attrition warfare. Rise of Nations features 18 civilizations, playable through eight ages of world history. It is consistently ranked and considered to be one of the greatest real-time strategy games of all time.

 

There's a non-commercial RTS called 0 A.D. but it's probably full of bugs, they're on Alpha 21 - not a release candidate. Their latest trailer has 40,000 hits on Youtube, the video was published in November 2016 (promising!)

 

Eventually we may reach a time where an AOE game can be produced entirely by volunteers.

[Gben 20]

Not heard of 0 AD, will bookmark and check out later.

[jeffnz 23]

Besides 0 A.D. there is also an engine called Spring RTS, games for this engine are referred to as Spring RTS games. Example:

 

 

^ This particular game based on Spring isn't pretty, but then again, people who create graphics for this probably aren't using Maya for their 3D stuff. Here's the trailer for Spring RTS which shows sky, terrain and water detail. It's really good for something that's made from scratch:

 

[jeffnz 23]

*bumpity-bump* I've got 0 A.D. running in Windows but in Linux it crashes upon launch. I posted on their forum so hopefully they can point me in the right direction

 

https://wildfiregames.com/forum/index.php?/forum/145-help-amp-feedback/

 

I'm also going to try Battle For Wesnoth again, which is turn-based strategy (don't diss haha). Unfortunately Wesnoth's campaign is unbalanced, much like CnC 3 after the multiplayer patches. I'm going to see if I can make the difficulty settings in Wesnoth more reasonable for the player.

[Plok 320]

From this year's E3:

http://www.forgottenempires.net/age-of-empires-definitive-edition

The short story:

• Age of Empires 1 with the Rise of Rome expansion
• Overly fancy, completely new graphics with a Classic mode that switches the "1997 experience"
• Rebalanced gameplay (wonder if they checked the UPatch balancing list)
• Revamped UI
• Windows 10 exclusive with Xbox Live multiplayer (FFS, where's their less-than-perfect Steamworks support for AoE2HD and AoMEE when you need it?)

[Plok 320]

Turns out Adam Isgreen, former Westwood Studios employee, is the creative director at Microsoft Studios!

 

[Banshee 28]

If this game isn't restricted to Windows Store, I'm gonna buy it.

[Plok 320]

2 minutes ago, Banshee said:

If this game isn't restricted to Windows Store, I'm gonna buy it.

Sadly, it is.

[Banshee 28]

No Steam? Ahhh, too bad!

[jeffnz 23]

I'm listening to a sound track from the game right now. I don't remember this tune from when I was eight years old. If anything, it reminds me of cheesy music from Runescape!

[Plok 320]

Good news: Age of Empires IV is announced.

 

Bad news 1: it's being done by Relic Entertainment.

Bad news 2: fucking Windows store.

Bad news 3: AoE2 Definitive Edition and AoE3 Definitive Edition confirmed. Also Windows Store. Age of Mythology apparently ignored, this time probably for the better.

 

Wouldn't want to be in Isgreen's shoes.

[Banshee 28]

Weird... Age 2 already has a HD edition, doesn't it?

Anyway, Bad News 2 and 3 should actually be called Terrible News 2 and 3 respectively.

I don't know if Relic Entertainment is really a bad news, to be honest. I've played a couple of Warhammer 40k games in the past and I haven't seen anything bad with it.. although C&C, Starcraft and Age of Empires games are much better indeed.

I'm actually wondering which era Age Of Empires will actually cover. The trailer gives us no tips whatsoever.

Edited August 22, 2017 by Banshee

[jeffnz 23]

The release will be interesting to spectate (I won't rush to buy it, I'll see what others say first)

What is so terrible about Windows Store? I searched online and people were saying (a few years ago) that Windows Store "wasn't ready yet". I don't see how it can be worse than Steam DRM and GOG Galaxy.

I hope that AOE turns out alright. I'd like an RTS that isn't based on rushing.

[Plok 320]

5 hours ago, Banshee said:

Weird... Age 2 already has a HD edition, doesn't it?

But Windows Store and new graffics guise

 

5 hours ago, Banshee said:

I don't know if Relic Entertainment is really a bad news, to be honest. I've played a couple of Warhammer 40k games in the past and I haven't seen anything bad with it.. although C&C, Starcraft and Age of Empires games are much better indeed.

They've been less of an RTS company since Dawn of War II and Company of Heroes 2, and their latest MOBA-inspired Dawn of War III failed spectacularly.

 

1 hour ago, jeffnz said:

What is so terrible about Windows Store?

It's a poorly made and unmanaged piece of crap, full of fake mobile apps and barely any proper ones. MS is now trying to push it because it's theirs, despite a good portion of computer users are still on Windows 7 and 8.1.

[jeffnz 23]

Well that sucks. I guess it's nothing new for Microsoft: Halo 2 PC only available on Vista etc etc (back in the day)

[Plok 320]

5 minutes ago, jeffnz said:

Halo 2 PC only available on Vista etc etc (back in the day)

Except there was a workaround to run on XP.

[Banshee 28]

6 hours ago, Plokite_Wolf said:

It's a poorly made and unmanaged piece of crap, full of fake mobile apps and barely any proper ones. MS is now trying to push it because it's theirs, despite a good portion of computer users are still on Windows 7 and 8.1.

Yea, that and it forces (meaning: does not allow you to remove) several stupid junk (Bing, Grove, XBOX useless stuff) from Microsoft that comes with your Windows 10, redownloading it without your authorization if you manage to remove it). For this reason, Windows Store is simply a big no here.

[jimmypham3875 0]

Just missed this game. Aoe 2, or 1,.