Age of Empires II: Age of Kings

Another expansion announced, Victors and Vainquished.

This expansion contains no new faction, but is completely campaign-focused, containing 19 scenarios created by a famous community scenario creator who was hired by the devs. Fourteen of these scenarios are some he's already shared with the community before, with enhancements, bug fixes and professional voice acting, but five are brand new and never seen before. You can see each new scenario name 44 seconds into the video.

Edited by Resileafs on Mar 5th 2024 at 10:28:52 AM

19 Scenarios or Campaigns?

Coz if its scenarios that's... kinda lame?

Like, Lords of the West came with 2 civ and 16 scenarios across 3 campaigns. And this is retailing for more than Lords of the West did. and 14 of the Scenarios are ones people have already had free access to.

Edited by Ghilz on Mar 5th 2024 at 10:42:00 AM

19 scenarios, many of which appear to be virtually campaign-sized and have multiple ways to play through them.

As far as the scenarios being free, you're totally able to play the free ones without buying the DLC still. The DLC just makes those scenarios better, with the voice acting and the bug fixes and stuff. Whether you think it's worth it or not, you're free to make your own decision on it.

They're scenarios but epic, campaign sized things. The Siege of Constantinople for example, and you can play both sides of it, and it's depicted pretty accurately - a host of the real characters involved are there, the city has been designed to replicate the real thing as closely as possible, and there's loads of events in the scenarios depicting key moments from the siege.

This isn't like a single campaign level x 19, it's like a full scale campaign that happens to take place over a single map. Also worth noting that the normal 3 x 5 scenario campaigns thing means we're getting more by default (19 versus 15).

If you've ever played any of Filthydelphia's scenarios, he's the guy.

Based on the steam reviews the DLC is getting on steam, the widespread reaction is that it's not worth the money. Seems very little was changed for the formerly free maps, so you're paying for 5 new maps.

They're not "formerly" free. They're still free to download elsewhere. They're just also part of the paid DLC.

Wasn't "The Forgotten" expansion fan-made and then became an official expansion anyway? Was that a problem back then for people?

Edited by Resileafs on Mar 15th 2024 at 1:03:24 PM

I'd say the landscape between the Forgotten and this was very different.

When the Forgotten came out, AOEII had not had new content for over a decade. The Forgotten was the first expansion since Conquerors. So while the forgotten was fan content, it was a sign that AOEII was getting new life breathed into it, especially with the aforementioned fans being put in charge of the franchise. Also AOE 2 didnt have official mod support or workshop support before HD edition, so accessibility to the Forgotten content wasnt what it is now.

Here we're used to new expansions coming out yearly, with new content and new franchises. So turning around and going "Here's maps that are free and 5 more maps and also the DLC costs more than the other ones" comes across as a downgrade, not like, the franchise being breathed new life after a decade of being abandonned.

Edited by Ghilz on Mar 15th 2024 at 1:17:15 PM

There is more of a sense of rewarding a specific developer (Filthydelphia, who created the originals and is working again for the developers so has created this pack) than usual with DLC. I'd played a couple before, though the sprawling single map type campaigns aren't really my preferred style.

Had no problem buying this though, and I still don't. Many of the negative reviews are from people who never bothered reading what was offered in the first place - the DLC didn't hide what it was.

So there's a new bug that allows villagers to "Hunt" trees for food.

They've finally found the squirrels hidden in the trees.

That, or they're boiling and eating the leaves and bark.