RTS Age of Empires IV - Medieval Again

[Young_Hollow]

Yes of course they existed, but giving them a massive speed boost and pierce armour from wearing an eagle headdress is fantasy BS.

That's not even the biggest fantasy, what made cataphracts immune to spears or samurai good vs war elephants? If they were to go even 50% historically accurate, most civs won't have canon galleons (which only 3 civs lack currently).

 

[Tacgnol]

Yes of course they existed, but giving them a massive speed boost and pierce armour from wearing an eagle headdress is fantasy BS.

That's not even the biggest fantasy, what made cataphracts immune to spears or samurai good vs war elephants? If they were to go even 50% historically accurate, most civs won't have canon galleons (which only 3 civs lack currently).

Or full 15th century plate armoured "paladins" fighting the Huns.

Ranting about historical accuracy or realism in AOE 2 is kinda stupid.

 

[Young_Hollow]

Yes of course they existed, but giving them a massive speed boost and pierce armour from wearing an eagle headdress is fantasy BS.

That's not even the biggest fantasy, what made cataphracts immune to spears or samurai good vs war elephants? If they were to go even 50% historically accurate, most civs won't have canon galleons (which only 3 civs lack currently).

Or full 15th century plate armoured "paladins" fighting the Huns.

Ranting about historical accuracy or realism in AOE 2 is kinda stupid.

It depends on what people consider ''historically accurate'' and how much of a problem the lack of it is to them. Since most people can mentally separate an abridged vs edited version of history, people will probably be OK with longbows outranging crossbows or Chinese lacking hand cannoneers but won't be OK with a female Khan or scout. In a way, it could be said that it ignores the plight of women in those times considering how the Mongols were the biggest rape train ever seen and even noble-women could only get on horses to hunt.

 

[thesheeep]

Simplifying and abridging history to make it easier to understand to people playing and making the game is different from making a politically motivated addition. The LOTR movie may not have been 100% accurate to the book but it sure as hell didn't have a space marine in it. If you don't see a difference between abridging something and adding something that didn't exist in the first place, I don't know who can help you. But putting on the uppity internet psychologist hat myself, it seems you're quite quick to jump to conclude the proles who hate this addition are sexist, and according to my experience in reddit psychology, it stems from

Spoiler

daddy issues!

That's all nonsense, of course, but I gave you a brofist because that conclusion really made me laugh
I shall remember and use it for some totally unrelated rants as well.

If you cannot see your own sexism in being seriously triggered by women doing jobs in non-historically-accurate games they undoubtedly could have done, then I really can't help you either.
"But they wouldn't have been allowed to!" Yeah, no shit. That's the historically inaccurate part. It's just not a big deal - unless you have a problem with women, that is and see SJWs lurk in every shadow
Comparing this to Space Marines in Middle Earth really shows your mindset...

I could understand it if they gender-swapped some known historical figures, but they just have a few women around in places where they are not historically accurate (it's nowhere near 50/50 even).
I honestly cannot even comprehend the insecurity a person must feel about themselves to raise more than an eyebrow at this. But it does amuse me, so go on.

 

[Oreshnik Missile]

If you cannot see your own sexism in being seriously triggered by women doing jobs in non-historically-accurate games they undoubtedly could have done, then I really can't help you either.

That's a Young Hollow post you quoted as mine, but no, women Khans couldn't have united the Mongol tribes and then conquered China etc.
Humans are a sexually dimorphic species, go back to school you ignorant retard.

 

[Sarathiour]

Aoe 1 and AoM were actually trying to keep an heavy historical background. There is a lot of documentation and history tidbit in AoE, and every fucking unit is basically tied to some myth or historic use in AoM. Yeah it obviouslt took some liberty with the design, but you don't see gunpowder using viking or something or female warrior, beside the two amazon heroes of the greek.

AoE3 is the one that was a bit silly with indegenous and mercenary unit, but they were obviously treated a bit like mythological or fantasy unit, heck their last upgrade was called "legendary warrior" or something like that.

What's grieving here is the obvious lack of consistency, you have on one hand obscure rule for some map that only impact two faction ( boar is haram) and on the other hand female khan.

 

[Young_Hollow]

Simplifying and abridging history to make it easier to understand to people playing and making the game is different from making a politically motivated addition. The LOTR movie may not have been 100% accurate to the book but it sure as hell didn't have a space marine in it. If you don't see a difference between abridging something and adding something that didn't exist in the first place, I don't know who can help you. But putting on the uppity internet psychologist hat myself, it seems you're quite quick to jump to conclude the proles who hate this addition are sexist, and according to my experience in reddit psychology, it stems from

Spoiler

daddy issues!

That's all nonsense, of course, but I gave you a brofist because that conclusion really made me laugh
I shall remember and use it for some totally unrelated rants as well.

If you cannot see your own sexism in being seriously triggered by women doing jobs in non-historically-accurate games they undoubtedly could have done, then I really can't help you either.
"But they wouldn't have been allowed to!" Yeah, no shit. That's the historically inaccurate part. It's just not a big deal - unless you have a problem with women, that is and see SJWs lurk in every shadow
Comparing this to Space Marines in Middle Earth really shows your mindset...

I could understand it if they gender-swapped some known historical figures, but they just have a few women around in places where they are not historically accurate (it's nowhere near 50/50 even).
I honestly cannot even comprehend the insecurity a person must feel about themselves to raise more than an eyebrow at this. But it does amuse me, so go on.

I think you misquoted my name but all I was saying was this: the reason for women to be included more or less shows they had an agenda with it. I don't understand how insecurity somehow had a part in it but I don't say piss is rain and they have all my blessings to piss all they want, as long as they're not trying to passing it off as something else. They could've highlighted the many women leaders of the medieval era (one of them was a Muslim woman warrior called Malala iirc) but they instead chose to go with something that isn't for gameplay or accuracy or ease of understanding or anything. The previous games were never historically inaccurate for snowflake politics so saying ''it was never historically accurate'' is as stupid as justifying a space marine in a LOTR movie because the movies weren't faithful to the books in the first place.

Also, you fail to understand how ''sexism'' is so relative. It is well known that the medieval times were horrible for women especially where the luckiest a girl could be was to be born in a noble family and peacefully traded like chattel in marriages. I'm sure many wokes would say that to erase women's suffering by portraying it as if they could become warriors or rulers is ''sexist''.

 

[thesheeep]

They could've highlighted the many women leaders of the medieval era (one of them was a Muslim woman warrior called Malala iirc) but they instead chose to go with something that isn't for gameplay or accuracy or ease of understanding or anything.

I'm totally with you on that one - they could have chosen much more accurate ways of going about this.
It's just all so irrelevant in the context of this game that I can't help but point and laugh at people who get seriously triggered over it.

 

[cw8]

I've bought and been playing the campaign. Feels like AOE2 except for some civ differences and the way you age up now.
Mangonels no longer seem to have FF, at least not in my campaign missions. You can build 5 of them and have them fire in the middle of the clashes between your army and the enemy's army and you'll be fine.

 

[Young_Hollow]

If mangos don't have FF, what's the point of having scorpions?

 

[pickmeister]

So do I understand it correctly that this game is gameplay-wise just Age of Empires Online: Reskinned Edition?

 

[Oreshnik Missile]

Mangonels no longer seem to have FF, at least not in my campaign missions. You can build 5 of them and have them fire in the middle of the clashes between your army and the enemy's army and you'll be fine.

And this is the sort of thing that shows why it's not worth discussing the actual game. Better to just mock it for having female muslim generals, female khans, etc. AoE4's design is a mixture of absences and unoriginality, I assume that without bothering to check.

 

[J1M]

Uninstalled this during the second campaign mission.

Aside from the tepid gameplay, did anyone else find the narrator long-winded and condescending? Weird choice to show me some lame history movies about events more interesting than the campaign missions.

 

[MajorMace]

It's hard to click on stuff due to the 3d. UI needs some fixing as well. Otherwise game is good. Sound design is to be lauded. I'm eager to see where it'll go from here.

 

[thesheeep]

Aside from the tepid gameplay, did anyone else find the narrator long-winded and condescending? Weird choice to show me some lame history movies about events more interesting than the campaign missions.

I actually quite like the campaign style.
I'd be more immersed if the campaign was told from the perspective of the characters, but I actually enjoy the documentary style videos.
Something different for a change.

Some of them are more interesting than others, though, and indeed some choices of what was just shown vs what can be played is weird.

What I found MUCH weirder is that there are no India, Abbasid, China or HRE campaigns.
Only half the factions have a campaign.
What's up with that?

Frankly, as much as I like the game, for the current price I wouldn't recommend it.
There's too much missing, both in content and gameplay features (e.g. there is no smart select, no global queue, and other obvious oversights that are just baffling).
Wait for sale or wait for patches would be my recommendation. Or both.

If mangos don't have FF, what's the point of having scorpions?

There are no scorpions in AoE4.
There are anti-siege siege weapons, which are very much required if you want to deal with Mangonels from a distance (their range is higher, too).

I don't mind the lack of FF at all. In fact I very much welcome it.
One less thing that needs microing. Good for me, cause I suck at it!

 

[MajorMace]

What I found MUCH weirder is that there no India, Abbasid, China or HRE campaigns.
Only half the factions have a campaign.
What's up with that?

Most absurd thing to me. I played the norman/english campaign and a bit of the french one, they're far from the top of the basket when it comes to quality in rts campaigns.
When SC2 launched with only the terran campaign, I kind of understood why afterwards due to the production value of wings of liberty which just pushed everything forward (we could debate this but I believe SC2 to have the best rts campaigns on the market).
But here it's very basic stuff so far. I don't see the problem in giving us at least one muslim campaign on top of the existing ones.

It's the main element which makes the game feel rushed imo.

 

[Alienman]

I was in the mood for some classic RTS gaming and got the MS game pass for 1 euro, and man, I think I managed to play about 20 minutes before turning it off. The graphics is just off. It looks unfinished and the same time cartoonish, at least for units and weapons, and the game ran really sluggish for me. But the thing that killed it for me was the campaign, the BBC documentary style of it. I like history and all like anyone else, but this approach felt like the antithesis to gaming for me. Hearing some dull English woman drone on does not really make it very exciting to play. Boy, talk about a misstep here. Makes me wonder if Company of Heroes 3 will get the same treatment.

 

[cw8]

What I found MUCH weirder is that there are no India, Abbasid, China or HRE campaigns.
Only half the factions have a campaign.
What's up with that?

DLC 1, DLC 2, DLC 3, DLC 4, DLC 5.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Dunno, I like this campaign stlye. Nearly finished it, some missions gave good Stronghold vibes and there are some missions without any base, C&C style.
My main problems is unit graphics as many of you mentioned. Especially barracks troopers, they look same and it become a clusterfuck visually after getting a really large army of them. Even with control groups it become total chaos. At least mounted troops and siege weapon don't have this problem.

I won't play it online probably but it satisfied my RTS hunger (since its a dead genre...) but I wouldn't pay it a single dime.
Thanks to game pass I guess, yet again.

 

[Young_Hollow]

Aside from the tepid gameplay, did anyone else find the narrator long-winded and condescending? Weird choice to show me some lame history movies about events more interesting than the campaign missions.

I actually quite like the campaign style.
I'd be more immersed if the campaign was told from the perspective of the characters, but I actually enjoy the documentary style videos.
Something different for a change.

Some of them are more interesting than others, though, and indeed some choices of what was just shown vs what can be played is weird.

What I found MUCH weirder is that there are no India, Abbasid, China or HRE campaigns.
Only half the factions have a campaign.
What's up with that?

Frankly, as much as I like the game, for the current price I wouldn't recommend it.
There's too much missing, both in content and gameplay features (e.g. there is no smart select, no global queue, and other obvious oversights that are just baffling).
Wait for sale or wait for patches would be my recommendation. Or both.

If mangos don't have FF, what's the point of having scorpions?

There are no scorpions in AoE4.
There are anti-siege siege weapons, which are very much required if you want to deal with Mangonels from a distance (their range is higher, too).

I don't mind the lack of FF at all. In fact I very much welcome it.
One less thing that needs microing. Good for me, cause I suck at it!

Why indeed did they skip the history of the Islamic Cliphate, a Muslim empire in a Hindu region, a civ whose AoE2's campaign was waging a crusade and the history of a country where they give social credit for forgetting the truth? Pop history only flies with people who don't have their own idea of history and taking liberties with any of the above is risky because there are people with strong beliefs about them (whether true or not). DLC could also be an option but I don't think they'll release campaign only DLC, just like AoE2DE, which releases at leas two civs along with campaigns so even non-campaign players have to get them.

Anti-siege siege is an idea from AoE3, and I won't be surprised if there isn't a single original idea in this game's code. Less micro-heavy RTSs already exist, like AoE3 and if that's too much there are MOBAs, which were born out of the casualization of RTSs.

 

[jaydee2k]

Game is better than expected. Castle building/sieging in skirmish games can be fun. Sound is incredibly good. Mechanics are ok.
Thats about it. Lacks to much polish to be a hit.

 

[Cyberarmy]

Thats about it. Lacks to much polish to be a hit.

Yeah, that's really about it. Shocking how much little things this game really lacks.
And main menu is really a mess.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Those videos probably cost a lot of potato to make. Same with marketing and doing stuff like paying every semi-recognizable aoe youtuber to post "t... this is really fun, guys" videos and whatnot. While the gameplay is so basic, featureless and production values hopelessly outdated. Budget allocation in modern gaming, eh?

 

[Oreshnik Missile]

doing stuff like paying every semi-recognizable aoe youtuber to post "t... this is really fun, guys" videos

Kek. Some aoe2 streamer video titles I've seen include "Micro is possible in aoe4!"

 

[Tacgnol]

I was in the mood for some classic RTS gaming and got the MS game pass for 1 euro, and man, I think I managed to play about 20 minutes before turning it off. The graphics is just off. It looks unfinished and the same time cartoonish, at least for units and weapons, and the game ran really sluggish for me. But the thing that killed it for me was the campaign, the BBC documentary style of it. I like history and all like anyone else, but this approach felt like the antithesis to gaming for me. Hearing some dull English woman drone on does not really make it very exciting to play. Boy, talk about a misstep here. Makes me wonder if Company of Heroes 3 will get the same treatment.

Yeah it really lacks the "character" or "soul" of AOE 2 campaigns. I really can't think of any rational way to put it.

All of the AOE 2 campaigns have distinctive voice acting and a real sense of "character" (at least the ensemble ones, the FK stuff is a bit of a mixed bag). The missions are often quite open with a lot of rewards for exploration and thinking outside the box.

The AOE 4 campaign missions all feel massively scripted and constrained with some BBC documentary narrator ranting at you every 5 minutes.

Another thing that really frustrates me is how boring/generic the soundtrack is. The AOE series from the first one to three (including Age of Mythology) have all had great soundtracks.