Age of Empires

Age of Empires
Developer(s)	Ensemble Studios
Publisher(s)	Microsoft Game Studios
Designer(s)	Rick Goodman, Bruce Shelley, Brian Sullivan
Engine
Latest version	{{{version}}}
Release date(s)	1997, 2003
Genre	Real Time Strategy
Mode(s)	Single player, multiplayer (IPX, TCP/IP, Modem or Microsoft Zone)
Rating(s)	ESRB: Teen (T)
Platform(s)	Microsoft Windows), Pocket PC, Nintendo DS Apple Macintosh, Gizmondo
Media	CD (1)
System requirements	P90 MHz CPU, 16MB RAM, 80 MB HD
Input	Keyboard, mouse

Age of Empires, abbreviated to AoE, is a history-based real-time strategy computer game developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft, released in 1997. The game allows the user to play as the "spirit guide," god, or immortal leading a historical tribe or civilization. The game became immensely popular and led to several sequels and expansion packs. The name Age of Empires thus started to refer to the Age of Empires series as a whole, which includes Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings, its expansion pack Age of Empires II: The Conquerors Expansion, and the most recent Age of Empires III. (For more information about the series see Age of Empires series.)

In addition to the following games in the series, there have been many similar games that have used the Age of Empires "through the ages" formula including Empire Earth and Rise of Nations.

Overview

In AoE, twelve civilizations (often referred to as "civs") are available:

• Ancient Egyptians
• Assyrians
• Ancient Greeks
• Babylonians
• Choson (Koreans)
• Hittites
• Persians
• Phoenicians
• Minoans
• Shang (Chinese)
• Sumerians
• Yamato (Japanese)

When the game was first released, the Shang were considered the most powerful civilization: as villagers cost 30% less for them, a skilled player controlling the Shang could make it to the Bronze Age minutes before his competitors. Many players chose to ban the Shang from multi-player games. Interestingly, the official strategy guide claims that the Shang are the weakest civilization in the game (the Yamato are supposedly the best), suggesting that the development team did not realize how powerful it made the Shang.

Like most real-time strategy games, Age of Empires uses natural resources to pay for new units or buildings - gold (trade or mining), wood (chopping trees), stone (mining) and food (hunting, gathering berries, farming, and fishing). The amount of resources collected by a player in addition to the types of buildings they've created allow the player to advance through the ages. In Age of Empires, there are four ages: the Stone Age (Paleolithic), the Tool Age (Neolithic), the Bronze Age and the Iron Age.

While a "single player mode" is available, Age of Empires features online and network play in groups of up to eight players simultaneously. Like other early network games, lag proved to be a problem, as well as being disconnected while in the middle of a game. World tournaments are played regularly to establish the best players.

Technology

Research into various types of technology can allow one civilization to gain advantages (such as better armed and protected units, and stronger buildings with better lines of sight) over competing civilizations.

A major research goal is to allow advances through the ages (stone age < tool age < bronze age < iron age). Researched at the town centers, age advances makes new buildings, units and technologies available. In order to advance from one age to another, two technology buildings from the current age and a considerable amount of resources are needed.

Other research consists of more advanced technologies, which increase the defensive and offensive abilities of units, or the efficiency or strength of buildings. Each research is performed in its specific building, and may require previous technologies to be researched, being only available after a certain age and in some cases, only to certain civilizations.

Units

Archers

• Bowman
• Improved Bowman - upgrades to Composite bowman
• Chariot Archer
• Elephant Archer
• Horse archer - upgrades to Heavy Horse Archer

Infantry

• Clubman - upgrades to Axeman
• Short Swordsman - upgrades to Broad Swordsman, Long swordsman and Legion
• Hoplite - upgrades to Phalanx and Centurion

Cavalry

• Scout
• Chariot
• Cavalry - upgrades to Heavy Cavalry and Cataphract
• War elephant

Siege Weapons

The two types of Siege Weapons, Stone Throwers and Ballista, are designed mainly to destroy buildings, and can do large amounts of damage in one shot. Stone Throwers are even capable of inflicting splash damage.

Stone Throwers are all variants on the Catapult. They can attack a small area, rather than targeting a particular unit or building. The units of this type, in increasing order of effectiveness, are:

• Stone Thrower
• Catapult
• Heavy Catapult

The Stone Thrower is available in the Bronze age, and the Catapult and Heavy Catapult in the Iron age. The Catapult is an upgrade to the Stone Thrower, with a greater range, area of attack, and attack strength. The Heavy Catapult is an upgrade of the Catapult, increasing its hit points and attack strength. The Heavy Catapult was very good against large groups of units, which led to a change in the algorithm behind damage calculation in the 1.5 version - fast units no longer suffered damage from siege weapons, some average-speed units would take damage, and all slow units were hurt. As they are slow, and can only attack units at a distance, siege weapons must be protected by ground troops.

The second type of Siege Weapon is represented by the Ballista. They fire missiles at the enemy, and can hit only one unit or building, rather than a group. Their rate of fire is faster than the Catapults, but they do less damage and have fewer hit points. This family consists of the following units:

• Ballista
• Helepolis

Both are available in the Iron Age. The Helepolis is an upgrade to the Ballista with a greater range and faster rate of fire.

Other units

• Priest

Priests are military units that cannot attack the enemy directly, but can heal friendly units and convert enemy units, adding them to their own army. After researching Monotheism, they can also convert enemy buildings in a similar way. They are very vulnerable to attack, so they must be defended by other units to be effective.

• Villager

Villagers are the backbone of a civilization, as they are the only ones capable of gathering resources (except food, which can also be gathered with Fishing Boats, and gold, which can be earned) and repair buildings and boats. They can fight, but are no match for most enemies. With the Jihad advance, villagers are faster and tougher and deal more damage, but can only gather two units of a resource per trip.

• Ship

Ships can be built at the docks. There are two basic classes: warships and support ships.

• Warships

• Scout Ship - upgrades to War Galley and Trireme
• Catapult Trireme - upgrades to Juggernaught

The Scout Ship and the War Galley initially shoot arrows. When the Trireme upgrade is completed, ballista bolts can be fired. Catapult Triremes fire rocks, which deal more damage but cannot hit nearby units. A successful marine attack depends on both Juggernauts for raw firepower and Triremes to hold off enemies. This is particularly true with the Rise of Rome expansion, which adds the close-range Fire Galley.

• Support Ships

Support ships are non-offensive ships that perform tasks related to the players' economy or logistics. There are 3 classes of Support ships: fishing ships, trade ships, and transport ships.

• Fishing ships provide food for the civilization by fishing in nearby rivers and oceans. To build a fishing boat, a dock must first be built. Upon gathering a full load of fish, the boat returns to the dock to drop off the fish. There are two kinds of fishing vessels in Age of Empires.

• Fishing Boat - upgrades to Fishing Ship
• Fishing Ship - an upgrade of the fishing boat, which is quicker, has more hit points, and can hold more fish.

• Trade ships are ships that allow one civilization to trade with another. They take excess resources from the owner's civilization and exchange them for gold at the dock of another civilization, with more gold being earned the further the ship travels. This has no effect upon the civilization controlling the dock. There are two types of trade ships:

• Trade Boats - upgrades to Merchant Ships
• Merchant Ships

Trade Boats are first available in the Stone Age, and can be upgraded to Merchant ships in the Bronze Age. Merchant ships are faster and stronger.

• Transport ships

Transport ships are ships that can carry units, and artifacts over water. They come in two types:

• Light Transports - upgrades to Heavy Transports
• Heavy Transports

Light Transports are available in the Tool Age, and can carry 5 units and/or artifacts. They can be upgraded in the Iron Age to the heavy transport, which can carry up to ten units and/or artifacts, and are stronger and faster than Light Transports.

Unlike other strategy games where cheats are limited to extend resources or remove the fog of war, Age of Empires also has several cheats which allow a player to use hidden units or enhance regular units. All units created appear next to the newest town center.

Buildings

An Iron Age settlement has been under attack.

Technology

• Academy
• Archery Range
• Barracks
• Dock
• Government Center
• Granary
• Market
• Siege Workshop
• Stable
• Storage Pit
• Temple

Town Center

The Town Center is one of the most important buildings in the game, allowing the production of villagers, advancement through ages, and serving as resource collection stations. Players can only begin with a single Town Center. Building the Government Center in a later age allows a player to build more than one. Town Centers allow the production of villagers, as well advancement between ages. The Town Center can support 4 units, just like a house.

Non Technology

Farms

Farms are buildings that can provide food when villagers are allocated to work there. Eventually farms will go fallow and disappear. Farming production can be increased by researching domestication, the plow, and irrigation.

Houses

Houses are needed to support units. Each house can support 4 units, and new units can only be created if there are enough houses to support them. After a unit is built, it doesn't matter if the house that supports it is destroyed, but if the number of houses is not enough to support the current number of units, more houses must be built before new units can be created. However, there is a population limit set inside the game; if the player reaches a total of 50 units, he can't produce additional units even if there's enough housing. A patch later added the possibility of changing the limit via the command line and the expansion allowed it to be customized before each game.

Walls

Walls are defensive buildings, that prevent units of any civilisation from passing, unless they are destroyed. They come in 3 varieties, in order of increasing strength:

• Small Walls
• Medium Walls
• Fortifications

These are available in the Tool Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age respectively. Medium walls are upgrades of small walls, and fortifications are upgrades of medium walls.

Towers

Towers, like walls, are defensive buildings, but can also fire arrows and later, missiles at nearby enemies. They come in four varieties, in order of increasing effectiveness:

• Watch Towers
• Sentry Towers
• Guard Towers
• Ballista Towers

Watch towers are available in the Tool Age, sentry towers in the Bronze Age, and guard and ballista towers in the Iron age. Sentry towers are upgrades of watch towers, guard towers of sentry towers, and ballista towers of guard towers.

Wonders

Wonders are crowning architectural feats that can potentially win the match in standard or wonder games, and can play a major part in score games. They are the most expensive buildings in the game, requiring several villagers to work together to complete them in a reasonable period of time. They cannot be converted even by monotheistic priests. Each wonder design is unique, some of them based on the seven wonders of the world:

• Egyptians, Assyrians, Sumerians: Pyramids
• Babylonians, Hittites, Persians: Ziggurat
• Greeks, Phoenicians, Minoans: a giant bronze statue of a warrior, possibly based on the Colossus of Rhodes
• Choson, Shang, Yamato: large round Oriental temple, similar to a pagoda, possibly based on the Temple of Heaven

Expansions

In 1998 Age of Empires was followed by the expansion pack Age of Empires: The Rise of Rome Expansion (or simply RoR). It featured four new civilizations (Carthaginian, Macedonian, Palmyran, and Roman), four new technologies (Logistics, Martyrdom, Medicine, and Tower Shield), five new and revised units (Armored Elephant, Camel Rider, Fire Galley, Scythe Chariot, and Slinger) and a new architectural style, as well as some game enhancements such as larger maps and unit queueing.

Sequels

• Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings (AoK) (1999)
• Age of Mythology (AoM) (2002)
• Age of Empires III (2005)

See also

• List of computer and video games by name

External links

• Official website
• Collection of Reviews of Age of Empires
• Fansite
• aoe3 -planet.de: Fansite Age of Empires 3
• Age of Empires III preview
• Unofficial arrangements (ReMixes) of Age of Empires's soundtrack at OverClocked ReMix
• Age of Empires at MobyGames