Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings

Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings moved Ensemble Studios' historical strategy into the Middle Ages and became one of the most significant real-time strategy games ever made. The player builds settlements, develops an economy and leads one of many civilizations, from the Britons and the French to the Mongols or the Japanese, each with its own units, technologies and playstyle derived from historical reality. The campaigns followed the fates of historical figures such as Joan of Arc, Saladin, Genghis Khan, Frederick Barbarossa and William Wallace, combining entertainment with an engaging historical narrative delivered by a narrator.

The gameplay was built on a refined balance between economy, army building and battlefield tactics, with a system of fortifications, siege engines and units with conflicting strengths and weaknesses creating room for deep strategic decision-making and a wide range of playstyles. On Windows 9x computers the game ran stably and graphically offered a detailed, legible environment that represented medieval towns, castles and battlefields full of archers, knights and catapults well. The music and sound heightened the atmosphere of the individual cultures, and many players still associate the game with its distinctive melodies accompanying the building of a settlement.

Age of Kings became extraordinarily popular both in singleplayer and in online multiplayer, and founded one of the longest-lived community phenomena in the history of PC gaming - the game is still played competitively today, as evidenced by the later remastered Definitive Edition release. For many players it remains synonymous with a perfectly balanced historical strategy game from the late 1990s and a benchmark against which new titles in the genre are still compared. The Conquerors expansion added further civilizations, units and balance improvements, deepening the overview of history that grew up around Age of Kings and which has persisted into the era of modern remasters and esports tournaments around the world.

Why play it: For anyone looking for a balanced historical strategy game that is still played competitively today and defines the benchmark by which the genre is measured even decades after release.