What Could Have Been / Age of Empires II

Wait a minute...

There are many ways in which this popular game, or any of its expansions, could have been different.

For stuff which later found their way in later expansions or games, check the franchise-wide page for Refitted for Sequel.

---

Original game

Ages

• Ages II and III switched the names "Feudal Age" and "Middle Age" constantly during development.
• The "Imperial Age" was originally named "Gunpowder Age", but was changed after being ruled too restrictive.

Buildings

• The beta had one wonder per building set (Aachen Cathedral for Western Europe, Suleiman's Mosque for Middle East, beefed-up Temple of Heaven for East Asia) like in Age of Empires. Fortunately, the designers took the extra effort to give each civilization an unique wonder that gave them more personality. The Aachen Cathedral and Suleiman's Mosque are still available as eye candy in the scenario editor, and the beta Temple of Heaven can be downloaded from some fansites. The Central European building set was likely introduced later than the others.
  • In a released confidential "Design Doc" (5.0 version), the designated Briton wonder is Westminster Abbey, Aachen remains the Frankish wonder, and the Saracen wonder is debated between the Great Mosque of Samarra and the Mosque of Omar in Jerusalem.
  • There is at least a theory that the final Frankish wonder is not based on Chartres Cathedral but on Prague's St. Vitus Cathedral, and that it was intended to be the generic Central European wonder or the Gothic wonder when first made.
• The Trade Workshop was going to allow villagers to produce "luxury goods" which would be sold for gold. It survived as an eye-candy building in the Scenario Editor but only had Western European and East Asian versions until The Forgotten made it in other building styles.
• Bizarrely, the Mongols, Celts, and Vikings, three widely separated cultures, would have shared a common building set.
• Houses would generate small amounts of gold over time as a reference to taxation.
• The original concept of the Blacksmith was more like the Storage Pit in Age of Empires. In addition to armor and weapons upgrades, it would be available from the Dark Age and serve as a dropsite for Ore (see Nature) and Stone.
• Docks would produce only civilian vessels and technologies while a different naval building, Ports, would produce war ships and their upgrades.
• The Editor's "City Wall" was the original design of the Central European fortified wall.
• Monasteries (the Western European version, at least), looked more like real monasteries, with more than one building and a cloister, and were available from the Dark Age.

Campaigns

• It is likely that a Charlemagne campaign was planned at one point, due to the presence of Charlemagne and Roland heroes and the originally more Carolingian spin of the Frankish civilization. Coincidentally or not, Microsoft held a contest of Charlemagne-themed fanmade scenarios before the release of The Conquerors (and the winner, "The Saxon Revolt", was added as a hidden scenario to the expansion).
• Likewise, it is probable that a King Arthur campaign (presumably Britons) was planned at one point, due to the large number of Arthurian heroes and the original emphasis on rebuilding civilization from the ruins of Rome. Perhaps as the learning campaign instead of William Wallace.
  • The aforementioned Design Doc proposes a Briton campaign in the mold of Age of Empires campaigns (following peoples over the centuries instead of one notable person). The first scenario would show Egbert of Wessex fighting the Vikings, the second Alfred the Great building a navy and retaking London, the third the Battle of Hastings... and the rest were to be determined.
• An unfinished special relic ("Piece of the True Cross") is present in the Editor. The scenario "The Horns of Hattin" references a "Piece of the True Cross", but it is portrayed as a normal relic.
• An early draft of the Mongol campaign had the conquest of Khwarazm offscreen and more importance placed on the wars against Kushluk and the Chinese. However, it's debatable if this would have meant more scenarios with them, or just more objectives within the same scenario.
  • Kushluk was going to be defeated once and made flee with the Kara-Khitai. Then, he would be defeated a second time by inciting a Kara-Khitai revolt against him.
  • A mission involved assassinating the Hsia (Xi-Xia) King in a mountain fortress and making peace with his successor. This was split between the assassination of the Shah, and the Xi-Xia fortified mountain base in the final campaign.
  • The Mongols would ally with the Sung to besiege the Chin (Jin) capital in Pien Liang (Kaifeng). In the final campaign, the Mongols fight all Chinese dynasties at once.
  • After the invasions of Poland and Hungary, there would be a final Alternate History scenario about Ogatai not dying and the Mongols invading Western Europe.
• Since Mongols were not using the East Asian set yet, the proposed East Asian campaign was about the Japanese defending their islands from the Mongol invasions of 1274 and 1281.

Civilizations

• Several names for some factions were considered, including British instead of Britons, French instead of Franks, Germans and Teutonic Knights instead of Teutons, and Song instead of Chinese.
• In general, the Frankish civilization was more closely based on the Early Medieval Franks and the Carolingian Empire than the later Kingdom of France. The Design Doc even implies that the Franks would speak German or Latin, not French.
• Bizarrely, the Design Doc calls for Teutons to have weak buildings because the Teutonic Knights were supposedly more concerned with destroying Pagans than building structures. In the final game, the Teutons are a Stone Wall/Turtle civilization with the strongest defences because... the Teutonic Knights built many powerful castles to keep the Pagans down.

Formations and Tactics

• The developers considered giving units multiple attack modes, but decided it would add more frustration than it was worth. For instance, the Samurai could choose between using a bow and a katana. This feature would finally be added in Dynasties of India, where the Bengali’s Ratha unique unit can switch between a ranged and melee stance.
• Infantry could perform a shield wall that would make them immobile but more resistant to arrows.
• Spearmen would run faster when they were a few tiles from cavalry units (called "pikemen plunge"). They could also be "set against charge", in which case they would stand still, but be 3 times deadlier to cavalry attacking from the front.
• Cavalry could be set to charge, dealing double damage on their first hit.
• The galley, fireship, and demolition ship were just three attack modes of a single warship: shooting, Greek fire, and ramming. Ramming ships would deal 50 damage and receive 10. Greek fire would damage units and goods aboard transport ships.
• Warships could also grapple and board enemy ships, converting them to your side.
• Camels would kidnap villagers, like the cavalry in the raiding cultures concept (no Camels were planned in that version).
• Walls would blockade arrows from the outside while enabling archers on the inside to shoot.
• "Forced treaty" would temporarily turn an enemy into ally by paying it resources. The Britons would have the cheapest treaties and the Byzantines the most expensive.
• "Fealty" would allow players to become "clients" of other player. The other player would automatically receive 50% percent of the resources and gain (joint) control of the client player's units. Naturally, they could not attack each other until the agreement was rejected by one of the parts.
• Players could declare one "Jihad" against another player once in a game (this was not exclusive to the Saracens or anything, so it would probably be renamed if implemented). A Jihad would make impossible to change diplomacy between the target player and the proclaiming player, would boost the attack of the latter against the target by 20%, and would also boost the attack of all other players (minus the target) against everyone by 10%.
• Heroes would have the ability to convert units.
• There was a "Horde" formation where, if selected, units would move without formation, like in Age of Empires I. This was removed so late in development that it is still listed as available and described in the original Age of Kings manual.

Nature and Resources

• In addition to Food, Wood, Gold, and Stone, Ore was considered as a gatherable resource, also mined, and spent on military units and upgrades, while Gold was used for civilian units and technologies.
• Gold was to be acquirable through trade, taxes, and pillaging, but not mined (at least in most maps). A version of the minimap would show gold sources only, including established trade routes.
• The beta had different, less detailed graphics for most things, even rocks. The cliffs, on the other hand, survived unchanged until the HD version despite being just scaled-up versions of the ones used in Age of Empires.
• Trees and wild animals would slowly respawn (as long as there was one left of their species, in the latter case).
• Wolves would regain their health after killing a unit. They would move in packs, avoiding towns, and when encountered by villagers, there would be a random chance between attacking the villager or ignoring it. However, wolves would also get "hungry" periodically; the packs would then seek and attack deer, boars, bears, and villagers. Players were expected to figure how numerous wolves were by hearing their howling.
• Dolphins were fish sources in the beta but were replaced by Marlins to avoid controversy. Dolphins and fish may have moved around the map.
• Wild Boars could feed on farms and berry bushes, reducing the food they could provide for players.
• Bears almost replaced Boars. In addition to farms and bushes, they would feed on shore fish.
• Like in Age of Empires, there would have been a Hawk (as successor to the Eagle) and a Seagull. This time, the Seagull would be confined to water areas and show attraction to fishing boats.

Units

• Spies, also known as Infiltrators, would appear as Villagers wearing the enemy's colors. They could not be tasked by the player with "their" color so they were easy to recognize, and they could be attacked and killed by other units.
  • On the other hand, the Design Doc describes the "Infiltrator" as a "Ninja-like" infantry unit with high attack that can be used for isolated assassinations behind enemy lines (presumably of Kings and other Heroes). It is possible that the Infiltrator had a different "built" image before adopting the Villager disguise, like the Spy in Tzar: The Burden Of The Crown.
• Saboteurs were also relegated to the Editor before being reintroduced as the much nerfed petards in The Conquerors. Unlike the petard, which deals large damage to buildings but little to units, the saboteur deals large damage to everyone and is viable to use in crowds as a suicide bomber.
• The Janissary was originally a heavy foot archer◊ (like the Vietnamese Rattan Archer), before being changed to a heavy hand cannoneer◊, in deference to the Turks' status as sole gunpowder heavy civilization in the original game. Then, just before release, Microsoft insisted that Ensemble took out the Janissary's tall white hat out of fear that users would mistake it for a Klansman. Ever since, the first skin with hat has been available in fan sites, or included in fan expansions either replacing the hatless skin or as a "Royal Janissary" unit in the editor.
  • At one point, Janissaries were intended to shoot bows in the Castle Age and upgrade to firearms in the Imperial Age only.
• Knights went through several different designs as the developers debated between arming them with lances (as this was their primary weapon historically) or more iconic swords. One of the early sword versions used the same sprites as the Joan of Arc unit but with a full helmet and a plume similar to the Arbalest's.
• Before the Throwing Axeman, the Frankish UU was the "Frankish Paladin", a superheavy Paladin armed with a lance. It was based on Charlemagne's legendary Twelve Peers.
• The Saracen UU was first going to be a ranged infantry called "Dervish", then a "mounted berserker" (still called Dervish) before settling on the Mameluke.
• As in Age of Empires, trade cogs would bring different resources instead of just gold.
• "Trade boats", a sort of super-trade cogs, would travel to the edge of the map and disappear for a while before returning with a larger number of resources. However, they were difficult to code and very buggy, so they were taken out.
• "Builder ships" would allow players to build on the sea (walls, doors, towers, and docks) and also repair ships without having to bring them to shore. They were eliminated because playtesters used them in an offensive manner only, walling enemy docks instead of using them to protect their own as the developers intended. The sea walls, doors, and towers are now only available in the editor.
• Archers and Crossbowmen were going to be separate lines before crossbowmen were turned into archer upgrades. It is not known what upgrades archers would have, but longbows and composite bows come to mind.
• Mangonels and Onagers originally had to be packed to move and unpacked to use, like Trebuchets.
• The beta models of catapults and scorpions had soldiers pushing them like the Bombard Cannon and Organ Gun, although it is unknown if these would only appear when they moved or also when they shot.
• The Woad Raider was called the "Woad Berserker", and the Throwing Axeman, the "Axe Thrower".
• The Berserker was the Gothic UU at first; the Vikings were going to get the Longboat only (which was going to double as a transport ship). Longboats still have transport abilities buried in the game data.
• The Mongol UU was going to be an unspecified mobile siege unit, pulled by a horse or donkey.
• The Persian UU was provisionally named "Multipurpose Cavalry" and could switch between fighting with bow and lance.
• Surprisingly, the first plans called for Monks to have different skins depending of their religion (and to be Monk-like rather than Priest-like): Christians in tied brown robes, Muslims in white robes and circular caps, Buddhists in white robes and bald head, and Pagans in brown robes and goat-head masks.
  • As of Update 36202 of the DE, there is an unused African Monk icon, unique Asian and Muslim Monk heroes, and the Mesoamerican Monk introduced in The Conquerors, of course.
  • A development memo leak◊ confirms that this was worked on before the release of the Definitive Edition: the suspected Imam for Middle Easterners (plus Tatars), Bhikkhu for East Asians (plus Burmese), and African for Malians and Ethiopians, but also a Cardinal for South Europeans (minus Byzantines), Bhramin for Indians and Southeast Asians, Schemamonk for Slavs and Byzantines, Wiseman for Lithuanians, and Shaman for Cumans, Huns, and Mongols. Some civilizations would also receive unique Monastery sprites or share them with civilizations using a different building set but sharing the same religion, with the two Pagan shrines in the editor being used by the Lithuanians and shamanistic civilizations.
• Proposed cheats included a reference to Kung Fu B-movies (apparently hindering on a proposal to make Buddhist monks fight, and scrapped when monks were not made religion-specific), windmills that spun very fast and threw units away, fire-breathing dragons that set buildings alight, sea monsters that destroyed boats and ate units on the shore, Tim the Sorcerer and the Rabbit of Caerbannog.
• There was an Artifact Cart, like in Age of Empires.
• Donkeys would appear as a second land trade unit besides trade carts (they were later added in The Forgotten, but as a scenario-only unit; they move slower than carts but carry more gold).
• Monks would be available from the Dark Age, but they could not convert units until the Castle Age.

Expansions

Buildings

• In the preceding "Russian Mod" (see below), the Russian wonder was a model of St. Basil's cathedral borrowed from Cossacks. This is likely why the Slavic wonder ended being Kizhi Pogost despite being anachronistic: similar and monumental enough, but different enough for Microsoft not to be accused of basing their wonder on another company's graphics.
• Likewise, the Indians started as a mod that gave them the Middle Eastern building set and the Taj Mahal as a wonder (also taken from another game). The Forgotten changed the wonder to the Gol Gumbaz. However, another popular mod gave the Indians their own architecture, with the 3rd century BC(!) Sanchi Stupa as their wonder. This building style was later refined and made official with a third, Medieval wonder at last: the Brihadishvara Temple. The Sanchi Stupa remained as a Editor only building.
• Originally, the Ethiopians had Bet Giyorgis as their wonder instead of Bet Amanuel, the Malians had the Sankore Madrasah instead of the Great Mosque of Djenne, and the Portuguese Belem Tower had a wooden roof and less detailed ornaments. Amusingly, the only reason these early versions made it into The African Kingdoms (as skins of the "Palace" building in the editor) was because the developers wanted to have a non-convertable and non-victory-giving wonder in a campaign scenario, and plain forgot to replace the old designs with the definitive before release. Bet Giyorgis was modified into the Editor's Rock Church in the Definitive Edition.
• Given that the Italians began as the Romans, it shouldn't be a surprise that their wonder was originally the Colosseum, as in Rise of Rome.
• The Definitive Edition has Editor-only models of the Tower of London and the Dormition Cathedral in Moscow, which are good candidates for wonders of the Britons and Slavs. Given how the two have the most questioned wonders in the HD version by the fandom (Aachen Cathedral as The Artifact and anachronistic Kizhi Pogost), it is likely that the devs considered replacing them before deciding against (or, in the Britons case, choosing a third option with Chichester Cathedral).

Campaigns

• The "Scythian Prince" in the Attila campaign was going to be played by the "Scythian Scout" hero in the Editor, but it was changed to a non-heroic Scout Cavalry with 1000 health points. The Scythian Scout is used in the Definitive Edition.
• "Kyoto" was going to start as a mission to rescue Nobunaga from imprisonment and become a revenge mission after the rescue failed. This was changed when the creators got mail from Microsoft Japan telling them that samurai never took prisoners.
• A Korean campaign about the unification of Goryeo in the 10th century was planned for The Forgotten but was not finished due to time constraints. A single level ("Kaesong") was later uploaded to Steam.
• According to scenario designer Filthydelphia, the Portuguese campaign was first planned to be about Afonso de Albuquerque, and his first scenario was altered into Francisco de Almeida's second scenario.
• In early development of The Conquerors, two possibilities explored were to base the expansion on the "Dark Ages" and Charlemagne, or to move solidly into the early Modern Age with the addition of a fifth age and pike and shot tactics. The final expansion included aspects of both (Attila, Montezuma, and the Hussar, Petard, and Halberdier units).

Civilizations

• Before settling on a new American set, developers considered a Mediterranean set (shared by Spanish, Italians, and Moors), Eastern European set (shared by Slavic factions), and South Asian set (shared by Khmer and probably Indians).
• The Incas were discarded because the developers felt that their architecture was unique enough as to need its own building set instead of sharing it with Aztecs and Mayans, and because they were having enough trouble trying to make two distinctive civilizations with no cavalry to think of also making a third. Ironically, The Forgotten ended introducing an Inca civilization that shared the Mesoamerican building set and didn't have cavalry anyway.
• The eastern Europeans were also discarded because it was felt they'd require their own new building set, and the expansion was being rushed. The game ended including a technical eastern European civilization, the Huns, but they were given the Central European building set. Eventually, a Slavic civilization mostly based on Medieval Russia and with a new Eastern European set shared with the Magyars was included in The Forgotten. The Last Khans adds Lithuanians and Bulgarians, also with the Eastern European set, and Cumans, with a new Central Asian set. Despite this, the Hunnic architecture is still unchanged. Poles were at last included with the DLC Dawn of the Dukes, receiving the Eastern European set along with the Bohemians.
  • The Slavic civilization developed from a fan-made mod called the "Russian Mod", which replaced the Mayans and Aztecs with Ukrainians and Russians, and had a more markedly (though crude) Russian architecture than The Forgotten gave them. Because of this, they had no cavalry (except for two unique ones replacing Eagle Warriors and Plummed Archers) and the Russian UU was a type of infantry.
• The Khmer were at different points considered as the fourth East Asian civilization (before being beaten by the Koreans), and to have their own set shared with an Indian civilization (before being beaten by the Mesoamericans). They were later included in the southeast Asian-themed expansion, Rise of the Rajas, with a new architecture set based on Angkor Wat.
• The Tibetans were considered for The Forgotten before being replaced by the Indians, and are one of the most demanded civilizations by fans. However it is widely speculated that they will never be implemented due to the expected opposition of the Chinese government and AoE gaming community (one of the strongest ones worldwide along with the Vietnamese).
• The Italians were considered for the Western European set (and they had already been referenced extensively in the Barbarossa campaign) but lost to the Spanish after the creators decided to make a campaign about El Cid Campeador. The Spanish also had the additional value of being featured as campaign enemies of the Aztecs.
  • The Italians from The Forgotten also started as a fan mod, but one that would turn the Aztecs into Ancient Romans, with their own new set (incidentally, the makers would eventually go on to make 0 A.D. after Microsoft turned down their offer to remake the original Age of Empires). When they were reworked into a Medieval civilization, they were first called "Lombards".
• The Magyars (or Hungarians) were the candidates that almost made it, as a Central European civilization, but Ensemble decided that the Huns would be more recognizable and that a campaign based on Attila would sell better. Again, they were revived by a Hungarian modder.
• The Moors were discarded because Ensemble felt that a fifth civilization with the Middle Eastern set would be excessive. They eventually were included as the Berbers in The African Kingdoms.
• The Scythians were considered for Forgotten Empires but were discarded for being anachronistic despite appearing in the Attila campaign, and were replaced by the Slavs.
• Sandy Petersen proposed an African-themed expansion after The Conquerors, first for Age of Empires II, then for Age of Empires III. In the earlier draft ("Age of Africa"), all four civilizations were Subsaharan: Ghana, Mali/Songhai, Ethiopia, and Kongo. Mali would be a "camel-based civilization" with a Camel Archer or "tough camel" UU, Ghana would have a female UU based on the Dahomey Amazons (apparently from confusing Medieval Ghana with modern Ghana, and using it as a blanket for Guinea Gulf peoples), Ethiopia would have a melee infantry UU with a small range or area effect, and Kongo would have cavalry but no camels and a knife thrower UU. By a second interview (but still years before African Kingdoms), Petersen had already combined his plans for Mali, Ghana, and Kongo in a single Malian civilization.
• Not only are the Thais suspiciously absent from Rise of the Rajas, but the cutscenes in the Khmer campaign actually showed characters in Thai clothing before it was corrected in an update.
• At first, one of the announced bonuses for the Burgundians was that they were going to receive some gold for every knight they lost (a reference to the Battle of the Golden Spurs). This was considered unbalanced and was changed to a discount in Stable technologies (which isn't much, seeing as they don't get Bloodlines). As a Development Gag, the player receives gold when losing Burgundian cavalry heroes during the campaign.

Units

• The unfinished "Genitour" unit in the Scenario Editor of The Conquerors was going to be the Spanish UU, a mounted skirmisher that the Spanish would use to counter horse archers in lieu of their missing foot archer upgrades. The unit was likely dropped because it was too situational and so weak against most other units that they would have to be accompanied by knights to be effective (ironically, not unlike how they were used in Real Life). They were replaced with gun-toting Conquistadors that counter infantry instead: the knights now protect the Conquistadors from archers and the Conquistadors protect the knights from pikemen.
  • The Genitour was later finished and introduced in The African Kingdoms as a Berber UU that is also available to other civilizations allied with them. It isn't a popular unit, except among Native American players (who don't get cavalry otherwise) and Turks (who have no skirmisher upgrades).
• Had Magyars been included in The Conquerors, it's likely that the Hussar would have been the Magyar UU and not a generic light cavalry unit, as it was absent from the original game and non-Hungarian, non-Serb hussars all postdate the Medieval period.
• Likewise, it's all but confirmed that the Hwacha was the first option for a Korean UU, with one dev blog going as far as to claim that the War Wagon is "based on" the Hwacha despite looking nothing like it. The Hwacha probably needed more time to be designed and playtested than Ensemble could give it.
• The Malay were originally going to have the Champion upgrade in exchange for not having the last Imperial Age armor for their infantry units, but the developers realized the power-spike of the Champion is so huge in conjunction with Forced Levy (a unique tech that makes the Militia line cost no gold) that developers decided to remove the Champion upgrade since the Two-Handed Swordsman upgrade is enough to be an effective late game (aka "trash") unit. This explains why the Malay campaign has starting Champions in some scenarios despite the civilization not having access to them.
• The Vietnamese were not going to have the Champion upgrade or Bloodlines to put more emphasis on their archer units and their Battle Elephants, but testing revealed that the Vietnamese wouldn't have cost effective answers to the Goths's lategame. The developers decided to give the Vietnamese Champions and Bloodlines, as the former allows the Vietnamese a fighting chance against the Goths while the later allows strong synergy with their Cavalry Archers.
• A couple of hero units in the Definitive Edition (Itzcoatl and Cuauhtemoc) look closer to how Aztec Jaguar and Eagle warriors looked like in real life. It is possible they wanted to make them closer to their historical appearances, but decided against because of nostalgia or because the "wrong" versions actually stand out better.
• African-looking Villagers were considered for The African Kingdoms, but they were scrapped due to the complicated way in which they work (each Villager "profession" - farmer, hunter, gatherer, fisher, etc - is a different unit that they "convert to" when assigned a task).

---