20 years ago, Command & Conquer and Red Alert occupied computer rooms large and small, and soon after, the emergence of Age of Empires broke their "monopoly", which was a relatively novel RTS game at that time, and some of its concepts such as classes, resources and victory concepts were different from the popular RTS games on the market at that time.
Shortly thereafter, RTS games mushroomed, from the popularity of "StarCraft" to the domination of "Warcraft 3", before MMO became the top player in the PC game market, this single-player RTS game with online functions was more sought after by domestic players than the more popular FPS games in Europe and the United States.
Screenshot of the original Age of Empires game
However, with the advent of the Internet era, the PC has gradually become a dedicated platform for major online games, and the MMO with low cost of getting started and can bring more sense of achievement has gradually replaced the once brilliant unlimited RTS games, and the closed body environment, difficult to master, etc. has been its biggest traffic and selling point, and under the change of the times, it has become a shadow that RTS games cannot get rid of.
Nowadays, compared to the wide variety of games on the market, RTS games have undoubtedly declined, and in this history of the rise and fall of RTS, the Age of Empires series is like a sailboat, sailing on the sometimes calm and sometimes turbulent sea. From the blockbuster of Age of Empires 1 by Ensemble Studios, to the best of the series, Age of Empires 2, to Age of Empires 3, which has not met Bóraer, the content, systems and features of the two previous generations have been combined, but unfortunately they have not gained a sense of existence comparable to their quality.
Screenshot of Age of Empires 3 game
Just three years later, the full studio that produced the Age of Empires series was shut down by its parent company, Microsoft, and Microsoft Games' strategic focus was on its own console platform, which has been fully focused to this day.
But in fact, Microsoft did not give up the PC, "Age of Empires 4" re-landed on the PC after 16 years, appeared in front of our eyes, perhaps this is not the renaissance of RTS games, but this bottle of old wine containing the "history of civilization" still smells as fresh and mellow as it was then.
Developed by The Mine Society and published by Xbox Game Studios (formerly Microsoft Studios), the game landed on Steam on October 28, with Chinese Simplified support. According to Steamdb statistics, a total of 1211 players have commented, of which 226 are bad reviews, the praise rate has reached 81%, and the current national price is 248 yuan.
In terms of media, IGN gave a higher 9 points, and Metacritic also gave a positive score of 82 points.
The collision of classic and modern
Microsoft has found Relic Entertainment, a well-known RTS developer in the industry, to produce "Age of Empires 4", which shows that Microsoft is full of sincerity this time. The works of the Mine Society from the original "Homeland" series, "Warhammer 40000: Dawn of War" series, and then to the war theme of the "Company of Heroes" series are well received by players, there are not many works, but all of them are "elite soldiers".
"Age of Empires 4 is a generation for all players, offering a delightful gaming experience for novice players, including a tutorial system designed to learn the best of real-time strategy games, and a specially designed campaign story mode that makes it easy for novice players to set up and win." The developer says.
"Age of Empires 4" gameplay and operation methods are not much different from the previous three generations, for old players do not even need to adapt to time to get started quickly, and for new players who have not been exposed to the "Age of Empires" series or even RTS type games, they can still rely on the first battle in the main line "Normans (English civilization)" to familiarize themselves with and understand the entire game, this 10-level single-player campaign is called a nanny-level tutorial, from pointing to unit selection, collection, to the restraint rules of the class and the construction of troops and command operations. It is a very comprehensive introduction to all the actions that a player might use in a game.
Although Age of Empires 4 doesn't have the complex systems and mechanics of Civilization VI, players who have experienced the campaign will understand the richness of the game's content. The existing battle scripts in the game include four major scripts: "Norman", "Hundred Years' War between England and France", "Mongol Empire" and "Rise of Moscow", all of which add up to 35 levels.
In addition, "Age of Empires 4" also prepared a very solid documentary for the players who opened the battle as the end, in which the film is very detailed about weapons, armor, national habits, etc., and even players can see the corresponding experts and scholars to introduce and explain, which provides very convincing evidence for the advancement of the entire game campaign.
The game begins in 1066 with the Battle of Hastings, the key battle between Harold, the new Anglo-Saxon king, and William, Duke of Normandy, which lasts until the Second Battle of Lincoln in 1217, during which the player will participate as witnesses in the famous battle, and the game's prominent mission logos and clear Chinese voice guidance help players become familiar with the game in a short period of time.
Although the picture quality does not surprise the player, the basic functions of the game's more "modern" 3D environment are all available: for terrain with height differences, the unit speed will decrease when moving higher, the range and field of vision of the long-range troops placed by the player at a high place will increase, the troops in the shade will not be easily discovered by the enemy, and so on. The physical collision effect between units and the determination of weapon damage are calculated very finely.
Balance and diversity win the game
In the current version of Age of Empires 4, there are 8 factions for players to experience, and although these 8 factions have different development directions in the later stages of the game, they are generally more balanced. Perhaps in order to take care of the game experience of new players and give old players "make-up lessons", Age of Empires 4 occupies a certain advantage in the actual game, such as the English forces, which can build stone walls very early, and in the absence of siege equipment in the early stage, it is difficult for the basic classes of AI to cause effective damage to Stone City, and arrow towers can effectively slow down the rhythm of enemy attacks, which is friendly to many novice players who do not know enough about the game system.
This set the stage for Age of Empires' three ways of triumph. There are still three ways to win in the game, the first is the traditional "conquest", which simply means to destroy all the enemy landmarks on the map; the second is "spectacle to win", after the world wonder is repaired, the player needs to ensure that it is not destroyed within 10 minutes, and once the spectacle is completed, the enemy will launch an onslaught on it; the third is that the player sends monks to occupy all the holy places on the map, they will be randomly distributed on the map, and the enemy can also retake it after being occupied by the player.
Slow pace, abundant resources, and diverse winning conditions give Age of Empires 4 players a more free gaming experience: they can build tightly knit walls and dense arrow towers to "wrap the town into rice dumplings" and then build a spectacle in the central area to win; they can also quickly train feudal era (second-stage civilization) troops to quickly defeat those silently developing opponents by cutting off their resource supply chains, and "conquer" to win.
The era of RTS has long passed, and having the courage to finish an RTS and put it on the market is a thing worth encouraging, and "Age of Empires 4" is undoubtedly one of the most historical themes in recent years, the potential of its game content is still outstanding, although the current variety of civilizations is not much, the picture quality has not been much improved, but it is not hidden, it carries the banner of "Empire", and finally becomes the "Age of Empire" that many old players are looking forward to.