Here is my story…
Age of Empires has been a game that has greatly inspired my life. AoE was the first game I ever played when I was just 2 years old, sitting on my dad’s lap and just barely learning the basics. Eventually, AoE turned me into an addict and by the age of 3 I was able to play through most of the campaign almost on my own. Having my parents read me objectives, and my father spending loads of time explaining different units and goals to me, kind of became my most favorable childhood memories. Looking back, I kind of think the AoE franchise was what allowed me to be the man I am today. Allowing myself to learn greater motor functions, higher-level thinking, and quick learning, all of which fueling the mind of a child at the time. Through the ages (I know, all of these ‘age’ jokes keep coming to mind.), it kind of became a family tradition to get the newest Age of Empires game as they were released. (I still to this day have a disc copy of every AoE, and even have a few extra copies for things like the full collection series) LAN parties, LAN tournaments, Library tournaments, these were the type of events I hosted and attended on a regular basis when I was about 10-12 years of age. My mother worked, and still works, at our town’s public library and at the library they have computers that me and my friends downloaded AoE onto. Sure, we all had computers of our own at home, but there was just something special about being there in-person. Day after day we would spend our time at the library, doing AoE2 battles, or Age of Mythology battles. As time progressed, we had our own section of computers upstairs because we attracted too many people around our screens and made too much ‘noise.’ To this day, being 20 years old and studying Computer Science & Programming, I have dreams of one day being a game developer myself. This dream has been all I have thought about since that first day my dad sat me on his lap to watch his armies clash with the enemy on Age of Empires, and if it wasn’t for such a great game franchise to shape my life I cannot even imagine what type of person I would be today.
So I thank you Ensemble Studios and Microsoft Studios, not only have you helped ‘develop’ my life, but you have also allowed me to be the type of person I am today. Thank you yet again for all of the amazing work you have continued to do with things like AoEII:HD, and now AoE:DE. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, this has been a wondrous journey.
(I would like to ask any readers, as a final note, please ignore any grammatical errors. I know grammatical errors annoy me at least, but with all the memories that flooded back while typing this had me a bit choked up, and I have done my best. Cheers.)
Cheers & Thanks,
SlayerWasp (AKA Keller)