The AoE2DE UI needs a 6th column because we are running out of space.
Many things can’t be added to game or require stupid workarounds:
3 Kingdoms have the Trebuchet at the Siege Workshop because of the Hero at the Castle
The Archery Range UI is extremely crowded if you have a Berber ally
Dock rework removes Demo Ships from civs with unique ships
New buildings like Shipyard can’t be added
New mechanics like Cuman Mercenaries can’t be added because there is no space in the Castle
Both AoE3 and AoM have 6 UI columns. They even add a 4th row that has none grid hotkeys. That gives overall 9 more buttons/keys. But just adding a 6th column would give us 3 more buttons/keys. Both of those games don’t even need a 2nd page for buildings.
If you look at your keyboard might notice that there are way more then 6 columns. We could easily add a 7th too.
I agree! There is another issue, some buildings get very crowded in Full Tech Tree mode. Archery Range/Stable even gets second page in case of some civ, if I remember it correctly.
Although I agree, I think a more simple short-term solution would be to move the “flag” (direction for created units) to the bottom right corner, to fully use the top and middle right-most column.
Nonetheless, another column is a good idea, with one small restrictions: it is harder to reach six columns on the keyboard than five.
I didn’t say that. It does have a gigantic and intrusive UI, though. Taking up a lot of screen real estate, and in relation to the gameplay map view area, too. Which is, objectively, a bad thing, imo. If AoE2 had that UI, I’d say the same thing. Hopefully you can mod the menu to your liking someday, or hotkeys are super fast to use (highly recommend)
Maybe scroll up to my post again and look at the AoE3DE and AoMR UI. They clearly cover a lot less of then screen then the AoE2DE UI.
There is a long list of reasons why it’s less popular then AoE2.
released when the RTS genre was getting less popular already
colonial setting left out many of the most interesting things that happened in the early modern times
removal of drop of points
removal of Stone (replacing it with artificial limits on defensive buildings)
home city levelling to unlock cards (removed in the DE)
worse feeling unit movement
generally less popular setting
smaller civilisations selection (only Europeans on release)
smaller part of the world (only the Americas until the 2nd expansion, no Europe until the last DLC)
effectively lower population because some units cost more then 1 pop and the limit is still just 200
Less realistic feeling elements like bullets that never miss
Campaign focusing on a fictional story instead of real life events
Higher hardware requirements making it harder to run on low end machines
Coin being to easily available in late game
Covering a too big timeline with too different levels of technology. Crossbowmen vs Gatling Guns doesn’t make much sense.
And yes trade being boring is one of the reasons
Those are just some reasons. None of them individually are the “one” reason why it’s less popular. There are also many reasons why it is still pretty popular and many things it did better then AoE2 in my and other peoples opinion. I could write an entire essay on this topic but those were just the reasons I could think about right now.
Cuman Mercenaries seems to be universally unpopular and should probably be changed to something else. The game doesn’t need any new mechanics.
I agree with your other points though. In particular, some aspects of the water rework seem to be motivated purely by the interface. Which slot does Chronicles use for the Shipyard – same as Bombard Tower?
I think one can change the size of the AoE2 interface in the settings? (Not to add columns – I just mean to scale it to take up more/less screen space.)
