We got AoE 1 on the computer as a demo when I was a kid. Think the CD came in a cereal box or something. Played through the same beginner campaign a bunch of times. Was fun.
AoE2 changed the game though. Absolutely amazing. The controls felt so much more fluid and the campaigns were so much fun to play though and see the story. We managed to network all the family computers and would have big family multiplayer battles against the computer (dad carried us kids though).
My brother loved Mythology and while it looked pretty I never really got into it. Something about it felt slower paced and kinda hand-holdy.
AoE3 was just weird. You had a home base that persisted through games, how is that fair? And playing cards were involved somehow? The ragdoll physics was cool though.
AoE4 is okay I guess. I participated in the beta program because I was so excited for them to produce something that might surpass AoE2 but… Naah. It just doesn’t have the right feel to it. Very pretty though. They keep coming out with new content but until it feels right (something about the way the window scrolls and zooms) I just cant enjoy it.
i remember getting age of empires ii at compusa in rhode island while i was in university and playing multiplayer with the rest of my roommates all the time. it was the best.
i already remember not being very good at conquest but loving the design aspects and being so sad when i got raided. blobcat, sad
I played the 3 CD OG Age of Empires III with my brothers as a kid. It was great. We rigged up Hamachi to create a private network and manually edited some AoE config files with our Hamachi IP addresses to be able to have LAN coop sessions. Half the session was getting everything installed and working.
Now it’s even easier and we play regularly, decades later.
Definitely one of my favorite series as a kid! I used to play it more as a city builder to be honest. AOE3 is still gorgeous, and apparently a Age of Mythology remake is about to come out
Loved AoE II. I still play it on occasion, and I grew up playing it with cheat codes (there’s some silly ones). I think it still holds up well to this day, even with my nostalgia glasses off.
If you’ve never played it, my only caveat would be to expect the AI to not compare to modern iterations. “Balance” in campaign missions sometimes comes in the form of giving the AI an unfair advantage, but everything can be overcome, and you can always save-scum your way to victory. It’s fun, and I definitely recommend a play if you are into retro gaming or RTS’s.
Recently got into playing AoE 2 with some friends and had a good time with it. I didn’t grow up playing it but a couple of those friends did and boy were they good at it. I think I would enjoy it more if I didnt have to constantly micromanage all of my units, as that seems to be where their experience would beat out mine as a newbie. Still had some fun game nights with it though despite getting trampled when we do a pure pvp match
Age of empires II is one of my first experiences as a child playing games. I used to play it on a computer in the back of my mother’s pharmacy. A friend of mine was a huge fan, but I truly sucked at it.
Later I bought Lord of the Rings: the Battle for Middle Earth II, and to this date this is the only RTS that I actually enjoy playing a lot (I later also played the first one which is also amazing).
Still, I played Age of Empires II a lot, mostly the tutorial levels and the early missions of Jeanne d’Arc. I think the micromanaging and constantly having to do multiple things at once (like constantly making new units, etc.) were to much for me (and it still is). Still, a classic in gaming history and a part of my childhood!
I am a late fan of this series. I used to have a Gameboy color as my first gaming device, but never actually sat down to play a Mario game fully until Super Mario Odyssey on the Switch. I really liked it, but it wasn’t a 10/10 for me like for other people.
For me the unexpected match came in the form of Super Mario 3D World. Something about the simplicity of the level design (short levels with 3 collectibles each) combined with the amazing coop make this an all time favorite game of mine. I also adore the music and general tone and creativity. It really had an almost therapeutic effect on me, I’ve seen more immediate effect on my mood than any of the anti depressants I’ve tried :D.
I have Wonder but it’s a bit to strange at times for my tastes (even though it is incredibly creative it isn’t as relaxing as 3D World was for me)
Long time fans of the 2d games really enjoy Wonder as the movement mechanics moved back to a faster feel from pre-New Super Mario Bros. My favorite will probably always be Super Mario World because the movement is the most responsive in that game and I also like to play ROM hacks for it and that community is wild.
New Super Mario Bros ended up with a sluggish movement by comparison and dominated 2d Mario for decades.
The big draw for many people in Mario is movement mechanics and that’s why Odyssey is so popular as well. The 3d platforming with Cappy just feels right. Like a missing extension that we never new we didn’t have.
Super Mario 64 has to be my favourite (and is also the most recent one I’ve tried). When that came out it rocked my world, and I didn’t even have my own N64 at the time. I would play at friends’ houses or Toys R Us.
There was a Canadian TV show called Video and Arcade Top 10 and they would frequently give games away. I wrote to them explicitly requesting SM64, and a year later it just showed up in the mail.
Wow I love this story, I used to watch that show all the time! I can still hear the theme song as if I just watched it yesterday. That was super cool of them to send you a copy. I hope you still have it!
Does anyone remember the Super Mario Land series for Gameboy? This series was so strange, but I still loved playing them on car rides.
The games felt surreal, it seemed so novel playing a mario game where you pilot a submarine and shoot at enemies, or when giant easter island heads are enemies in the game.
It’s kind of funny how Mario has evolved over the years, it doesn’t sound so out of place anymore. I’m pretty sure there are Moai statue enemies in Mario Odyssey funny enough.
Super Mario Land also gave birth to Wario as an enemy and then eventually his own gameboy Spin-off Warioland (subheaded as ‘Super Mario Land 3’), which went on to have more installments than Super Mario Land itself!
Wario is one of Nintendo’s best characters and deeply underutilized (along with Waluigi).
Yes! I loved Warioland as well, what wonderful strange little games lol. I never got a chance to play Warioland Shake it, but I’ve played all the rest!
I agree I always want more Wario games, we hardly get any! And I can’t believe how little they’ve done with Waluigi. I thought for sure he would get a Smash invite :(
I don’t remember much about Wario Land on the gamecube… but if captain toad can have his own adventure game on the switch that’s actually pretty good, than so can Wario!
I remember my first time finding the ceiling path in the Pyramids in SML1. I just decided to try to see if I could jump up to the ceiling tiles, skip passed the enemies.
It blew my little mind when it worked. I could do that. Where else could I do that‽ The entire game just changed! I lost hours trying to make the stupidest jumps, just to see if I had found another one.
The second game feels like where they found their footing before leaning into wario with the third game, but I still enjoyed the first because of how unique it felt at the time.
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