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AoE3 is amazing. Pretty much all I can say - great graphics, great music, great intensity in the battles, everything's awesome. The Home City feature is also quite fascinating.

The gameplay is nowhere near where it should be. Why the homecity? Why are you looking for treasure? WC3. 50 trillion man hours into coding the graphics engine, they decided they'd start working on the gameplay. The result was a complete mess that is only enjoyable for the first 30 minutes, after which the graphics get old. I regret buying it as well.

Ichbinian - Thanks, I agree that the graphics are amazing, but that�s not the role of a RTS game, I don't buy AOE, or AOM or WC3 because of graphics, I buy it for the strategy, the planning and execution of the plan. The graphics detract from the game in my opinion; I have an ok machine, it�s a 2ghz machine with a 128 mb graphics card, and the units move jerkily at times during a battle, I think this is due to the extreme graphics (I�m going to play with the options and see if that fixes it), but AOM didn�t have that problem, and it didn�t need to have the extreme graphics of this game.

Also the UI stinks, it�s harder to select specific items (like I try to select trees or animals while my peons are gathering them, and I can�t (as easily) select them to see how much of that item is remaining)�little things like that.

I quite like the UI. If you learn the hotkeys it'll be better. But the small maps erk me.

I like the good graphics, but it's not what I bought it for. I bought it because of the features is advertised and the name of the series. The first two games were awesome, so why couldn't AoE3 be? That's what I thought, and I really like the game.

I'm not really in a position to comment AoE3 because I have only played it for a cople of hours at friend's place, but I must say that I don't like it. There's nothing specific I can point a finger at, it's the general feeling of the game. AoE3 has no soul, IMHO. Thus I'm sticking with AoK.

It just didn't have the same special touch as AoK, so whilst I could spend hours on AoK, I only spent a short while on Aoe3, and get bored of it quite quickly. AoK is miles better.

I utterly disliked AoE3 when I just started playing the demo, because I still prefered AoE and AoK.

However, after a few more months, I tried AoE3 again last week, and I think it's rather special in its own way. Definitely, it's not the same as good ol' AoE/AoK anymore (then again, what's the point of having a revamped version of those games?), but the new features offer different styles of gameplay and vastly different strats to try out.

I really wouldn't mind adding it to my collection of games if I had the time to play...

well, i played aoe, ror, aok, aoc for a very very long time, since they came out when i was a little kid, and still play the conquerors alot when i have time. These games were the best ever made IMO, although Aom was a notch down. Last christmas i bought aoe3, and the graphics amazed me. the scenery is beautiful, and by all means it is a great game. However the gameplay is not comparable to AoK. whereas i would give AoM 5.0/10, titans 5.5/10 (which is ok), ror would get 9.1 and the conquerors 9.9. Aoe3 would probably get something like 7.8 because of the really good animation, but besides that, there really isn't that much to it. I hated the whole home shipments idea, it ruined the original gameplay of the age of empires series.

[This message has been edited by kasimoto (edited 04-24-2006 @ 10:33 AM).]

edit: if you like cool graphics, go for aoe3. But if you prefer strategy, gameplay, playability, rush and get a copy of AoK if you've never got one before they stop making them.

I agree that AoK is better, it's just more fun. But AoE3 is a top notch game. It's more intense than AoK (what with the guns, the sounds, music) which is great because I love intensity in games. I love the Home City idea, and the shipments and decks you can build, and the explorer unit is nice too, because he can't die. I think the gameplay is just great too, plus the graphics and music makes it an awesome game. ES delivered, IMO.

Quote:

They put the Home City feature to make the game more fun and historically realistic.

Afterall, the theme of the game is based on imperialism, and if you look at it from a historical perspective, when a bunch of colonisers need assistance/supplies/reinforcements from their own home country they request it off them, when they have it available in supply. This action translated to gameplay is the Home-City in your AoE3!.

As for whether it made the game more fun, I'll leave that up to you guys.

[This message has been edited by General Marcus (edited 04-30-2006 @ 05:42 AM).]

I liked it overall. I'll always prefer AOK to any other RTS, but that's just my personal bias. The Home City page took some getting used to, but I can live with it. Since I got my new PC, I have a new appreciation for the game now that I can play it with some form of good performance.

AoE3 is also great for playing multiplayer. I almost exclusively play online.

Aoe3 is an amazing game, the second best RTS iv'e ever played(Second only the the Rise of Legends demo). For an age fan such as my slef I was glad to see that it greatly simplified and sped up the gameplay but most shockingly in spite of the simplifacation , a great deal of strategy was added.

I didn't really like it. The graphics were unimpressive, the interface too complicated and the gameplay merely ordinary. It certainly failed to draw me in like AOK did.

I hated it. IMO, AoK had much better gameplay and much better music (I really don't understand the people who say AoE3 music is better. Am I the only one who's ever stuck my AoK CD into a CD player just to listen to the music?).

With AoE3, I get a game that forces me to use an incredibly close view (unless I'm missing something), uses much more system resources, allows only two teams per game, and completely lacks a scenario editor and custom scenario support. I also dislike ESO2.

AoK is just a much more fun multiplayer experience.

As to where AoM ranks in the equation, I'd say below AoE3.

gaming discussions is not for AOE!!!!

There is an AOE heaven site off of heavengames!!

Since when was AoE not considered a game?

Anyone looking at a site dedicated to AoE3 is a AoE3 fanboy and thus not able to give an opinion on the game that isn't biased. The main site would obviously offer more of a diverse, subjective crowd.

[This message has been edited by PoinT (edited 04-28-2006 @ 03:46 PM).]

So what are gaming discussions for, Mahamotii?

And Findiil, just to point that out.

It's a bit better than AoM, but still below AoE and AoK.The homecity feature is interesting, and i love it that ships dont take up population, but i miss having 18 differnet civs to play with more than just a 1 or 2 bonuses. The small maps alos piss me off a bit.

But if you're an age fan, at least give it a few tries, it is an ok game...

I was throughly un-impressed with it. Not having any army formation buttons really turned me off from the start. The home city concept was cool at first, but the bonuses you get to buy is crap like "receive 10 of this unit" type of stuff wasn't what I was looking for. I was looking foward to customizing my techs and units.

I also loathe that ES used the weak wall system from AOM. Having a seige weapon bust through a fully upgraded wall in just seconds really didn't enthrill me. Don't forget the asanine graphics requirements, low civ count, and the whole "keycode" crap which prevents 1 disk multiplayer.

It seems that too much enphasis was on graphics and not enough was on ballancing or fun gameplay. I'll stick to TC for my strat needs still.

Personally, I love AoE3. I never got to play AoK online because the Zone never worked for me.

AoE3 is the new style of RTS. I perfectly understand why many do not like it, it does take getting used to. The home cities, treasures, explorer, trading posts, cards, and batch troops are odd at first, but it does have decent gameplay IMO. I would like others to further their opinions on why it is not good. No strategy? Not competitive? I believe since the Zone will no longer support AoK, AoE3 may become more popular and the competitiveness will soar.

Another possibility it is not popular is people may not have the computers to run it. The graphics are stunning with a proper graphics card (which I do not have, but am planning to get ). The amount of things you can do in the game requires micro. First off, you must choose the proper deck and make sure you use cards that came be used to its highest effectiveness, second you must explore with your explorer gathering treasures to get a leg up on your opponent, possibly make a tp and getting to age 2.

Others may not like it because of leveling up home cities. They want to play an RTS, not something where you need xp and gain levels. However, this can be fun. Reaching the key level 25 is rewarding.

Ok, now I�m ranting, and may be slightly biased since I mod at AoE3H ^_^, it is worth getting if you like the Age series, plus the Xpack is coming out with p[layable native civs, which will add a whole new dimension and level of gameplay to AoE3.