I’ve already stopped playing ranked and played significantly less multiplayer aoe2 since 2022 (the game declined a lot in 2023 and even more since then) so I definitely think what you are saying could be true.
Nobody who plays AoE2 right now actually wants all this heroes stuff and its baffling anyone would think otherwise to me. I still dont think AoE2 is going to die, but there are changes to the DLC and such plans needed to keep it healthy for the medium-long term.
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Even if the Dev’s rage quit their support because
of backlash. The game would certainly not die. Just look at AoE3. Fans of the game will keep it alive. It’s a timeless masterpiece. Same with AoE2.
Man, I hate that director who is taking such rash decisions. We are such a sticking community. He is so lucky to inherit the rights to lead the future of this game yet he is being such an idiot with his decisions.
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So if die means, WE stops supporting aoe2, then yes.
I’d actually been thinking of creating a similar topic.
I really don’t have the time ATM to go into depth, but basically from forgotten to DoI, all the dlcs had a similar concept and were generally well received.
Since then they’ve been lurching from concept to concept, some more or less invalidating others, and the worst rated dlcs are among this group.
Doesn’t look like a team on their A-Game relentless executing. Looks like a team circling the drain, becoming increasingly desperate.
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How can they not know that?
For years, people have been screaming about what they want for an East Asian DLC. It wasn’t just five people who spoke up.
That was very prominent.
With the Jurchen and Khitans, they even show what people want… but then market them with something after no one has asked for it. For Chronicles, yes, but not for the main game.
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You do not know that
Agree on the misleading DLC part
AoE2 didn’t die when MS abandoned it years ago, it won’t die now
This discussion should be closed IMO
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I mostly play campaigns + with the massive update, so I bought the DLC.
The best we can do is being vocal about which DLCs we want. Chances are the top managers will understand to give players what they want (though that one seemed tailored to break into the chinese market, the current player base being secondary)
On the list I’d make :
- medieval chinese DLC, what everyone expected this one to be (Tibetans Khitans… + campaigns existing civs in the area). That one is a slam dunk !!!
- Balkans DLC (Serbs Vlachs…)
- Barbarian Invasions DLC (Vandals Saxons Alans, Roman campaign)
- Maybe a Saracen split DLC (Egypt Syria Iraq Arabia)
If they want to make something that detours from that, don’t force it into the main game, make it chronicles. Though the 3K don’t break it too much.
Let’s be clear, I also expect new architectural styles & regional units skins.
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AoE2: DE is the biggest game in the franchise. It will be the last to die.
If you don’t like the expansion, don’t buy it.
Aside from the name calling, I do agree that it would be nice to have more communication from the dev team but a lot of game suffer with similar issues.
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How often died AoE2 in the past 20+ years again?
We just received a free DLC, the next DLC will have some treats for MP players again. It’s more alive than ever.
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I don’t think the game will die, but it will get a lot of negative view from a lot of already existing players. If they even think about bringing hero units to multiplayer ranked or unranked, I’ll probably just go and play warcraft 3 tbh. Why would I want to play a warcraft 3 wannabe when I can play with real warcraft 3 instead? aoe2 is not designed around hero units and yet they want to add them in as if they need to compete with warcraft 3, which is ridiculous.
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As much as I am the first to share the criticism of the DLC and to a small extent the patch (infantry costing wood and even worse pathfinding), and have pointed out that the creative director has been far too stubborn in recent years, I think what you have written is over the top. All criticism is fine, but this seems like too much imo.
If anything is going to die soon I hope it’s the AOE2 communities’ turn to the melodramatic
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Ego and arrogance already destroyed multiple media franchises, not just video games.
If this is the case, it would not be the first one.
And then make an expansion and campaigns in a historical medieval game instead of the fantastical game Age of Mythology…?
What I like in AoE2 is the things it have different from games like Starcraft 2 and Warcraft 3.
The devs, on the other hand, thinks that turning AoE2 into these two games will make it somehow better.
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Well i like WC3 TFT and SC2 but when i wanna play AOE 2 DE i don’t like heroes included. I am european and looking forward to new china regional units and civs. Tho i think dynasties could be represented without heroes.
I agree it might already be the end of “standards” DLC (my opinion is they sold less and less at each iteration), and that further adds to the game could change its nature.
Agreed. IDK what sales were for LotW-DoI, but it really seems to have become noticeable with RoR.
pretty sure RoR undersold, TMR was cut to bare bones to compensate, and since then it’s been throwing stuff at the wall.
IDK, all good things have to come to an end. at least aoe2 made it to it’s 25th anniversary.
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These aren’t even dynasties or “real” kingdoms, bro.
They are just paramilitary groups trying to rule in this DLC. Remember the dlc ends with the battle of red cliffs.
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Yeah, but that’s their fault; punishing us for the consequences of their own actions is an outright stupid move, even on their part.
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RoR probably sood okay considering it has so many reviews
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Personally, I loved it; I know I’m in the minority contingent, but I’m a fan of not only the new campaigns they introduced (of which I wholeheartedly think they should do more of) but the Romans in base game. The thing is, at least to me, the Romans belong in base game mainly so they can depict the fall of the WRE that the game is supposed to start with as well as the pockets of (Western, non-Byzantine) Roman civilization that survived up until the 9th Century AD. How do you do that without the Western Romans?
I can’t make the same justifications for the 3 Kingdoms DLC. They didn’t represent, nor had any major minority representation, nor held any separate cultural concepts beyond any other civ but Chinese, which is already present in-game. Whereas Rome was present, established, and clinging to survival even at its own fall, none of these factions even got as far as being the one who united China; it was the Jurchens who did it out from under them via the Sima Clan and instituted the Jin Dynasty. That, genuinely, would have been a better campaign, even if it’s fairly early into the timeline. Also, the entire DLC itself is a lie given the campaign content; we aren’t even getting the 3 Kingdoms period, we’re getting the prologue to the 3 Kingdoms with the Campaign ending where it is. If I’m getting a DLC coined after something, I want the something they’re advertising for, not the prequel. Definitely not the semi-mythical, romanticized version of the fanfiction novel written centuries after the period.