Yes, it could be that that statement was true at the time, but that Three Kingdoms didn’t end up appealing to (many of) those campaign-only players. Three Kingdoms actually looks more like a multiplayer DLC than a campaign DLC, given that it has the least scenarios of any DLC, but the (joint) most new civs.
Or maybe the achievements are just bugged and those percentages don’t reflect reality…
I kinda feel like it doesn’t count if they don’t provide campaigns for the civs, but i’m admittedly biased as I mainly play campaigns, and I get what you mean…still feels like them throwing a bone to try to placate the more history-focused fans that wouldn’t like the DLC, but it’s not an invalid point.
I mean, as one of those basically “campaign only” players (I watch competitive play on T90’s and Ornlu’s streams, but I don’t play competitive myself) it could still just be that its garbage content lol.
In defense though, those achievement metrics aren’t the best to use because it counts everyone that owns the game; even the people that bought it but never played, played it a couple of times but decided it wasn’t their cup of tea, or used to play regularly but haven’t touched the game in 3 years. So those metrics can be a bit misleading.
Preordered the Three Kingdom DLC, because there was a discount for it. Played one mission and never touched the Three Kingdoms campaigns again.
in the age of digital distribution we as consumers should ignore pre-orders entirely. Any minor pre-order discount will be dwarfed by the game going on sale 2 months after release
I only preordered AoE content in the past, because I would have bought the contend anyway on the release days. Never did this for any other game. Now I will wait as I do for any other game.
I pre-ordered pretty much every thing they pumped out.
Gave negative reviews to Three kingdoms and Knights of Cross and Rose.
I will not pre order Dynasties of the East and will wait for a 50% discount.
Quality has gone down by a lot. Let’s see next Chronicles DLC.
The first time I ever pre-ordered anything was mountain royals, it was also the last time.
We all learn that lesson at some point.
I think what you want is something more akin to the civilization series.
You’re talking about “roleplaying” in a campaign, however tell me how many “alternative endings” and “roleplay” the traditional AoK/AoC offered? I still remember playing Saladin as a kid. It was so great in fact I still remember it 25 years later. It was like reading a book but where you can be the protagonist. However, the story was linear and the roleplaying element you are talking about was never there. Maybe you and I have a different idea what a real roleplaying experience is. I played games like Skyrim and the Mount and Blade series. To me, that is REAL RPG freedom. None of the “You could experience or change the course of historical events as a participant, interact with the real locations and people, choose alternative paths and waht-ifs” apply to any of the AOE2 campaigns I know, new or old.
To me you sound like someone who used to enjoy games 20 years ago and now that the novelty is long gone you see issues everywhere. Look, it happens. Maybe what you truly want is a different franchise, possibly not even in the strategy game genre.
Seems that even if I have successfully gatekept the insincere argument about “absolute accuracy” I failed to gatekeep “absolute freedom”. My oversight.
You can choose to finish some objectives in orders you chose, and some alternative side quests not necessarily happening in history, on large and open maps with multiple factions. Not the “modern” campaign designs of “one opponent, small map, most regions inaccessible and linear objectives”
You could also play on real-world maps and open maps with more predictability and exploration for skirmish, not “perfectly symmetrical arenas” which is the only thing they want to make since 2003.
What “strategy game franchise” has to survive with poorly designed non-fitting factions, free content sold as low effort but full-priced DLCs, flashy cool innovative world-ending reality-shattering “new” game mode copied from other games, then no sp content at all?
They are downgrading, not improving, not even keeping up, but downgrading what had already worked in this very genre and I, not them, am the one who should leave because of that?
I think this points to a real problem:
Since the release of DE exactly one “real world” map has been added. It’s another part of shrinkage for the DLCs. In comparison, African Kingdoms came with 8 real world maps, Rise of the Rajas with 5, vanilla DE also with 5. Similar for special maps
Yes, sadly. Unless you’re a CEO of Microsoft, all you can do is vote with your dollar.
Yes, 100% to that, as long as they keep it away from thee ranked and unranked rotations. Nothing worse than losing because you’ve got boned by poor map generation (like old BF or nomad).
I think this speaks of another issue. While you didn’t mentioned it directly, you probably agree that this is one of the causes of the problem you’re experiencing. I’m talking about the sweatification of the playerbase. While the pro scene and big streamers brought this game back to life, they also ended up shaping this game into what it is now. 5 years ago you wouldn’t see a 700 ELO player pushing deer, having a competent fast castle build and know their counters. To me, the golden age of AOE2 was in early 2020 when a big amount of people rushed to play it out of nostalgia. Now it’s becoming the second Starcraft 2. But hey what do I know, I’m not even a pro player so who would listen? lol
Well then it would not be harmful to point out the problem and warn other people of it instead of redirecting it to “personal taste”. Yet quite a few people are still in firm denial mode
Developers and most players only thinking about “ranked” when it comes to any game design is the problem.
Ever since the player community let the company get away with V&V (that it generated any revenue at all), and still forgave them without any decision maker visibility removed, there is no turning back.
We all deserve it. Whether you stayed two decades for the classic vibe of the series or not. This is the complicity guilt. In fact the series is on the great track of becoming the next Fortnite or Genshin but not in a way myself and some others would care about.