What Era Age of Empires IV should be?

I’m sorry to break the hopes of a modern setting for some people, but the timeline is going to go back, like zeroempires said, for 2 reasons:

  1. Profit
    The most successful game in the series, Age of Empires 2, takes place in the middle-ages. It made and still makes the most money by far from the whole series and is the only one still played massively today and they (MS) know that.
    AOE3 gunpowder setting didn’t prove so appealing to the masses (while it was fun for some for a while, the game pretty much died long time ago and was never at the level of 2 to begin with), they wouldn’t risk going even further.
    If there is one strong positive today about AOE unlike when they decided to go fremium cartoony model (AOE:O), it is that Microsoft knows what works and what doesn’t (which means we won’t end up with another AOE: Online fiasco, that’s for sure), they no longer wonder around blindly. They also work with the AOE2 community and the AOE2 competitive community, the only one still thriving.
    They also made remakes for AOM, for RON, while also having AOE3 as a modern looking game still capable of running on modern computers, not just for AOE2… They basically re-tested all products on the market and people still stayed or returned to AOE2.
    So Microsoft took the hint loud and clear, they know whats the recipe for success this time and where the money would come from.
    Of course, for a mammoth like MS it is more about the image and solidifying platforms like Windows 10 and their gaming store in an effort to compete with the likes of Steam and slowly winning ground over PS rather than just making a few hundred millions with a single game franchise, but that’s another discussion.

  2. Gameplay
    The only way to make a strategic gameplay in a WW2 setting which wouldn’t turn out to be downright silly, with aircraft levitating in mid-air while kept idle, would be to make it actually tactical, just like Company of Heroes or Sudden Strike or Men of War, where aircraft are called as tactical abilities, or turn it into a 4X Civilization game where you have a planetary sized map and aircrafts return to airports/carriers after a strike.
    There’s a reason all WW2 real time strategies are RTT and not RTS, with tactics/positioning/headquarters/reinforcements called off the map as opposed to strategic/macro gameplay with focus on gathering resources and building a base/city. It needs to be within a context.
    During middle-ages for example they gathered resources on their way to the battlefield, built there and recruited more soldiers from the vicinities, while in WW2 they kept receiving reinforcement and resources from home (headquarters).
    Now we can’t have an RTT instead of an RTS, that wouldn’t be Age of Empires and Relic knows that, they aren’t novices.

I get your desire for a contemporary setting, I like WW too, I watch documentaries and read books about it, but it just doesn’t fit into a strategic eco based AOE style gameplay. You would need to make it really silly in order to work. Try to see that or you will be disappointed for no valid reason when they announce the timeline the game is going to be.

And yes, they are going to remaster AOE2 for the 2nd time, but believe it or not, its near perfect gameplay can actually be improved with new ideas that would make it a fresh new game. If you paid attention, Quinn Duffy (Relic AOE4 producer) hinted at that. Having AOE2:DE highly more successful than AOE4 as well would be ridiculous. It makes more sense they would prefer to make use of the series own ‘heritage’ rather than competing on a market over-saturated by WW2 and sci-fi games.
AOE is not about continuing a timeline, it’s about history and empires, and of course quality gameplay.

I like to the see AoE in a comtemporary setting but realise that it will be a hard task to create an interesting storyline. I wish the creators of AoE best of luck with that.

I like to the see AoE in a comtemporary setting but realise that it will be a hard task to create an interesting storyline. I wish the creators of AoE best of luck with that.

@IamDalv said:
I’m sorry to break the hopes of a modern setting for some people, but the timeline is going to go back, like zeroempires said, for 2 reasons:

  1. Profit
    The most successful game in the series, Age of Empires 2, takes place in the middle-ages. It made and still makes the most money by far from the whole series and is the only one still played massively today and they (MS) know that.
    AOE3 gunpowder setting didn’t prove so appealing to the masses (while it was fun for some for a while, the game pretty much died long time ago and was never at the level of 2 to begin with), they wouldn’t risk going even further.
    If there is one strong positive today about AOE unlike when they decided to go fremium cartoony model (AOE:O), it is that Microsoft knows what works and what doesn’t (which means we won’t end up with another AOE: Online fiasco, that’s for sure), they no longer wonder around blindly. They also work with the AOE2 community and the AOE2 competitive community, the only one still thriving.
    They also made remakes for AOM, for RON, while also having AOE3 as a modern looking game still capable of running on modern computers, not just for AOE2… They basically re-tested all products on the market and people still stayed or returned to AOE2.
    So Microsoft took the hint loud and clear, they know whats the recipe for success this time and where the money would come from.
    Of course, for a mammoth like MS it is more about the image and solidifying platforms like Windows 10 and their gaming store in an effort to compete with the likes of Steam and slowly winning ground over PS rather than just making a few hundred millions with a single game franchise, but that’s another discussion.

  2. Gameplay
    The only way to make a strategic gameplay in a WW2 setting which wouldn’t turn out to be downright silly, with aircraft levitating in mid-air while kept idle, would be to make it actually tactical, just like Company of Heroes or Sudden Strike or Men of War, where aircraft are called as tactical abilities, or turn it into a 4X Civilization game where you have a planetary sized map and aircrafts return to airports/carriers after a strike.
    There’s a reason all WW2 real time strategies are RTT and not RTS, with tactics/positioning/headquarters/reinforcements called off the map as opposed to strategic/macro gameplay with focus on gathering resources and building a base/city. It needs to be within a context.
    During middle-ages for example they gathered resources on their way to the battlefield, built there and recruited more soldiers from the vicinities, while in WW2 they kept receiving reinforcement and resources from home (headquarters).
    Now we can’t have an RTT instead of an RTS, that wouldn’t be Age of Empires and Relic knows that, they aren’t novices.

I get your desire for a contemporary setting, I like WW too, I watch documentaries and read books about it, but it just doesn’t fit into a strategic eco based AOE style gameplay. You would need to make it really silly in order to work. Try to see that or you will be disappointed for no valid reason when they announce the timeline the game is going to be.

And yes, they are going to remaster AOE2 for the 2nd time, but believe it or not, its near perfect gameplay can actually be improved with new ideas that would make it a fresh new game. If you paid attention, Quinn Duffy (Relic AOE4 producer) hinted at that. Having AOE2:DE highly more successful than AOE4 as well would be ridiculous. It makes more sense they would prefer to make use of the series own ‘heritage’ rather than competing on a market over-saturated by WW2 and sci-fi games.
AOE is not about continuing a timeline, it’s about history and empires, and of course quality gameplay.

A comeback to the Ancient Times, would be amazing too. Roman legions fighting in Turtle formation or Hoplites in Phalanx…it could be really fantastic… Unfortunately AOEDE will no have features of modern rts (except for graphic update, and other little improvements)…

I’d love to see a return to the ancient or medieval eras, for a bunch of reasons:

  • Immersion. In AOE1, everything’s ancient. In AOE2, everything’s medieval. In AOE3, there are a lot of massive leaps - everything’s kind of ill-defined. Depending on the civ you’re playing, you can build late medieval longbowmen or 19th century Sepoys in the same age. The first two games spanned massive periods of history too, but the technological development was slower so it doesn’t feel so crazy to have the Goths and Saracens fight each other. All but the most niche history buff is gonna think the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries are more distinct from each other than the 7th, 8th and 9th centuries. In the first two games, the slow development of technology felt genuinely exciting, like something special was unfolding as you watched your stone or dark age town centre advance into an empire.

  • Simplicity of concept. I personally loved a lot about AOE3, but it felt more aimless than the first two games, it wasn’t entirely sure of itself or what it was meant to be. Part of that wasn’t just from the wide ranging technological leaps, but also from the overall constriction of the New World colony concept. The expansion civs in particular often felt like they were uncomfortably forced into the position of civs from the vanilla game. Home Cities and shipments logistically just didn’t quite make a lot of sense for Native American and Asian civs and gameplay-wise they added an RPG element that, although not as bad as a lot of people made it out to be, probably wasn’t what the series really needed.

  • Distance from the present. We romanticise the eras before 1492 because they feel so detached to our lives today. The further Age of Empires gets into the historical timeline, the more likely it’ll have to somehow deal with horrific historical events with consequences that still unfortunately reverberate today - issues like genocide, colonialism, the slave trade and fascism are impossible to tiptoe around without controversy, and I don’t think the payoff is worth it. You don’t need to deal with those issues in an ancient or medieval era game. Of course, terrible things happened back then too, but none of it really affects us now compared to the stacks of awful things that have happened within the past few centuries. But beyond that, there’s also the sense of mystery that comes with early historical settings. We know pretty much everything about the day to day life and equipment of 19th and 20th century soldiers, and the cultures they belonged to. We don’t for their ancient and medieval equivalents, and that’s what makes it more exciting to play as them. We fill in the blanks.

  • Game of Thrones is kind of a thing right now. People like swords and castles.

  • Priests, wonders, hoplites, ruins, relics, cataphracts — this is what most think of when they think AOE. Other games fill niches for later historical periods — there seem to be a myriad of Napoleonic and WW1/WW2 games on Steam. Nostalgia plays a huge factor, even when marketing it for younger gamers as well - we want them to see just why AOE was such a big deal, to make it feel like it’s something they want to be a part of too.

Having said that, I wouldn’t mind if AOE4 was, say, mid-late Victorian with the final ages (or perhaps an option similar to Revolution/Ragnarok from AOM but better integrated) including WW1 stuff so that aging up feels really worth it, with civs such as the Zulu included for gameplay diversity — even though they used firearms to fight off the colonisers too, there’s still potential for strong melee units and more traditional rushes. But there are still big issues with that, even in a focused timeline. I know in Civilization games that a lot of people tend to find modern leaders more boring, for instance. I also think covering all of human history is out of the question - it barely worked for Rise of Nations and Empire Earth, and it only works for Civ because it’s turn-based and takes hours upon hours to finish a single game.

tl;dr (understandable) my preference would be a revisiting of the ancient or medieval timeline with the modern RTS adjustments you’d expect after 20 years, but still distinctively AOE with wonders and wololo.

I think the AoE IV should feature all the ages so we can experience pretty much everything. There are a lot of expectations since this game is being made now, in 2017. So I think it will be the most complex RTS game with tons of features brought to the table.

I’m sure it will be set on Contemporary Age. Because of:

1- From AoE IV announcement trailer: ‘‘A new age is upon us’’
2- ¿What’s the point in remastering all Age of Empires if you are going to set AoE IV in the same eras?
3- Relic Entertainment, known for Company of Heroes, Warhammer 40K and Homeworld. It’s just like some kind of spoiler.

The series is called Age of Empires— Not AGE OF Countries ---- why would they go to the 1800s. I am surprised by the outcome of this poll to be honest.

@Iamfarmer1 said:
The series is called Age of Empires— Not AGE OF Countries ---- why would they go to the 1800s. I am surprised by the outcome of this poll to be honest.

Austro-Hungarian Empire
Japanese Empire
Brazilian Empire
Mexican Empire
Germany 3rd Reich
USA
USSR
Even the Spanish, British, French and Ottoman Empires can fit in a 20 - 21 century game

The point of making DE is to modernize the previous games, and AoEIV would take the game into the near-contemporary era, as it is, as many other fans have stated - the next logical step. It is true that the contemporary era has a lot of rather controversial and rather ugly aspects to its history - and mechanized and aerial combat could be an issue in terms of game balance. However, with a dedicated team of developers and fan support, it should not be too difficult to implement a more modernized game play into AoE franchise without destroying its core structure.

I think aoe4 will do fine in any historical era that supports a “build yourself up from humble beginnings” experience. But I do not think contemporary age (1800+) will work out very well for it - such an era is simply a bit to “modern rts”-esque for the game to stand out as a mainstream success, and it runs the risk of being too much focused on military thematically (WW1 etc). From a casual perspective AoE is as much a city builder / lemmings game as it is an rts and the theme must support that. Plus Cossacks 3 is a pretty new release and we get world war 2 rts titles all the time (sudden strike 4, coh2 etc) so these contemporary eras are not exactly novel.

Mainstream players in particular will be mostly interested in a setting where you start with a small settlement in a big random forest and build yourself up by hunting and chopping wood. This is what made aoe 1/2 explode in mainstream popularity and it is what makes games such as Civ and even all those survival titles still so popular today. The theme should be clean and simple to support this, this is why romanticized eras like medieval/ancient work so well.

Just keep AOE IV away from gunpowder weapons . Ancient - Medieval best for this franchise

Interesting that “Future” got zero votes. Perhaps we are all historians at heart?

I voted contemporary as the next as it follows the original timeline of the game. Although AOE2 was amazing, why recreating it since that was AOE2 and now we are into AOE4 finally!!! Yes!! :slight_smile:

If they are not planning a rise of nations 2, an all ages Age of Empires 4 will definetly make up for it.

They should follow the chronological way as intended.

I think that all ages is a good idea, just let the host decide the cap on the age each round. search games by era cap and EVERYBODY is happy :smile:

i gotta say one thing i didn’t like about aoe games were the match lenghts. you eider finish it normally after 5 attack or so or the match gets boring because you don’t have anything else to do besides building an army for another attacks.
i think more ages or more options like the revolution in aoe3 should be a main feature of this game.

Nerdgasm all over… anything will do… please bring us this ASAP…

Industrial/Modern. AoE IV should be a sequel to AoE III, not a greatest hits.