Shampoo-Girl's Full Review: Age of Empires 2: Age of Kings for Windows
Microsoft's Age of Empires 2 ( or AOK ) has long been considered to be the pinnacle of the RTS gaming world alongside other equally deserving titles as Blizzard's Starcraft. Like many other hugely successful titles before it, the emergence of clones should come as no surprise. AOK is a huge improvement over its now ancient-looking predecessor, featuring superior graphics & sound. In spite of all these upgrades though, there are still several flaws which tend to limit the game's overall playability. Among them include a somewhat low-set population limit of 200. Further details on the issue will be discussed in the gameplay section below. As with most of my other reviews, graphics is always the first on the agenda.
Graphics
Veterans of the original Age of Empires will find the graphics in AOK to be more than just simple eye candy; some of them might even start drooling over their keyboards after seeing how detailed the buildings & units are compared to the ones in its prequel. The structures you get in AOK are comparatively larger & more refined. The detail in the landscape is rich & nicely laid out. Each of its 13 civilizations sports a unique style of architecture; you get to see nice old English castles while playing the Britons & ornate looking Oriental palaces when playing the Chinese or Japanese. The ships, though nicely drawn tend to look a little off at times. I often compare them to the more richly detailed ones found in Cossacks European Wars, from which those in AOK look as if they could use a little brushing up. Overall grade: B+
Sound
Perhaps the biggest complaint with AOK lies with its rather lowly sound department. Although AOK has a huge vocab derived from the speech of each one of its 13 civilizations, the effects you get during an actual game is somewhat sparse. The music replays itself over & over again, giving the player a bit of a monotonous feel. Additionally, the in-game tunes aren't as catchy as the ones you get in Cossacks. Almost all the tunes have somewhat of a mellow medieval flavor, which some might consider a nice touch while others like me would opt for something a little more upbeat. Overall grade: C-
Gameplay
As mentioned in the first paragraph, a list of nifty improvements does not make AOK a perfect game. There are still several issues that require some attention. While most may feel comfortable with the newly set 200 unit population limit, others might still complain that it's a little too low to mount a decent offensive. The lowly set population limit prevents players from building large armies & engaging in massive invasions as seen in titles like Cossacks. A squad of 150 isn't going to do much compared to say an army of 2000 or more. This is why most campaigns in AOK tend to drag on for days without an end in sight.
AOK does require a moderate level of micro management. Farms do not rejuvenate so you'd have to rebuild them every now and then after they get exhausted. This can be a bit of a pain, especially when you're engaged in a seige against an enemy. Being told you're out of food halfway during a heated battle is not something you'd want to experience. The player is then faced with a dilemma on whether to leave the scene of battle ( thus risking his troops ) to go plant some crops, or continue on. The AI can be surprisingly strong at times making you wonder if the CPU is actually cheating behind your back. Then again you could always cheat back by typing in special keywords in the chat-box. One such cheat even allows you to build yourself a souped up Shelby Cobra complete with twin machine guns to mow down those annoying little invaders.
The tactics employed by the CPU controlled opponents can be a little tricky at times. A favorite method of deception would be to falsely petition for an alliance in an attempt to buy some time then stabbing you in the back after building itself a fairly large army. There is an option at the start of the game where you are able to pick your teams & enemies. If you're playing a 6 player game, you may adjust sides according to your preferences; it can be 2 against 4, 3 against 3 or maybe 5 against 1.
The campaign editor is a cool feature that allows you to create your own scenarios & campaigns. Creating a custom campaign may take up sometime but it's well worth the effort once you've beaten every one of the pre-set in game scenarios. Overall grade: B
Conclusion
AOK is one title no RTS fan should be without. It's definitely worth checking out if you're a fan of the original AOE or others like Starcraft. The game works fine on higher end processors so you might want to make sure to have at least something over 600 Mhz for it to run smoothly. Believe me, you don't want to be running this based on its minimum system requirements. Used copies may be found at most major online auctions for a fraction of their original retail. Final Grade: B
Age of Empires II Gold Edition unites the exciting game play of both Microsoft Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings and Age of Empires II: The Conquero...More at Newegg.com
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