Critique the devs and game, not the reasons you were bad at playing it

Age of Empires IV IV - Discussion
1

Critique the devs and game, not reasons you were bad at playing it.

Reasons I only paid for the 1$ pass and then canceled it after beating players 1st week:
+general or gameplay issues

  • springald spam with defensive booming quickly became the only way to play
  • known bugs, like relic bug, not that acceptable (I noted that this was fixed)
  • defenses are cheap and powerful, macro&defensive play is favored over any aggressive&micro plays

+visuals/sounds are ‘worse’, or not even same as previous games

  • unclear unit attacks, with random animations
  • less clear range attacks with area of effect
  • unclear what is going on with unit clumps, formation effects
  • unclear results between counter units and simply stronger units
  • contrasting better games, where every unit/attack can clearly be viewed
  • opinion: graphics and handling ‘worse’ (2021) than in Age of Mythology(2003) and Age of Empires 3 (2008)
  • general agenda issues, female khans and other fakery that are taught to kids?

+AI issues

  • is not utilizing things Microsoft has access to, such as deep learning
  • only randomly presses buttons then sends attack groups
  • does not learn, nor is any rule/mod file present, thus AoE2(1999) AI ended up better already
  • any difficulty is too easy, only a delay timer to see if player does basics on time, even up to hardest

+Using brandname (Age of Empires)

  • too many reviews are not really critiques: it’s “i played this before! its aoe4 now!” or “aoe is a classic”
  • only used for sales/marketing (with Microsoft help)
  • no ties to prior development teams (Ensemble Studio created AoE1-AoE3 and AoM)
  • opinion: previous dev dow3 title was a flop, but, I don’t see much learned improvement here
  • I don’t see even half the level of map editor, triggers, and modability (granted it’s harder)
    -lastly I leave you with two random images to compare (2003 old, vs 2021 new)

1920×1080 720 KB

2560×1080 819 KB

(note: unlike brightened market images the real aoe4 plays different and looks darker on average, giving this unknown murky/dark feel, and unit abilities/animations do not clearly display as well)

  • Two comparisons of gameplay, look for yourself how frequent early and lategame fights are; variety of units, clearer ability to see each unit and what it does (no relations to either video)

The real question is: why pay 60$, not refund, and choose to critique ‘other’ things?
Critique the devs and game, not reasons you were bad at playing it.

final opinion: the gameplay flow and design of the other games (even in battles) was much more clear, and this one has clear ‘too strong’ units, and other differences that ultimately make pre-game civ choice a > b instead of a = b and makes for a defense buildup and blob-fight structure with siege. I firmly believe playerflow is going to diminsh but only continues based on the brandname.

9 Likes
2

are you bad but you dont want to accept it? this is the impresion you give me lol

what gameplay issues exactly?

things that are going to fix in this new patch

are you mad? the relic bug got already fixed

exactly , things as it should be lol.

you are clearly a troll .

Captura de pantalla (24)
Captura de pantalla (24)1920×1080 200 KB

nobody agrees with this one.

tf are you talking about?

what? this is not even a fair point but ok

this is true only for the horse man but ok.

reaibility?

this is your opinion so i wont discuss it.

this is true and very weird .

this is true but they said that in the spring update it is going to be fixed.

you are a troll , they clearly said on an interview that they are debating if this is going to get implemented in a future update.

please try a bit harder in learning how english is writen , we dont understand what this means lmao

Aoe2 AI actually was update , it didint taught it self but ok

same point , just recycled , they are going to fix it .

its and age of empries game , what did you expect.

i think it is because the game is great?

well i mean , if this game dont sell well dont expect any other age of empires game in at least a decade.

these development teams are actually disolved except for the aom team.

map editor is going to release on the spring update.

and to finish my response this is the most absurd thing i have heard.

Man if you got a pizza but you dont know how to eat it , you want to critique the ones that made it?

another example : if you have ordered a pizza with cheese and tomatoes but you recieve the pizza with cheese only , you want to have the tomatoes right? not critique the one who mad ethe pizza but forgot to put the tomatoes.

8 Likes
3

Maybe im too stupid or cant understand but even after reading your post twice I still dont know what youre intention is with this thread. Is it a question? Is it a complain? Sorry dude but I feel like english is not your native language and the translator ■■■■■■ some things up.

4 Likes
4

i though this as well , so i though that he is complaining i think??

3 Likes
5

I have actually no clue. May be some good points in there but I dont understand the context and the intention at all…

2 Likes
7

the context is that if you are bad its the problems of the devs.

the most stupid thing i have ever heard though

11

agree on all points

plus siege is going to be a big problem for this game… difficult to balance

civs difficult to balance too.

The game has already loosing player counts on steam while age 2 and age 3 are stable.

If it continues soon it will be below age 2 in numbers of players…

3 Likes
13

aoe4 isnt for you, you will never like it, so why do you keep posting here? its about as logical as an FPS player complaining on an RTS forum that they dont like the game, it simply isnt your style but you keep popping up to complain or support someone as warped as the OP here?

6 Likes
14

It’s such a shame they completely ignored that side of singleplayer/coop. The current AI is basically used to form an additional, more free-form tutorial mission, which can be re-played on all multiplayer maps with slight variations in timing via choosing “difficulty levels”.
Nothing but a primitive learning tool before the player is supposed to jump into multiplayer (and preferably stay there).

Imagine what they could have achieved if they threw some money on developing more complex AI systems and used AOE4 to present it. Creating something that sticks and can be used for further M$ RTS products. You know, to also secure the future monies, not just ripping 60€ out of peoples pockets one time and leave scorched earth.

1 Like
15

In gneral I agree. And man you forget the fact that you acces to a new age with buildings. That not is a Age of empires game lol

16

Unfortunately, among the games released in the second half of 2021, there were too many major titles that did not have this quality.
This game has many problems, but that shouldn’t be an excuse for your defeat.
It is also worth noting that we are continuing to fix it after launch.
If you really want to enjoy this game, develop your skills while waiting for the problem to be corrected.
If you don’t like it, I recommend a refund.

1 Like
17

Great life advice. If you have a hard time at your job, blame the managers not yourself. If you struggle at school blame the teachers not yourself. If your marriage is a wreck, blame your spouse not yourself.

18

I agree with PlunpDuclin, you need to get off this forum if all you gonna do is degrade so you can get players back to age 2 or wherever the ■■■■ you came from. Age of empire 4 is doing great imo and with some polishing will make the past titles nonexistent lol, get real dude… this thread needs deleted cause it was an absolute waste of time reading to.

3 Likes
19

WTF do you say? Age 2 has lost 30 000 (thirty thousand) players since april, 10 000 in the last four months only in the 1v1 ladder, and every day that goes by loses a couple hundred more.

Age 3 is stable as always, yes: nobody play it.

20

Sorry, but what are YOU talking about?
This is AOE 2 DE https://steamdb.info/app/813780/graphs/

image
image992×412 55.6 KB

image
image986×757 72.2 KB

Saying people are not playing because of a ladder player count drop means nothing. Im one of your “10k in the last 4 months” and sure am still active, I only don’t play 1v1 RM anymore because DM is lot better. The ladder represents only a tiny share of any AOE game

2 Likes
21

tbh major overreaction about games dying on both ends. AOE2 has lost like 2k players since AOE4 came out which is less than 10% of the playerbase. AOE4 has been holding at a pretty steady rate since thanksgiving after the initial hype everyone tries the game out (standard playerbase drop in the first month or so of a hyped release).

At the same time, steamcharts aren’t necesarily accurate as a large portion of the playerbase will not play through steam, for example if they own xbox game pass (which is probably going through a huge boom right now with all the new releases on it like stardew valley, halo, new forza, aoe4.

22

You can see in your own images how since january the maximum peak drop from 38 000 to 22 000 players, near 50% of players. And thats the maximum peak, the average drop from 20 000 to 13 000: Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition - Steam Charts

I’ve played 1 962 hours to Age 2 DE, but it’s dying, its time to go.

23

Can’t disagree more about “it’s dying, its time to go”. You should play because you like to play it, not because its mainstream or not-very-niche. Though, that’s none of my business.

It was a peak during north hemisphere’s winter, with 4 new worrying COVID variants between jan-march and few vaccines available. South hemisphere winter with many vaccinated in some countries with larger playerbase, as US, Germany and China, probably shows more what would be AOE 2’s playerbase in a non-COVID reality. Anyway, AOE 2 DE lost 155 players on steam between July-November, couldn’t be less worried about its death, specially because AOE 4 should have taken a larger base in november than barely 2.2k players.

2 Likes
24

I have hope that once the bugs are fixed and the scenario editior is released it will take off. I’m sure I’m not alone with wanting to be able to design scenarios and mod.I probably wouldn’t have purchased it yet if I knew the scenario editor wasn’t available. I’m sure quite a few people probably asked for a refund just for that reason alone.

1 Like
25

What a moronic title to generate clicks. Title of the post doesn’t reflect the content.
Didn’t bother to read your post because you’re missing something entirely.

Any game, whether be a “good game” or “bad game” doesn’t care about your performance as a player. It’s a game with a ruleset and a toolset. No matter the game, good or bad, there will always be good players, and bad players.

There are bad games with good players. There are good players because they know the best strategies to use with a bad game.

Take this trash and put it in your game review or your blog post. There is nothing constructive here with your bulleted complaints and YouTube videos I don’t need to watch.