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ccm290's Age of Empires II: Conquerors Expansion (PC)
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| [March 5, 2014 07:30:47 PM]
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Game Analysis 2: Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings W/Conquerors Expansion
Background Information:
Age of Empires II is a Real Time Strategy game that allows the player to take the lead of one of several civilizations. The goal of the game is to complete all given objectives for each map. The goals, depending on type of game, varies from gathering certain amounts of resources to outright destroying their base. Age of Empires has two types of game modes: Campaign mode and Standard mode. In campaign mode, the player completes a set of scenarios that revolve around a historical event. There are several campaigns to choose from, such as Joan of Arc's rebellion against the British and the Downfall of the Aztecs. In Standard mode, a semi-random map is generated with a fixed number of players. The primary goal to victory is to destroy all other players. Other possible goals are to collect all relics on the map and build a wonder. When a game starts, the player is usually presented with a town center and three to 5 villagers. Using the villagers, the player must build the necessary buildings and military units in order to achieve the goal. Players must also gather resources such as food and gold for several purposes such as training units and building houses and military buildings. Players must also advance through the ages and research techs which unlock different things.
Game Mechanics:
Resources: Gathering resources is essential to winning the game. Resources include Gold, Stone, Wood, and Food.
Ages: Starting in the Dark Age, these limit what techs, units, and buildings can be built. Advancing through the ages ultimately relies on gathering resources. The four ages are Dark, Feudal, Castle, and Imperial.
Techs: Techs improve the team in different ways. Each tech can only be researched by building certain buildings.
Game play 1:
For the first play through, I chose only one other opponent. I chose Full random for the map generation and limited the population limit(max number of units) to fifty. When the game started, I had a town center, three villagers, and an Eagle Scout. The civilization chosen for me was the Aztecs and the map was generated based on Mediterranean geography. I immediately sent my villagers to start collecting resources and used my Eagle Scout to start exploring the areas around me. I also set my Town Center to create a new villager. After my villager spawned, I set it to gather food along with another villager in order to advance to the next age(which requires 500 food). Using my Eagle Scout, I found the location of my enemy's base, as well as some more sheep for gathering food. I also found a relic on the map, which I will obtain later when I have access to the Monastery. Noticing that I needed two Dark Age buildings to advance along with 500 food, I built a house and a Mill beside a foraging bush. The house adds 5 available units(which will only go up to 50), and the mill will allow me to collect food from foraging bushes and farms quicker. Noticing that a house didn't count toward my Dark Age buildings, I also had to build a mine that allows me to collect stone faster. After it was complete, I started my advance to the Feudal Age. I also built a Barracks for training melee military units, which will be used to defend from and attack my enemies. When it finished, I immediately trained three military units to boost my security. Being close to water, I built a dock, which allowed me to build food gathering fishing boats and naval ships such as Galleys and Galleons.
At this point in the game, I patiently waited for my villagers to gather the needed resources to advance my civilization. Eventually I advanced tot the Castle Age, built an archery and workshop, and had about twenty melee and ranged units. The enemy's first attack came, which consisted of only a small amount of melee units and I was able to defeat them easily. I started to build a castle, which allows me to build the civilization's special military unit. The enemy continued to assault my base with small groups and managed to destroy one of my buildings. I sent a large battalion of my own to the enemies base for a counter attack. Unfortunately, it failed to destroy the base, but I did destroy their siege workshop. I immediately built up another battalion and advanced to the Imperial Age, the highest age achievable. This allowed full access to all research. I upgraded my units and sent them to attack my enemy again. After 4 or so ambushes, the enemy's town center fell, sealing their fate. After laying waste to their monastery, the enemy resigned from the game giving me the victory.
Game play 2:
For the second play through, I played through the single player campaign Joan of Arc.
On the first scenario, my objective was to escort Joan to a certain location on the map. I followed the advice from the AI and made my way along the path to my goal. During my journey, I recruited different units that helped me get through obstacles, such as breaking down a wall and crossing a river. The scenario wasn’t very hard or eventful.
The second scenario, however, was much more difficult. In this scenario, the player must escort Joan to the French city of Orleans to defend it from the British invaders. When the player arrives, he must build an army to take down one of the two castles built north of Orleans. What makes this hard is that the player has to both defend the city from two invaders and at the same time build a large enough army to take down the enemies castle. Once I arrived in Orleans, I was given a set amount of each resource to start building my armies. But I realized that it wasn't enough to take down the castle, so I had to send out my villagers to gather even more resources. I eventually was able to take down the castle stronghold with a mixture of archer, melee, cavalry, and siege units.
Analysis:
Overall, Age of Empires II is a fun and challenging game. Although it can become a bit stale and repetitive after a large number of playthroughs. The campaigns are also challenging and fun. The campaigns also provide historical lesson by depicting events that happened during the Medieval time period. One game mechanic about Age of Empires always bugged me, though. It would have been nice if there was an auto explore function for at least the scouting units. Without this, the player has to manually explore the map in order to reveal it, which could get irritating. I would definitely recommend this game to a friend.
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ccm290's Age of Empires II: Conquerors Expansion (PC)
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Current Status: Playing
GameLog started on: Wednesday 5 March, 2014
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