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Out of the box. . .and back in again

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 1 / 8
Date: May 05, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Boring, tedious, and pointless. A mere shadow of the far superior Civilization (pick any incarnation). Why would anyone want to sit and watch people chop wood and carry carcass meat around the screen? Why does this game freeze my computer? Why do foreign civilizations appear from nowhere (always with better weaponry) and bombard me for no reason-with no hope of diplomatic recourse? I realize that with diligence, this game may be playable, but I was already spoiled by years of playing-you know.

Problems with iMac

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 3 / 5
Date: January 29, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I purchased this a week ago since I heard great things about this game and having played Civilization a Call to Power. After installing it, it kept prompting me for the cd even when running the program off the cd itself. I wrote to tech support within the hour and have yet to hear back. I can however play the scenarios and found Civilization to be more challenging with better game controls. I often lost member of my civilization and had to scroll the entire map to distinguish to dark blue dots from the black dots. Overall, I am not impressed and will stick with Civilization games in the future.

Great animation, informative; try Civilization instead.

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: May 07, 2001
Author: Amazon User

I got this beacause I enjoyed both Civilization and Alpha Centauri, and it had come highly recommended by some of my friends in the PC world.

The animation and attention to detail is really great, and kind of hypnotic, mostly because of the music. The time required for development of technology is pretty considerable, however, so you just kind of sit and watch these little guys truck around for the bulk of the playing time. This slows gameplay to a virtual crawl.

The intelligence that moderates enemy activity is pretty rudimentary - I found it easy to avoid being attacked simply by not going within a certain distance of another civilization until I had a decent sized force, which, of course, took more time. Once engaged, however, moving the individual units was fun, if not a little chaotic. And the indivudal units just attack whoever is near them, whether that's a enemy or a building. The diplomacy settings are appalling basic: they are radio buttons which simply assign a value to each opponent: ally, neutral or enemy, which is usually not enough to get them to stop attacking you for a bit, only to stab them in the back, heh, heh.

Lastly, I more than a little put off by the "slash and burn" tone of the whole game - there's no penalty for simply cutting down every tree to make buildings and weapons, and exhausting every resource. (Oh, right, this is a Microsoft game.) In Sid Meier's excellent Civilization and space counterpart Alpha Centauri, you really have to watch your consumption levels and pollution. I find that this keeps me interested and coming back to play multiple times.

If you really like slick animation at the expense of gameplay speed and little snippets of historical information as the payoff for a level, then go ahead and try Age of Empires. If, like me, you like the intricacies of building an actual empire, then STICK WITH CIVILIZATION OR ALPHA CENTAURI. The animation may not be as good, but that's what movies are for.

a knockoff of the more interesting Civilization

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 10 / 14
Date: January 04, 2000
Author: Amazon User

I can't really see what the appeal of this game would be when you could just buy Civilization II. Yet again Microsoft steals someone else's idea and doesn't carry it off very well. The mac version is a pretty horrible port, and doesn't follow Mac user interface conventions at all. The mouse cursor gets stuck now and then, too. Laying out the empire isn't nearly as interesting as in Civ. The warfare aspects are OK, although the defender gets such a big advantage that wars tend to be inconclusive unless one side just wasn't prepared. I guess some people might like the real-time format better than the turn-based format of Civ, but personally I just find that half the time I'm bored because nothing's going on and the other half of the time too much is going on at once and I get messed up.

Very fulfilling RTS title

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 10 / 11
Date: February 07, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Historical conflict has been the basis for many a PC and console title. But none deliver the goods better, in my opinion, than Age of Empires. Sure, it's a Microsoft game for Mac, but I don't think much about that as my Persian hordes roll into Greece. There have been many comparisons between AOE and the widely-popular Civilization 2, but it's like comparing Apples to... ummm... PCs. AOE is a true real-time strategy, which means you control your villagers and send them to collect food, wood, etc., and you control your armies which (if they're lucky) collect decapitated enemies. Civilization is more a political-military board game, with turn-based play and not as dynamic a control system as AOE. Not that this is bad--both games are a lot of fun to play. But I think while Civ 2 wins on the side of depth and scope, AOE wins on the side of excitement and playability. The only strike I have against AOE is the fact that the units all look and act the same, regardless of what civilization you play as. Using a legion of samurai to beat back a Hittite advance would have been wonderful.

It is a Good Name

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 2 / 2
Date: November 28, 2000
Author: Amazon User

It is a really good game, the graphics are great. I love it when you see your army of 15 horses marching in and attacking everything. Its really fun, althugh for Mac you can only play against Macs and it is also pretty annoying the Population Limit it has. You also can not build a whole army at once you have to build it soldier by soldier.

It's an Action-Packed Strategy Experience!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 22 / 25
Date: November 15, 1999
Author: Amazon User

Age Of Empires is an incredible game! It will entertain strategy gamers for hours on end with its many missions and endless variations of Death Matches. Parents can buy this for their children too. Each mission is based on real battles in history and it gives a historical summary of what really happened at each battle. The different civilizations all have different weapons and if you want an easy game there are cheat codes galore. THIS GAME IS A MUST-HAVE!

One Word: Spectacular

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 15 / 25
Date: November 19, 1999
Author: Amazon User

If there was a better game out there I wish somebody would introduce it to me because AOE is the best game of its time. I recently bought AOE 2 and although it is ok, I don't find it half as fun as its predecessor. The bottom line: Buy Age ff Empires now!

Missing One Thing- People

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 12 / 13
Date: December 29, 1999
Author: Amazon User

Age of Empires is the best strategy game I have ever played. It takes you through time to fight in historic battles or build your own empire to conquer other people or your computer. I am very pleased MacSoft made a Macintosh version of this game. Dispite its exellence, it is mising one thing... people. I have yet to find one place online where I could play another person. If you are thinking about buying a game for your Macintosh, get Age of Empires, it is a great game and I'll look forward to playing you.

This was a great game!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 11 / 13
Date: February 08, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Boy, Microsoft really outdid themselves! When I opened the box and started the game, I was expecting something like StarCraft, simple and completely based on battles. However, I was soon exposed to intense strategy and huge amounts of details. For an example, units on elevations do more damage and vice versa. Also, much of the game is concentrated on the gathering of foods, minerals, and the researching of technology. This is no bash 'n brawl game for former Duke fans. This is hardcore strategy. So, I advise you to buy this game. This has kept me adicted since summer when I got it, and in my opinion, its better than Civilization II. (Why all the hype?)

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