Age of Empires Online

An excellent free-to-play game, but a less than stellar paid experience. Definitely worth the download, but not worth your cash. [Nov 2011, p.44]

If you choose to get the free version, Age of Empires Online has many hours of content to offer, however, the restrictions of this version gets the game closer to a "giant demo".

It's most suitable for newbies, as the veterans will miss all the advanced options. The first will anyway find some good fun in this lighter version of the historic RTS.

Age of Empires Online could has been a great free to play game. Unfortunately a bad implementation of the freemium model ruins all the instances.

Quotation forthcoming.

Being free and highly accessible, AOEO will certainly score with casual gamers, but the repetition and lack of depth make it hard to recommend dropping coin on premium content.

Age of Empires Online's jaunt across the ancient world serves as a robust and enjoyable free introduction to the real-time strategy genre, but if you're willing to plunk out $20 to $100 dollars for a complete strategy experience, you'll find much better options elsewhere.

Caught somewhere between massively-multiplayer online role-playing game and hardcore competitive real-time strategy, Age of Empires Online delivers some of the most addictive parts of both. Some sloppy mechanics and balance and reward issues detract from the core Age of Empires experience, but not to the point that it's not worth playing.

Age of Empires, great as it was, doesn't quite stand up against the best in the RTS genre today - and Age of Empires Online doesn't improve on its mighty predecessors in any meaningful way in-game, while adding a lot of bumf around it of questionable value.

There's still fun to be had here, though given the choice series fans and strategy purists will likely boot up a previous title, such as the genre-defining Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings instead.

In the end, Age of Empires Online works well as a demo rather than a F2P game. There just doesn't seem to have been enough thought about what each element from the MMO and RTS genres bring to the party. Instead, they've just been thrown together.

A fine RTS in the classic tradition, but it takes players far too long to get to the good parts--even if you pay. [Dec 2011, p.76]

It's beautiful, free and addictive to a point, but Age of Empires Online's battles fail to deliver a challenge. [Nov 2011, p.110]

While there are a lot of positive elements to Age of Empires Online which see it retain the series' core strategy mechanics, you can't help but shake the feeling that there is a decent amount of content hidden away from you.

Age of Empire Online is the good old strategic game we all remember, with its infamous flaws we all remember (AI and pathfinding) and the free-to-play business model that hinders the overall experience in favor of Microsoft's easy cash gains.

By no means a breakthrough in the RTS genre. Veteran players of games such as StarCraft, Supreme Commander or even Age of Empires III will most likely find that it lacks the depth of its bretheren. Still, in spite of its abysmal AI and other design flaws, AoE Online has a certain appeal, thanks to its interesting progression. For some players, the game will work just like an MMORPG: questing may not always be exciting, but the reward system will keep them coming back.

Age of Empires Online effectively infuses its conventional real-time strategy gameplay with massively multiplayer online-style loot and leveling mechanics.

To use its whole potential you have to dig deep into your pockets to unlock premium content. The only thing left for the fans of the series is to hope for Age of Empires IV. [November 2011, p.80]

If you want to "play for free", then Age of Empires Online has enough content to keep you entertained for about forty hours. But if you want to play it as a completive "pvp" RTS, the only way to do it is by purchasing the Premium content. If you choose the second way, you will find out that AOE Online has far less content and options than some older AOE titles.

Quotation forthcoming.

Real-time strategy for the FarmVille generation, and yet it still owes too much to the past - and offers far less than it pretends for free.

We don't feel that all the pieces are in place just yet.

It's never worse than pleasant, and the evergreen villages, the jaunty swagger of its cows and donkeys and the peaceful expansion of your city are exactly the kind of recharging experiences Taylor talked about providing four years ago. It's only a shame that the repetition, and a lack of anything to look forward to, mean that you eventually realise your grass still needs to be cut.

An aggressively contemporary take on a classic series that'll divide as many as it conquers.

The fact that so much game is available for everyone for free right away is a noble idea, but there needs to be more of a benefit to those who invest in a premium version.