The new Age of Empires "Game"

[Cobalt60]

Okay. To start off, these are my opinions, nothing but opinions. Your opinions may be different. And probably are.

Now, to business. You may have heard of the series called Age of Empires. Age of Empires 2 was great. Age of Empires 3 was awesome. And Age of Mythology is my favorite game of all time.

And then along came the new game. Age of Empires: Castle Siege. It wasn't an AOE game. It was a free-to-play Windows 8 and Windows Phone exclusive that was riddled with micro-transactions and a clone of Clash of Clans.

I'm not saying there is anything wrong with Clash of Clans, but Clash of Clans is certainly not an AOE game.

It is riddled with micro-transactions that are nearly imperative to gameplay if you want to progress in a sane amount of time. If you don't pay, you face ridiculous loading times to wait for. I quote a review that expresses this clearly:

"The only question about Age of Empires: Castle Siege is whether to waste your time or your money."

http://www.tomsguide.com/us/age-of-empires-castle-siege,review-2381.html

And the worst part of it was that we saw it coming. We saw this kind of thing in Dungeon Keeper from EA, and in Rollercoaster Tycoon 4 from Atari, both games that had great games previous to their new releases.

I am a longtime player of Age of Empires, but Age of Empires: Castle Siege broke something no other crappy game has done before. It broke my heart.

[Flymetothemun]

I've never played 1,3, or Castle Siege, but 2 is awesome. I don't play it much anymore but it's always fun. I could never imagine AoE having moneymaking schemes designed to get money from idiots for greedy developers through a crap game microtransactions. The whole RTS model pretty much gets hacked up and destroyed with microtransactions. It goes from Real-Time Strategy to Really, Truly Stupid. Moneymaking schemes microtransaction is basically selling you an automobile, but having you pay extra for the seats, the air conditioning and the windscreen wipers, and with some games, headlights, a bonnet, and a radio, you have a functional thing at the start but it isn't really usable until you buy all the extras.

Edited December 17, 2014 by Flymetothemun

[MartGonzo]

I don't know much about Age of Empires but on the subject of Rollercoaster Tycoon, it looks like they learnt their lesson and the new one will be a proper theme park sim again.

Already confirmed, no microtransactions and no facebook integration, spline based coasters too.

I'm really looking forward to it.

[King Arthur]

Age of Empires was a great series, Age of Empires II is my favorite-of-all-time game. That said, the AoE series died when Ensemble Studios, the people behind AoE, closed down. Any new AoE game is merely an attempt at milking the remaining cash out of a once prestigious game series, unfortunately.

[Cobalt60]

... on the subject of Rollercoaster Tycoon, it looks like they learnt their lesson and the new one will be a proper theme park sim again.

Already confirmed, no microtransactions and no facebook integration, spline based coasters too.

I'm really looking forward to it.

Yeah, sorry. I meant the mobile phone version, not the upcoming computer version as I don't have the details on that.

By the way the AoE: Castle Siege review on Reddit that was a positive review said "you have to look beyond the title". It then went on to explain that it really wasn't an AoE game.