Age of Empires 2
From Eduwiki
Review by Mehmet.
Age of Empires 2 was one of the games I used to play when I was in college. It is a very addicting and quite exciting "real-time" strategy game.
The game is based on historical story lines. You pick a Ruler that you want to be and you follow specific campaigns based on some real events. Historical accuracy is not 100 percent but you get to learn quite a bit about that leader and that nation and you go beyond the simple fights and you find out why that leader took out that war.
There are simple and clear explanations and goals behind each campaign. For example when I played as Saladin one of my campaigns was to get rid of a French Knight who was terrorizing the Medina and Aqaba region of Arabia. He was basically a pirate on sea and land, who broke a peace treaty. My mission was to kill him and meanwhile protect the caravans and provide security to the two cities. So there are simultaneous objectives you need to be following for the most part of the campaigns.
Each campaign has specific objectives usually between 1 to 4 or 5. Defeating the enemy, protecting your allies are some important ones. So you cant just keep attacking anything you see because there are other things going on around you that you dont see at that specific moment. You are supposed to allocate your army units according to your objectives and make sure they survive.
As you pass each campaign the objectives get more difficult to attain. You need to build your own structure and produce your army and weapons to attack your enemy before they attack you. Since its a real time game you need to be quick to make decision and maneuver your army and weapons. You have to keep an eye on your surroundings every other minute or so to see if anyone is approaching to attack you.
There is also a "random map" version of the game if you dont want to follow a series of campaigns. Here you pick a civilization and fight against another one on a randomly selected map.
The graphics are awesome in this game and you get the feeling of the real age that empire lived. The buildings and geography is represented beautifully with great details. Also each type soldier is pictured very nicely with their armors.
As you progress more and more in the game you get to develop great variety of technology to have different buildings and war machines. You also get to have magicians who make potions to convert enemy soldiers to turn to your side.
You also get to build religious buildings such as mosques or churches which look great by the way!
TIPS: In the first few campaigns try to move each group of your soldiers together. you can do this by double clicking on a soldier, this will select all the same type of soldiers. This is very effective when you want to move them around or attack an enemy. Stay away from towers and dont try to burn or destroy every enemy structure or kill every enemy soldier you see, it will waste your time and men! Focus on the target and go to it as quickly as you can.
Dont attack gates or towers with men, use your catapults, ships or other un-menned weapons. This will do the job quicker and with much less losses.
Save your game each time before you get to a critical point in the game(eg. before attacking a major city or castle). This way if you lose/die you wont have start all over(because thats what happens if you dont save the game every once in a while) and you can change your strategy with anew one to see if that will work. I remember trying 4-5 different times to just take over a castle.
EDUCATIONAL IMPLICATIONS: I think with a game like this students can learn many things about history, geography, religions and culture. Also technological developments, hierarchy and diplomacy. Also skills to be improved are strategic thinking, quick decision making, planning ahead, following specific objectives and developing a strategy accordingly and learning to have responsibilities. Overall it is an exciting game since it is a real time game. It keeps you focused and on task. Also the sounds and voices are motivating. The soldiers reply to you in their own language when you give an order, you can even learn some foreign language here :) I think its an awesome game!
