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At the end of 2023, with the “request” of an AoE fan named Michael, which peaked my interest, things were about to come to a conclusion for me. After all these years, I think people deserve to see this: Even if it meant they could be taken down, (and they still might…), these development builds are something else entirely. Indeed, they represent History and we should not forget about donating to that cause. However: The choice is important here. Because with that choice you cannot remain an active member of the community of HG and AoE, since doing this does in some way kind of “violate” the rules. Therefore you have to resign and quit. A culmination of the path of passion I have chosen – to play Age of Empires, and to run this website. You ask yourself the question: Is it right for me to do this? What would one do? Answer a request from a long-time fan OR pretend he does not exist? What must be taken in consideration of this all? That’s a whole library in itself there. And then a funny part happens, the request just so happens to coincide with the Christmas Holidays. What would you do? In this case? At that point in time? At least WE were allowed to celebrate in style. Now I would have to play the part of Santa too. Oh, and guess what? The fan bears the same name as the Archangel that started THIS VERY WEBSITE: Age of Empires Heaven. WHAT WOULD AN AOEH WEBMASTER DO?

It was a Glorious Game – and this is why I cannot co-rule anymore.

I can’t understate how important it is to have someone that helps you out. By that, I mean a Seraph that can continue what I would have done: Keep it running. We are saving/writing History here. This site has won me over so badly that I must remain grounded from now on. I cannot keep posting on AoEH anymore.

Now, you may ask the question, what happened on that coincidentally faithful Christmas Evening? I closed the Poll, added the new one and made the final adjustments to the last newspost I was about to make. Little did I know the other fish had the perfect counter-move ready: A Granary submission standing by to be approved, made by the legendary Gumble. When I checked the Granary, I APPROVED IT INSTANTLY, NOT REALIZING IT WAS FISK WHO UPLOADED IT INSTEAD OF GUMBLE! Seeing what had occurred, I let the Emperor himself make the announcement obviously. An amazing piece of art from one of the great masters of the sacred craft. What more could anyone ask for on AoEH in the Holiday Season? The icing on the lake that Christmas evening. Therefore, by (scn) design, Fisk is the greatest Seraph, because of his magic conjuring skills GUMBLE CAME BACK. And now he gets to solely lead the EMPIRE OF HEAVEN. YOU WILL BOW BEFORE HIM, and he will show you MERCY. He is the Definitive Cleidopus Gloriamaris to you. YOU WILL WORSHIP Pineapples: ALL HAIL EMPEROR FISK. And, Glory to Gumble!

That’s the move that was the checkmate, and therefore, I am per the rules of the game, defeated in this battle of gladiators.

We both celebrated in the best possible way an AoE(H) fan could think of – seriously – this part of the poetry, or should I say party, was very exciting! SKAL!

So, one final request from a personal fan, hereby.

AoE has lured me in like no other game series ever will. Masterpieces to be proud of, each one of them. Thank you Ensemble Studios.

This catalog of what appeared to have some fancy pictures of a game which came with the new PC my Dad bought, intrigued me. This was back in November 1998. That game, which was the first game I played on this new PC, was called Age of Empires: The Rise of Rome Trial version. It was included on a neat demo CD-ROM DISC. The catalog even mentioned cheat codes and also, websites with more information about AoE: aoe.heavenweb.com, or age.gamestats.com or something similar. It was the first time I started using the internet. *56k dial up modem sounds play in the background*

The moment I played the Battle of Tunes scenario, the third of the campaign, I was HOOKED. Oh man, did they get me. Those raiding parties. But, I was resilient. I saved my progress and ultimately succeeded in fending of the waves of attack by the ai, impressive stuff. Then little by little I gained more territory and ultimately destroyed the Colloseum in the west corner of the map. It took me about two/three weeks total to complete the campaign IIRC. That beautifully crafted map and polish of the game left such an impression on me that I asked my parents to buy me the full game, and on my birthday I got the Gold Edition. I absolutely fell in love – and a serious case of AoE addiction came next.

Do you remember the music part? Yep, I was one of those weirdos that loved popping in the CD-ROM to my CD-player and just listening to the amazing soundtrack, not playing the game. It is so well done and mesmerizing that I can hum each track by memory without problem. Even the midi tracks are way cool. It fitted perfectly for not only conquest but reading too.

Do you remember the educational part? I have read my hard-copy of the manual countless times, which features History on the civilizations aside from explaining how the game works. Age of Empires helped me become interested in History, and with learning the English language – invaluable lessons presented in the best and most fun way possible.

It is scenario design that got me interested in this place. I thought how neat these advanced design tricks looked and how more lifelike, or realistic the game became this way, what is known as eye candy. A lesson learned, and a Standard set. How can I do such amazing things myself? At some point a young me must have been very impressed with this stuff and asked that question. I found myself so attracted to it that to this day it amazes me that there are such works of wonder still here – and I have played some part in this too, part of a community that I’ve been proud to share with.

I became a forum member sometime in 2000 or 2001, and often visited AoEH, and became slowly more active after the height (The Zone, which was awesome, btw) of AoERoR. AoEH offered so much variety and such an amazing experience next to the game itself that I fell in love and have never looked back. It’s still HERE, a bit quiet perhaps, but AoEH is still here! Now I’m not going to post everything I and others did on AoEH, you just have to believe me when I say this community was/is amazing.

To sum things up: It is you, the fans, who continue to make this great experience last.

Keep this in mind though: At some point you have to remember that you are “just” worshipping bytes. That’s the real Wololo-ing going on right there. In case you have not noticed yet: It’s prevalent everywhere.

On Beta versions

I became fascinated with the development after finding the original Trade Workshop template in the Granary. Then there were the Horses also. Cool. HOW DO I GET THESE IN THE GAME? 😀 It enhanced my AoE experience so much that I went on a journey to find out more about where these came from, which eventually resulted in re-discovering a beta version myself. And then came the next, even better find by a like-minded person who helped me and the community out tremendously: An alpha stage build which gave such a unique insight into the whole design process. Fun times making lots of new discoveries. Somewhere along the way I found an actual copy of the first RoR beta on CD-ROM, a truly rare piece of memorabilia and my favorite amongst the other AoE stuff I own. It went as far as contacting and receiving the autograph of from one of the developers, Matt Pritchard, “The Optimizer”, a great guy. I have tried, along with others, to record some of the development history of AoE on my aoebeta.com website back then. Now, I think we can present to you a pretty complete picture of what made AoE, AoE, on the one website where this I think truly belongs: AoEH. There are quite some cool differences between the development versions. In one of the early beta builds, you can actually build a Trade Workshop! May they continue to have a place in (Gaming) History. I hope someone finds the time to go through these gems, and perhaps, make records and notes.

Litude – Thank you, it was great sharing the journey of discoveries. Stay safe. J – Thank you too man, good times. Thanks to the other fans (TAG) too, of course, lest we forget.

On Definitive Edition and Return of Rome

I of course enjoyed them very much, great job! I must do a comparison to the original game though, and that leaves me thorn between liking and not liking the newer iterations. Do you remember that slider thing comparing the DE graphics, with a purposefully zoomed in perspective of the original graphics on the ageofempires.com site? Who were they trying to convince? You should know that looks aren’t everything, lol. I get the sales tactic of course. The newer graphics are beautifully crafted I think, but so are the older original vibrant graphics. The gameplay in general of all versions is fantastic, and overall great fun. The capabilities of AoE2DE are especially commendable, there are SO many ways in which you can build a Kingdom, which is quite superb, if I may coin a term.

Now, I will mention what ultimately ruined the DE experience for me: communication, or lack thereof, specifically Censorship in chat. And I don’t mean stuff one could potentially “live” with – I cannot even type Fisk and I get censored. I cannot communicate in a proper way with a team mate. Imagine that. Worst of all, the censor can’t or won’t ever be made optional, which is a dick move. Nobody asked for it. You know it, everybody knows it. I play a game to be distracted from the modern RL world. In this game I get to build another world – the fun is immensely GREAT: and yet, suddenly ‘somebody’ felt the need to include BS RL politics = censorrrrsh!t and all that, and it ruins the experience. Unfortunately, this is being pushed around in every modern “game” now. Another thing which must be mentioned here, is to at least give credit where credit is due (to chab and scripter64). I know most of you don’t care about this, but really, you should. I gave DE enough chances to win me over – while I absolutely love many of it’s aspects, it just doesn’t seem to fully convert me in the end. As a former Scythe charioteer this should really not come as a suprise, though.

That’s why… in my humble opinion, the original AoE series of games, made by Ensemble Studios, win: They are perhaps simple to some, however, they are the original first series – and it doesn’t matter how many times you keep reinventing the wheel. I was thrilled to see the outcome of the last Poll of which a majority of AoEH fans seem to kind of agree and share in this sentiment. Despite some flaws, the original AoERoR game still stands out and reigns supreme. It’s certainly noticable in Vietnam: keep on playing, it was nice to watch a bunch of your matches – great fun and absolute insane moves.

However, and this is IMPORTANT: you play what YOU like of course! The Poll result does NOT mean the other votes are less valid. Remember: just have fun.

On my campaigns and map design

If you play my campaigns, play them as they were meant to be played, on the original vanilla AoE v1.0b (Part I) and RoR 1.0a (Part II, with RockNRoR), please don’t use Definitive Edition because they won’t work.

Some designer notes on The Heavenly Escort (Part I):

I started this project with the idea to represent AoEH and the community members in a scenario. You may have noticed the many Hero types, that’s why. I think I may have used all of them. The Wonder in the sky, which should as come as no surprise then, represents AoEH (the website you are reading this on). The Lost Soul is an allegorical reference to a visitor of AoEH – who seeks info about AoE and finally reaches the one wonderous site that has it all – AoEH. One needs a helping hand navigating that place of magic of course, an orange mercenary who can guide you…

The optical illusion on the south corner of the map came out of nowhere basically. I accidentally created it when hex-editing the scenario’s data tiles.

Some designer notes on The Heavenly Escort (Part II: Night of the Dragon)

I always had invisioned an extra level, or scenario for part I. But it required quite some time and experimenting before things really took off. It had to be something refreshing when it comes to design, yet resemble part I in some way and taking in account all kinds of new design tricks that you want in – those are the real fun parts. When after testing for so long you hit a mark that seems to be just right – and then magic happens. Something akin to a paradox – an optical illusion. It just boggles the mind.

I enjoy Escher quite a bit – his museum is worth visiting. I recreated his optical stairway illusion in AoE. How cool is that? Kind of a signature design trick if you will. The problem with this of course, meant that it had to be created on a very small scenario. Like VERY SMALL. Only 8×8 tiles. Anything bigger would distract from it. HOW ON EARTH COULD YOU DESIGN ANYTHING ON THIS AND SOMEHOW MAKE IT “WORK”? That’s where the solution came in – the glue that build and holds it together, literally – I have used RockNRoR so extensively with designing this scenario that I cannot recommend it anymore better than seeing it in action through the example I have given you – Part II. It is the tool I used to create the illusion – I did not have to do it through hex-editing this time, it saved me much pain figuring this thing out, haha. You are the MAN who made that magic possible Chab. To top it off, RockNRoR has all the basic triggers that would be required to at least make the scenario work. You are witnessing a design here that would not have been possible without this invaluable tool, and his knowledge of the game.

Now because it’s so small, how do you make the scenario “big” and grand? I thought of every conceivable way this could be done, it is, after all, a VERY small map… The amount of action that could take place even with triggers would reach a limit very, very fast. But the ideas were taking shape. And then formed a whole. I have tried to incorporate nearly everything I have learned about AoE scn design. Somehow it worked out I think, and then the painting came alive. Through the triggers and careful placement of certain objects the scenario could now be interacted with, even though it could only be done for a short time, in limited ways.

On some of the tricks used:
– The Assassin being killed and fences staying at the very start was achieved through accessing the status of the unit mode through RockNRoR.
– As Fisk pointed out, the white sails of Fishing Ships make for nice snow covered mountain tops. Thank you so much for the great in-depth review! I never even knew it was there before writing this.
– The frozen Dragon effect is achieved using a specific special terrain type. Birds stop moving on it when they touch. However, in rare ocassions, they can escape.
– The Dragon is owned by Player 6, green, a trick used first by member Scenario_t_c, a HEX-editing technique that allows nature objects to be owned by a Player instead of Gaia. It works in RoR too, to some degree.
– To “cover up” the jumping between tiles I used the Wonder building: when moving, it looks like you kind of enter and exit the building because of its entrances/exits stair placements.
– You reach the ACTUAL REAL MAXIMUM amount of resources that the game allows before crashing, which is over 2 billion. This was the final HEX-editing trick I had up my sleeve, it cannot be created any other way.
– Upon winning the campaign there appears another scenario in the campaign scenario list – but it’s not playable and displays a weird funny message if you click on it. This was achieved through an unorthodox way of incorporating a “scenario” into the campaign that can’t be read by AoE 😉
– Fun facts: map size wise, it is the tiniest custom scenario created in AoE and exactly 4 times smaller than the 32×32 tile map I used for The Heavenly Escort.

It was totally worth the time spent on designing these projects. Both campaigns took me around 3 months to complete. A reminder: that does not include the time spent on all the kinds of design experiments done on other older scenarios! And of course, I should thank the other people here who contributed in some way into making all of this possible, especially the Toolmakers.

What happens if you make use of all these neat tools and all that you have learned with AoE’s scenario editor? You get something so beyond what is capable in vanilla AoE. Creativity is amplified like a 1000% within the realm of AoE. I always like to push the boundaries with AoE because that’s what gives me joy, and I hope my campaigns gave you that as well!

A few thoughts on other designer’s custom work then. As you may know, my favorite works are made by Ingo, (his Tai Gun series). You should absolutely play his campaigns before you even attempt any serious map designing. If these will not inspire you I do not know what will. Another personal favorite has to be Little Big Nordic Adventure, by Andrea. I specifically loved the 3rd or 4th scenario, which is a small map but contains an absolutely ingenious puzzle in which you are drunk and have to win a fishing race. The creativity here is through the roof. Insane stuff. I loved Gumbles crazy experiments too. Thanks everyone for sharing your creations with the world and inspiring people. Keep submitting them!

A final thought on map tricks: I think there are still quite a few boundaries left unchecked in map design – you may come across them doing the unexpected…

Thank you to:

All Staff and members of HG and especially to those who kept/keep AoEH and the community going.
All AoE fans around the world, and those who contribute(d) in some way.
My Dad, for introducing me to the world of Age of Empires.

Soooo… if you are still here and have not fallen asleep, that about wraps it up I think. Note: I am permitted still to have a look and watch the game continue on 😉 It was a fantastic and fun Battle.

Oh, by the way, there is another AoE.

Long live AoE(H)!

Much love and the best to you all,

PhatFish

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