Age Of Empires 3

[ConDor 0]

First words.I've played this game for about a week now, so I think i've gathered enough information to writea good review. If you guys disagree on anything, feel free to post it. This topic is based on anOPINION after all, and more comments make it more objective.First Impressions of the gameAfter being impressed by aoe I&II my expectations of this game were high, as were the doubts.Could this game hold on to the AoE 'feel' with 3d graphics? What about army size? As thesethings cross my mind, the game intro starts. Intro is nice, but not that special, but the music! Itfeels like coming home after being abroad for a few weeks. Age of Empires is back.Then I first see the 'home town' and menu. The graphics are amazing, and I can't wait to startmy first game. Ingame, I find out I should not have worried, the feel certainly is there.GameplayBuilding a base, ageing up, gathering resources, raising an army.. It's all there and has thetypical AoE feel. Like said earlier, it feels like being back home. At the same time it has thenegative part of being back from holidays. Haven't I been here before? I know this stuff! Whatexactly is new? Luckily, there are some nice innovations. You now have a home city, from whichyou can recieve upgrades and units, and grows with you as you gather experience in the game.You have to build a deck of upgrade cards, which makes you make difficult choices. Stronger shipsor more free villagers? Upgraded cannons or a new fort? Also, the alliances you can make withnative Americans are quite nice, but it feels like building a new building instead of an alliance: you getnew units, but apart from that, nothing really changes. The unit limit which is still on 200 is quite annoyingtoo, as it makes you have either a strong economy or a strong army. You can't really have both. In my opinion, gameplay gets 85%GraphicsIn a strategy game, graphics are not that important I think, but this time they are BRILLIANT. The water, for example, riples like it should in full 3d, you can see the fishes swimming below the surface, but the most beautiful thing about it were the reflections. Ships are reflected exactly as they should. Overal detail is very high, not like Rome: Total War, but in the AoE perspective. Having a galleon floating about makes you feel great, as does seeing your armies form lines as they march to the battle. Birds fly, whales swim, and buffalo's walk around, all as they should. Buildings and ships suffer damage, you see parts fall of as they become weaker. All very impressive. The only graphic part I wasnt happy about was the clipping. It's a small thing, but still; seeing ships crashing halfway trough eachother, seeing a train running over my musketeers not hurting anyone.. It makes just that small differance. Graphics get 90%ConclusionThe gameplay is exactly what we are used of in AoE. Nice, addictive, but slighty more-of-the-same. Still, if you like strategy games, you're gonna be busy for hours with this game, wanting to get that one upgrade or decoration for your home city. AoE III might not be the most innovative game, it's still an instant classic.Final score: 9/10

[justjoey 0]

I palyed AOE 2 and i was blwon away, it is by far the best astrategy game i have ever played.. even though i do not undersstand what diffeenrces the different races make other than the alnguage they speak.the atges work well and the incorporated tactics work a treat.. the graphics on my new AOE3 are way btr than AOE2 but thas a gibven, the graphics have improved immensely since the first AOE, but hi do not think the gameplay has changed that much. It has always been a pleasure to play and the enforcement pakcs are a must to buy...

[Jeigh1405241495 0]

I would agree with justjoey. While the game has technically improved an extreme amount, the actual gameplay seems very familiar. I didn't feel the additions really changed anything all that much. To clarify, I haven't played as much as I would like, and plan to give it a second go, so these are just my initial impressions. But I played a chunk of the campaign and a bunch of snadbox skirmishes. The new units and changes to gameplay and the home city all add small variants, but don't make it feel updated enough to be considered a sequel. The reason I didn't play as long as I had hoped was because I had played AoE2 some a month or so before, aso 3 was unable to hold my attention.In the end, it is an amazing game, and anyone who loved AoE2 will love 3, and anyone who hasn't played 2 should try 3 as it is an amazing game by itself. It just felt more like an expansion pack and a graphical facelift then a true sequel. Still, great game though, I don't want it to seem like I hated the game, it just didn't wow me as much as I had expected it would.At least your resource gatherers no longer need to actually run back and forth all the time heh

[rogeruk 0]

Yeap AOE3 just like the other AOE's, the graphics are really good.Not much of an AOE fan but it was addictive to play like hell . Playing online was most fun