A 20 year old legend is rising again!

Age of Empires 2, a game from 1999, is back! It's moving from strength to strength. It already has a streamer among the top in the world (T90Official), just recently concluded its biggest ever tournament (Hidden Cup 3) with over 57,000 peak viewers and a $50k prize pool, has over 30,000 positive reviews on Steam (a quarter of PoE's, from 2013) for its latest rendition (released just a few months ago) and has an active (professional) development team once again delivering monthly updates. And Microsoft is back on board, with a previously released rendition of its predecessor, an upcoming remaster of it successor and the long awaited AoE 4 coming some time down the line. Take comfort milords and ladies, while Blizzard messed up, there remains a beacon of light on the horizon.

The RTS genre is NOT dead!

P.S.: I love the pro scene intros for HC3, such a wholesome community <3 - https://youtu.be/k61d-abXsno

I was never able to get AOE2 running on an OS newer than XP. If I can get my old comp running, there are several things I want to do on it.

"

harddaysnight wrote:

I was never able to get AOE2 running on an OS newer than XP. If I can get my old comp running, there are several things I want to do on it.

That's strange, it works fine for me on Windows 10.

Holy carp. I had so much fun with age games

First there was the chariot laming.

Then there was the Hun laming or the chu ko nu mass that could down towers. god those little guys could melt people's bases like butter. Basically all my end-game armies were 99% bows because they had no penalty vs. buildings or cavalry

Then there was stupid Russia sevastopol fort spam in AOE3. So abusive. Also starring: Portuguese silliness with rangefinder-buffed monitor ships; Sioux canoe spam with siege dance going so you just basically lascannon through entire armadas, because siege bonus applied to all wooden structures, including (and perhaps especially) ships. Honourable mention goes to discovery age mosque rush (Ottomans got early access to spies and assassins this way, which did not have an attack penalty vs. villagers) and the mansabdar infantry rush, stupidly powerful in age 3 given their siege and bayonet upgrades.

This would be perhaps the single biggest motivator for me to upgrade my rig so I could run win10 and install all the remastered and polished age games.

Let's hope they kept the depth and mod-friendliness of the level editors and map editors these games enjoyed. Full conversion mods for LOTR, Napoleonic Era, Triple Alliance, Monster Truck Rally, Pirates of the Caribbean, Clash of the titans, Tower Defence, DOTA, Zelda, you name it someone had made it.

Highlights from the recently concluded tournament (biggest one in its history!) - https://youtu.be/zL2jTVjiI-Q :D

"

Last month, in April, the games’ combined average player count was over 50,000 players. April 12 was the definitive edition’s all-time player peak, and the combined total of the games was 59,995 players. That’s well into the top 150 all-time peak player counts on Steam ... for a 21-year-old game.

The two games generally average higher player counts than popular free-to-play game War Thunder or industry darling Stardew Valley. They’re on-par with the popular action RPG Path of Exile. Their average is nearly as many as perennially popular premium games like Civilization VI or Terraria. Both versions of Age of Empires 2 sit in the top 100 games on Steam, with the Definitive Edition sitting at #25. Combined, however, the Age of Empires community on average pushes up to the #15 spot—or higher, on peak player count days.

<3

https://www.pcgamer.com/age-of-empires-2-is-quietly-having-an-incredible-year/

Ah now if only the next step for Age games was a true 3-D world setting and physics engine...

Remember the ghastly workarounds people used to have to use to create "3-D" tunnels or bridges in AoE3? The mango groves, the pillars of blank cliff texture holding them up, the rice paddies perched on top to disguise the cleft in the ground?

I'd love it to pieces if MS managed to rework even just one of the Age games with a true 3D physics engine. Caves, bridges, dynamite, rail lines, moats, drawbridges, skiffs, deep-draught ships, shallows passable by small craft, dirigibles, submarines, krakens (Age of Mythology anyone?) maybe airplanes. Who knows?

At any rate, going to enjoy watching people feudal rushing al over again.

"

crunkatog wrote:

Ah now if only the next step for Age games was a true 3-D world setting and physics engine...

Remember the ghastly workarounds people used to have to use to create "3-D" tunnels or bridges in AoE3? The mango groves, the pillars of blank cliff texture holding them up, the rice paddies perched on top to disguise the cleft in the ground?

I'd love it to pieces if MS managed to rework even just one of the Age games with a true 3D physics engine. Caves, bridges, dynamite, rail lines, moats, drawbridges, skiffs, deep-draught ships, shallows passable by small craft, dirigibles, submarines, krakens (Age of Mythology anyone?) maybe airplanes. Who knows?

https://youtu.be/TD0V5BfXwBE

Been watching t90 for awhile, he helps makes the AOE community fun.

If you haven't seen the forest nothing videos, you're missing out.
"The legend of FatSlob" heheheh!

Pointy boys unite.

I disagree with crunk.
The isometric graphic are what made it awesome.

"

Exile009 wrote:

"

crunkatog wrote:

Ah now if only the next step for Age games was a true 3-D world setting and physics engine...

Remember the ghastly workarounds people used to have to use to create "3-D" tunnels or bridges in AoE3? The mango groves, the pillars of blank cliff texture holding them up, the rice paddies perched on top to disguise the cleft in the ground?

I'd love it to pieces if MS managed to rework even just one of the Age games with a true 3D physics engine. Caves, bridges, dynamite, rail lines, moats, drawbridges, skiffs, deep-draught ships, shallows passable by small craft, dirigibles, submarines, krakens (Age of Mythology anyone?) maybe airplanes. Who knows?

https://youtu.be/TD0V5BfXwBE

There's no indication in the trailer that I can fly a squad of Stukas over that bridge and gun down the fleeing Franks while totally missing the TK-17 dredging the bottom of the river on its way to nuke my HC.

Isometric graphics are cute I agree. They make for awesome desktop wallpaper.

(NO I don't want to see Age of Empires: World of Tanks/Warships Edition. I have my own beef with Wargaming)