The transition from one game to the other is seamless. Luckily enough, Empires Apart borrowed its controls and even hotkeys from Age of Empries II. Or maybe not, it all depends on how you manage your resources and use your strenghts wisely. They are nomads (no Mongol castles like in AOE II), so you've got to move your buildings around the map and be aggressive, because if you let your French opponent to get some Templars (deus vult!), you're screwed. Mongols are again a world apart from AOE II. You've got to manage your units correctly, have a ton of priests and also capture enemy prisoners so you can sacrifice them to yoru gods and get additional bonuses. Your military units only evolve if they inflict a certain amount of damage. Instead of doing your usual upgrades, you've got to train your units in the battlefield. You even got trebuchets! So when you go French, you can expect a gameplay similar to AOE II You've got your barracks with the militia and spear lines, an archery range with xbowmen, a stables with light cav, knights (evolving up to paladins) and anti-knight cavalry. The French are the civ that feels the most like AOE II. In Empires Apart, the difference betwen civilizations is way larger. What changes is the tech tree, civ bonuses and unique units. Say, in AOE II you can do trash wars and archer rushes or castle drops with any civ. Moreover, just like in Starcraft, every civ is unique. Have you played Starcraft where you can choose from only 3 civs? Well, Empires Apart takes a similar direction by letting you choose from six civilizations. Empires Appart takes a different approach to this.
I really recommend you playing 1v1 against the AI unless your PC has a good CPU (this game is CPU-intensive).Įdit: it seems that after the latest updates the game now enjoys better performance in larger maps.Īge of Empires offers a huge array of civs to choose from. You choose your nation, your hero, your opponents, etc. There are several to choose from and you might see some similarities with AOE II (Mirage is like Oasis, Great Marsh is like Arabia, etc) Skirmish is your basic Single Player Random Map mode. Again, this mode is an advanced tutorial and it should not be taken as a campaign. IMO, it's a must for those who want to get high in the competitive ladder. The Challenge mode is a great way for you to learn some of the game basics - it teaches you about unit counters and unique abilities. Don't play it in case you don't enjoy it. It's a great way of testing your skills, though many players find it too hard or tedious. The Survival mode can be quite harsh for new players. The tutorial will also let you to experiment with different video settings and find the best compromise between video quality and FPS in case your GPU isn't exactly a GTX 1080 Ti.Īfter you complete the tutorial, you can either go Skirmish or Ranked Multiplayer. Yeah, do the tutorial even if you are an ELO 2000 in AOEII! This game is different. There is a Tutorial, which is what I'd suggest you to start with. The first thing you will see in the game is that it features four game modes.