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Over the last 20 years, these epoch-spanning games have starred more than 50 historical civilizations, sales have surpassed more than 20 million units, and a core fanbase of hundreds of thousands has put hours upon hours into playing one series entry or another on a weekly basis. Age of Empires is one of the most influential strategy games of all time. And far from fading into obscurity, as history is wont to do, Empires is now squarely back in the (games-playing) public consciousness.
[...] I spoke to several of the two dozen or so people who worked on the original Age of Empires about how it was made. I asked them to reflect on the series' triumphs, successes, failures, and legacy. This is a compressed retelling of their many stories, focusing on the early days—the building of the foundations that are so central to both the Age story and each of the Age games—but spanning the full breadth of the series' life
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2018/01/the-age-of-age-of-empires-as-told-by-the-devs-who-built-it/
Long read.
Related: Age of Empires: Definitive Edition adds 4K Resolution, Zoom Levels, Remastered Soundtrack
Microsoft Announces Age of Empires IV
(Score: 1, Troll) by Crash on Tuesday January 09 2018, @07:40PM (9 children)
AoE was shit. WarCraft defined the genre, with unique units and easily discernible buildings. AoE was muddled browns with crap graphics that required clicking on every building again and again just to figure out what it was.
WarCraft: 1994
AoE: 1997
StarCraft: 1998
At some point AoE became half-decent, maybe by the time WarCraft 3 came out.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by DECbot on Tuesday January 09 2018, @09:36PM (3 children)
AoE distinguished itself by having multiple factions, broader resource selection, troop formations, espionage/sabotage, age development mechanics, and the world wonders. To me, it felt like a RTS of Civilization. As for RTS mechanics, yes, it was an iterative advancement over WarCraft 2 and yes, the graphics are not a strong point of AoE, but what games do you replay solely because the graphics were awesome?
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 1) by Crash on Tuesday January 09 2018, @10:42PM (2 children)
Even Dune 2000 played better than AoE -- as you could tell apart the various units and buildings at a glance. YMMV.
I don't replay any game because the graphics were awesome. My favorites being,
CIV IV, Dune 2000, Dark Sun: Shattered Lands, Dungeon Siege I & II, Final Fantasy Tactics, Hexen, King of Dragon Pass, Pool of Radiance, Rise of Nations, Saints Row 3, Titan Quest, Tropico 3|4, Warlords 2 & 3, WarCraft II, StarCraft, plus a couple I've likely forgotten - cuz I'm old.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @11:03PM
I'm pretty sure an experienced AOE player can tell the units apart. Playing many hours of LAN multiplayer certainly helped.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 10 2018, @02:51AM
Damn, now I feel like replaying Dungeon siege 1..and 2.
Pity I don't run Windows at all anymore
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 09 2018, @09:55PM
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_2 [wikipedia.org] is where all the excitement is at!
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday January 09 2018, @10:00PM (1 child)
The article is mostly about AOE1, but also discusses AOE2, Age of Mythology, and AOE3.
AOE2 has aged really well and been improved by 3 modern expansions. Age of Mythology has a new expansion I haven't played yet that adds Chinese Gods. But I did like the game and its graphics hold up. I played AOE3 but didn't really get into it. And now an AOE4 has been announced as well as more definitive editions.
It's hard to beat Starcraft though.
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(Score: 2, Interesting) by Crash on Tuesday January 09 2018, @10:51PM
I picked up AoE II HD, AoE III Complete, and Age of Mythology, on July.04th 2016... haven't found the time nor inclination to play them yet though heh. Such as it goes with huge swaths of one's Steam and GOG libraries.
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Wednesday January 10 2018, @08:59AM (1 child)
Another one for your list:
Total Annihilation: 1997
I haven't had much experience with WarCraft et.al, but TA definitely beats the AoE series in my book.
(Score: 1) by Crash on Wednesday January 10 2018, @05:33PM
Total Annihilation (by CaveDog) was why I even heard about Dungeon Siege (by Gas Powered Games),
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_Annihilation [wikipedia.org]