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ZIOSoft Age of Empires: Gold Edition
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By Anthony Newman, Friday 6 December 2002  
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ZioSoft's port of famous real-time strategy PC hit Age of Empires for Pocket PCs has finally arrived - read Anthony Newman's exclusive review of the epic real-time strategy game!
Microsoft’s Age of Empires was released several years ago for the PC platform to great critical acclaim, followed by the Rise of Rome expansion pack. It has long been a favourite of the infoSync staff, in fact, so imagine our excitement to learn that ZioSoft were porting this illustrious title (and its expansion) to the Pocket PC platform. After some months of eager anticipation it has finally been released, so follow me as I guide you through the game.
 | | Ill: ZioSoft |
Age of Empires comes as a 24 MB download, and the main game installation requires about 8MB of storage space on your device. Unfortunately, extra space is required for the included campaigns and scenarios, as well as save games. Running the game requires 10 MB of program memory. This is a lot, especially for the 32 MB of RAM on my XDA, and so I attempted installation to a Storage Card, as I expect many users will. Fortunately, each user has full control over which campaigns they want installed in an effort to economise on space.
If you were expecting a straight port of the PC version, you might be a little disappointed. The hardware restrictions of the PPC platform have resulted in a number of cuts in functionality. Multiplayer mode has been completely cut, as have cinematics, the online help, larger map sizes and the campaign editor. As a saving grace, if you own the PC version, campaigns you create there can be run on the PPC.
In terms of gameplay, however, ZioSoft have done an admirable job. Graphically, the game is impressive, managing to evoke the atmosphere and detail of the PC version (I resist the temptation to call it the ‘full version’) despite being limited to 320 x 200 resolution: although the characters can be a little small, animation is still fluid. The full sound experience is also replicated, and so even on the small screen Age of Empires remains an immersive gaming experience.
The basic idea behind Age of Empires - for those unfamiliar with the desktop version - is the usual real-time strategy fare, with a slight twist. Set in the ancient past (hence ‘age of empires’), you must take your tribe from a primitive level through to a great civilisation, conquering rivals and becoming more sophisticated through the missions as you harvest resources and become more militarily powerful. Each civilisation has slightly different troops and upgrade paths and a range of different missions in an effort to keep the game fresh. Your troops and peasants are controlled from an isometric perspective around a selection of different environments in true RTS fashion.
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| Hands-on impressions, news, reviews, prices and release dates; now all-in-one-page: |
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