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For anyone who see the preview back in February, this is not exactly surprising, but it certainly brings home the reality of the situation—that the preview did not unfairly represent the actual game.
This deeply upsets me, because the Age of Empires franchise is one I really care about. 1, 2, 3, 4, and Age of Mythology are all excellent games, and every one of them belongs in the top 20 RTS games of all time. Microsoft might not be developing this game (that’s getting outsourced to Chinese company TiMi with a history of producing trash mobile games), but they are tarnishing their brand by allowing it to be associated with this game.
But it gets worse. They are apparently also silencing critics of it. Back when February’s announcement came out, some select few creators were allowed to put out videos about the game using exclusive footage of the game, and were told they’d be paid for their role in promoting the game. But they retained editorial control over the videos. YouTube channel Age of Noob put out one such video, and while tempered in its tone, it was largely negative.
Yesterday, the YouTube channel Age of Noob put out a video saying he never got paid, as well as more specifically saying how bad the game was. Today, he put out another one saying he was forced to take down that one (in vague terms—it would not even be clear he was talking about AoE Mobile, if you hadn’t seen the first video). In a pinned comment he also said that after making the second video, he found out he had been removed from the Age Franchise Partners programme.
If this is how Microsoft is willing to treat their biggest game franchise (well, biggest one that they didn’t buy after it was already huge), and the creators that help promote it, that is incredibly disappointing.
Not even close (baby) to the first time: videogamedunkey got stiffed by Microsoft for putting out a review they didn’t like some 10-ish years ago.
Microsoft offered to pay if he made four videos for Xbox Live’s Summer of Arcade. Shortly after Gastrow uploaded the first video, in which he lambasted the game he was playing, Microsoft took down the video and canceled the deal. [Wikipedia] [Source Video]
I saw that source video on the Wikipedia page, before you edited it in, and yeah, thanks for sharing. It’s angering. The thing is though, it’s much less surprising of 2013 Microsoft than it is of 2024 Microsoft. Today’s Microsoft has paid much better attention to its gaming products, and in particular has been an incredibly good steward of the Age franchise. The game itself of Age of Empires Mobile is such a huge departure from this, feeling like a massive kick in the arse to Age fans. And up to now, the only real criticism of how they’ve handled media and the fans of the Age franchise has been a comparative lack of communication directly from them. There’s been nothing similar to this.
It’s disappointing to see that they’re still pulling the same shit we thought they got out of their system when they replaced the CEO in 2014.
As a side note, that video makes a big point of referencing the Dreamworks movie Antz. I just finished watching another video that popped up in my feed that did the same thing (though for entirely unrelated reasons). That was a weird experience. (To be more accurate, I just finished watching a movie that I decided to put on immediately after watching a YouTube video that popped up in my feed. The video in my feed was not about Antz, and neither was the movie I watched. So technically I watched said video about 90 minutes ago.)
I am a long time AoE player, and I know Microsoft has paid close attention to game balance and feedback from the community. Still, as a mobile game, I can’t say I’m that surprised. I am disappointed that they didn’t put the same level of care in making AoE2 DE possible to play on console with a controller, that they could have done with the mobile game.
Microsoft has done scummy stuff in their various product lines 25 years ago, 15 years ago, 5 years ago, now, it’s all a similar story. Except where I have to to make money (at work), I’m trying to move my personal life away from Microsoft as possible.
Also you have been cursed by the ants, soon you will hear the band Alien Ant Farm everywhere you go /s
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Not surprising, but disappointing
It’s a cash-grab, play AoE 4 instead.
Or AoE 2 like god intended
¿Porque no los dos?
Both are great!
Not suprising, good mobile games usually come from small indie devs (like all good things). When a big IP gets attached to it, it usually doesn’t go well for the hardcore audience.
