Out of all the AoE games, this one has the greatest potential, by far. Do you think Relic might be conditioned by the glorious past of the AoE franchise? I hope not

Age of Empires IV IV - Discussion
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This game takes every AoE game before it to the next level, when things go right. Sure it’s not perfect yet -no game, nothing, will ever be- but just playing it makes me realise the incredible potential it has.

The sense of amazement when I first played AoE 1 as a kid in 1997, and AoE 2 to some extent…, but specially 1, that’s impossible to beat. That being said, feature wise this game can be in a totally different level.

My favourite AoE game overall is AoE1, just because I love the era and the fact that the game has some unbalance, which is not good, but leads to some uniqueness.

Also some of the campaigns had great moments and challenge, and the user campaigns had some of the best I’ve ever played in a RTS -and I’ve played many-.

AoE2 was my favourite for a while, specially when playing in the wonderful MS Zone, and the campaigns were great. My favourite campaign was the mongols’.

The game has now an almost PERFECT balance. However, I am not the biggest fan of AoE2 -compared to 1-, 'cos that balance comes at the cost of lack of uniqueness.

You can say a civ is chinese and another is japanese, but every single civ is the same, it’s only the bonus that change. In the end every player almost use the same build orders in multiplayer.

The huns were slightly different, or the goths, to an extent. But that’s it.

Seein the mesoamerican civs with archers looking like your typical european medieval archer was hard to digest.

AoE3…, I played it for a while but never clicked with me.

AoE IV…, well, that’s where things get interesting. Becauess the civs are VERY different. My favourite civ is the mongols, because of the aforementioned uniqueness, but so are the rest of civs, quite unique in their own right.

I just hope that Relic aren’t limited by the scope of a glorious franchise and can continue to create unique civs with very distinctive features.

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I grew up playing AoE2, I remember that being my fist game I have ever played. I got interested in it while living in Germany and visiting their castles. I remember watching my dad get owned in online play, but I was begging to play the game even though it wasn’t rated for young audiences. He eventually let me play it and even though I was awful, it got me hooked into rts games. Expanded my rts roster to: Stronghold, Rise of Nations, AoE3, World in Conflict, C&C3, Empires Dawn of the Modern World, Battle for Middle Earth2, Warcraft3, and Total War. I only “got good” at rts games with the Starcraft2 closed beta, the competitive nature of the game and how easy it was to understand made me strive to beat AI past easy and actually try pvp; this game feels very similar in those regards.

Honestly this game borrowed a ton from various rts games, and that is not a bad thing at all. This game feels less of a direct lineage from AoE2, and more at an attempt to become a bastion of all rts games.

Here is a list of similar or possibly copied features from various games:

Stronghold
Units on walls
Healing Above Head Icon
Being Unable to Shoot Through Walls and Terrain

Empires Dawn of the Modern World
Auto Road Generation
Color Coordinated Square Icons
Moving Town Center and Buildings
Build Siege Without Workshop

Rise of Nations
Resources Gain Per Min Tracker in Real Time
Farm Visuals and Mechanics

Empire Total War
Advanced Ship Firing Mechanics
Walls Only Damaged by Siege
Region Specific Music, Dynamic Combat Music

Battle for Middle Earth2
Unit Yelling and Personality
Wall Placement and Upgrades

Starcraft2, Warcraft3
Terran Burning Buildings
Single click = one single unit, not 1 for each building selected
Movie-Intergraded Campaign
Attack-Move Command (I feel that Starcraft Standardized the hotkey and made it more responsive)
Comic like style and Easy to tell units apart
200 population
Being able to actually watch a game from the opponent’s view instead of going to what they interact with

AoE1, 2, 3, AoM
Game Core
Broad Forge Upgrades with Specific Unit Upgrades
Visual Unit Changes
Batch Training but limited to landmarks and mongols stone mechanics
Basic Unit Counters
4 resources
Relic Mechanics

Thanks for the post, it was fun comparing this game to all the others, I hope Relic can iron out the bugs and add the features which people are clamoring for. I know AoE4 has a ton of potential! I can’t wait to start making maps, I hope Relic considers implementing popular custom melee maps into their map pool eventually!

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I feel like we live in different realities, I do not feel at all that this game has the greatest potential, I feel like it’s an opportunity missed already because they did a soft launch and even the gameplay alone is quite shallow.
But please tell me why do you think it has the greatest potential ever, you just made this post and gave almost no reason to why that is.

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Vehemently agree with this sentence.

They can start to achieve this by doing DLC civs like Mali, Inca, Persia, and the medieval superpower Turks / Ottoman Empire (check our civ concept, the Ottoman Empire is the only HYBRID civ in the franchise, as well as the first and only to feature an asymmetric BALANCE between eco and military). This way they can achieve the design success of the Mongols civ many times over, and turn AoE4 into the new classic.

I really like AoE3 DE though. It’s a superb game, and recent Africa DLC is so cool.

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It has potential but there are a lot of things and quality of life aspects that need to be adressed. i too love the diversity. Sure it’s nothing like StarCraft 1/2 or Warcraft 3 but I really have to approach each civ.

As much as I enjoyed AOE2, the civs all felt the same aside from minor tweaks to Economic/Military bonuses. That’s nothing like what we have here. Mongols are definitely out there.

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AoE2 being my favorite I love how they have the core gameplay of AoE2 and are building from that. I wish to see Relic go wild with what they think would be great for this game, they have done a very good job so far in my opinion.

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Rise of nations also had really in-depth mechanics.

  • Like attrition and territory influence for cities.

  • Terrain modifiers like high ground and rivers (you moved slower and took more damage in rivers)

  • Also every city had a name related to the faction’s real cities.

  • Every caravan made a road for every new trade route.

  • The generic general/spy units all had important spells/buffs to cast on allies.

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I can’t believe people actually request for DLC knowing that DLC is almost to content from high price… I’d you only know what a expansion pack was…

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I miss when expansion packs where normal. Not cut content but added content, even if it was spendy. Only game I know that does expansions still is World of Warcraft.

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Almost perfect balance? Uhhhh so you play french? xD

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Expansion will always be better you get a lot more of cotent, a DLC is just a spall piece… Nothing will beat age of conquerors, broodwar, heart of the swarm, winter assault/ dark crusade etc… No DLC can’t be compared to expansion…

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by that I mean that the new engine enables the game to include features that were impossible in previous AoE games -maybe except AoE3-, like an “infinite zoom” like Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance…

…or the new hills, more real life like and pronounced, where terrain can play in your favour -something which isn’t made use of in the game, not as much as I would expect from an engine like this. Yes, this is a criticism.

There is a reason why castles or celtic hill-forts in my region where placed at the top of hillocks, or at a mountain’s top.

In addition another potential advantage of the game is the aforementioned uniqueness, AoE2 is almost perfect but in that sense it misses the mark for me. AoE IV can certainly take advantage of its own philosophy and break some old molds.

Other enhancements include the ability to have thousands of units in the game and much better physics and how they collide, which was impossible before.

@KettleBunny impressive stuff! Thans for sharing. I only miss certain details from Supreme Commander, or its predecessor, one of the best RTS games ever made, Total Annihilation.

On another note, mills in the fileds are unrealistic. AoE1 granaries are more realistic. Mills were essential in human history to feed the people, 'cos they milled the wheat to make bread.

However, they used to be in the river banks where irrigation dams were used to lead the water to the mill.

In AoE2 they had donkeys rotating the runner stone. In places where water is abundant like my region, mills didnt have blades, the runner stone rotated by the action of the water in the tir below the mill, like this irish mill.

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Where I live these watermills were built until the 1950s decade.