Age of Empires III Demo

[RainOfTerror]

Age of Empires III is set in 1500 A.D. and chronicles the Age of Discovery that started around the time that Columbus discovered the new world. The single player campaign follows American history up through 1850, and in multiplayer mode, you'll be able to choose from among eight different civilizations, and there will include free-for-all and team-vs-team matches for up to eight players.

The demo includes single player skirmish mode and two missions in the single player campaign. In Skirmish mode you can play as the British or the Spanish empires in the New England and Texas maps.

Mirrors:

Worthplaying (http://www.worthplaying.com/article.php?sid=28055) (365 MB)
Microsoft (http://download.microsoft.com/download/d/7/3/d7348fe3-d498-4e13-96c6-3da92e8f0c62/aoe3trial.exe)
3D Gamers (http://www.3dgamers.com/news/more/1096482757/)
FileShack (http://www.fileshack.com/file.x?fid=7610)
GameSpot (http://dlx.gamespot.com/pc/ageofempiresiii/moreinfo_6132708.html)
FilePlanet (http://www.fileplanet.com/156731/150000/fileinfo/Age-of-Empires-III-Demo)

[Hizawky]

All I have to say about this game is this:

They hired a programmer to be fully devoted to programming the water effects in this game.

[Nameback]

Downloading it now...... anyone got it yet?

[resikel]

I just got it at 3dgamer. It me about 13-15 minutes to get, and that's including the 3 minutes wait time.

Time to load up.

[abso]

grabbing it now. guess i better do my homework while this downloads, or i'll never end up doing any tonight

[A-Team]

FileRush won't be hosting this one folks. We actually went over our bandwidth allotment (which is a pretty hefty amount of bandwidth) due to the fact that they added 10 additional days to our August bill. That doesn't mean that you can't download from us, but it does mean that we're paying $0.50 for every GB that we upload on one of our two boxes.

On that note, the Microsoft FTP is very fast. :)

[H.Bogard]

wooo hooo! yeah baby! lots more servers gonna crash tonight!

[Morrolan]

A-Team, you guys should show preference to the Bittorrent links. Have the DDs but make sure people notice bittorrent each time. Hell, BT is the reason I go to your site.

[Zulu107]

I was just checking the website about 2 hours ago and everything said, coming soon..so thanks I've anticipated this game for years! :)

[Thenetcase]

All I can say after playing it for only 30 minutes is.. wow. It's a great game and a worthy successor from everything I've seen. They definitely didn't overplay the amazing visuals and ignore the game engine. It still feels the same but there are some differences. The whole game makes you feel like you really did advance from the last era to the new age of mobilization and expansion.

Two thumbs up here!

-TnC-

[KarmaGhost]

Nice, getting it now. As A-Team said, go with the MS download: very fast.

[selfnoise]

Doesn't support Windows 2000.

Hi, we're Microsoft. We're assholes.

[A-Team]

A-Team, you guys should show preference to the Bittorrent links. Have the DDs but make sure people notice bittorrent each time. Hell, BT is the reason I go to your site.
The BT link and the DD links direct you to two different places in the world - literally. The BT link will take you through to our servers in NY, the DD link will take you to Romania (where LinkMania is hosted).

[TheBigL]

suprizengly the game feels just like the previus one in terms of grapthics (2D and 3D neveer look so alike... and thats a huge compliment!!!).

Gameplay stayed the same (Why to change a winning formula?) just as charming as it was before.

The AI was beefed up and its nice to see that you dont have to babysit every soldier anymore.

All is great but I am really pissed off... :/

It seems like there is a new trand to shut off half of the screen in a game for some GUI interface.
why do they do it? I can barly plan a frigging 20 people attack! not to mantion the zoom which is quite bad (cant too do far, nor can do too close).

Also the game feels sloooow. well just like the privius ones. But we are in a new era here, we recived so many stratagy titles that provide us with non stop fast action while beeing quite the stratigic. Why do I have to see my knight lag out when he tries to hit a running away soldier (He stops and gives a hit to the air, while the running away soldier gets hit).

In the end I Think Ill pick up The latest rome total war expention (barbarian invasion).

[doyama]

I've played thru the demo, it's got a few basic scenarios to play through. Not bad graphically its a nice upgrade.

One thing I"m noticing though, the cutscense the audio there is a huge pause between the subtitles and the voice acting. I even notice it in game as well. Its very annoying. Like it takes 10 seconds to play the voice sample or something

[Abash Alarmist]

Doesn't support Windows 2000.

Hi, we're Microsoft. We're assholes.

No, you are the asshole that believes in having a company constantly create programs/games that will work with archaic OS that was released February 17, 2000...Over 5 1/2 years ago...There is a reason that new technologies are being supported: they are far more technically advanced. Why should a company support an OS with new (Not even released in this case) software where it will be bogged down by the technical inefficiencies that Windows 2000 brings; where as if they fully support a more up-to-date OS they will be able to bring everything to do the table...Not down it because they support assholes like you too lazy to buy a new OS and blaming it on the developers/publishers.

[Lint of Death]

Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesssssssssss!!! Demo!!!!

Edit: I've been using Filefront for downloads (Worthplaying's second mirror); is there a faster free website? Not that I'm saying Filefront is slow, I'm just curious with the increasing occurence of large files.

[selfnoise]

Gee, Rogue, inefficiency, right. That's why I can play Battlefield 2 glass-smooth on my 2000 rig, but not this fucking RTS.

[thecrazyd]

No, you are the asshole that believes in having a company constantly create programs/games that will work with archaic OS that was released February 17, 2000...Over 5 1/2 years ago...There is a reason that new technologies are being supported: they are far more technically advanced. Why should a company support an OS with new (Not even released in this case) software where it will be bogged down by the technical inefficiencies that Windows 2000 brings; where as if they fully support a more up-to-date OS they will be able to bring everything to do the table...Not down it because they support assholes like you too lazy to buy a new OS and blaming it on the developers/publishers.
To be fair, 2k is the superior operating system. The only reason I changed is because BF2 is XP only.

Selfnoise, if you can run BF2 glass smooth, then you are one of the lucky few. And if you do have problems, EA will not provide support, because the game is XP only.

[selfnoise]

Well, I didn't know folks had problems with BF2 and 2000. I certainly haven't.

But I've had no problem playing hardware-intensive games on 2000... Splinter Cell : CT for instance. AFAIK the two operating systems are very, very similar, and the Directx versions are identical.

I'm okay with non-support the way EA does it. That's fine. But not allowing me to INSTALL the game? Jesus. What a Microsoft thing to do. Just because I don't want to pay for an operating system that restricts my rights without offering me JACK SHIT in return. Gosh, I really should give MS a reacharound. I'm an asshole for not doing it.

[thecrazyd]

*cough cough somepeoplepiratewinxp cough cough*

[Chagrinful]

I have to agree with the person who said they hate the new GUI, why take a step backwards with your GUI when you had an amazing one that did the job, I'm somewhat dissapointed they took they typical 3d RTS route and have a fugly GUI that takes up too much screen real estate. Otherwise great game.

[KarmaGhost]

Wow, lots of GUI here. Also, I didn't play AoE II, so I am kind of in the dark about the structure and how things work. I'm figuring it out myself, but why not include some sort of tutorial, if you're not going to include the "Learn How to Play" in the demo? If you reduce the graphical settings, things (buildings, units, etc) get kinda difficult to distinguish from eachother. Overall, however, quite fun.

[Nameback]

I found it very Meh, I loved AoE II and thought AoM was very enjoyable. I just find this game very diffrent then the previous ones, change is good, however I find these changes to be a bit too much.

[trip1eX]

I enjoyed my first playthru. The graphics and sounds and explosions have a lot to do with it. My biggest fear is that the game will get old quick cause it seems tlike too much of the same thing again.

[dojoteef]

Damn this sucks. It says it can't initialize Direct3D on my XPS laptop.

[amusedtoe]

*sigh* Time to crank up the coal engines that power the dial-up. :(

[Leaving Hope]

I have to agree with the person who said they hate the new GUI...they took they typical 3d RTS route and have a fugly GUI that takes up too much screen real estate.

I'm with you Chagrinful: The GUI is way too big. Though it's a great demo, and if you're considering downloading it I strongly recommend it.

[Arphahat]

Bah... another RTS... who needs another one of those?

[ÜberJumper]

hahahah I love that I can click on the Microsoft Download link and get 550+ KB/s.

Microsoft fucking rules.

[Evil Avatar]

Are you guys using really small monitors or something? When I played this a few weeks ago I don't remember the interface being any larger than in the previous titles.

I think we were using 17" flat panel monitors.

[Chagrinful]

I'm using a 19" one here.

[Borgboy]

I haven't tried it yet, because I'm not at home. It will probably kill my computer anyway, but in the previous titles, changing the screen resolution in game fixed that. It always freaks me out every time I start one of these games, and the resolution default has reset. Then I remember the GUI gets smaller when you raise the resolution.

[Moatman]

19" lcd(in 1280x1024) here and yeah, the interface did seem a bit large to me, taking up more than a third of the screen it seemed like.

I found it interesting, I'll have to toy around with the game more to give better impressions, but a couple things stood out. I couldn't figure out how to repair anything for starters, is that a learned ability for peons now or am I just being dumb? I found it interesting that the hero units can't die it seems like? Very big change from the age of myth version of hero unit immortality, not sure if I like it or not though. The Home City idea is interesting, I'm not sure how the "cards" work yet, so I'll have to try playing through some more, but at least now we know where some of those gorgeous street-level screenshots of real looking cities came from.

I found it a really odd mission to start with, way into the third chapter and with no tutorial or explanation of how the new buildings and units worked, seems more of a tech demo or hardcore gamer demo than something to get new players introduced to the franchise.

I will play around with it more, it's certainly pretty enough to look at, and just try to get an idea of all the things that have changed, also really wanna see how diverse the playable nations are(closer to age of myth or aoe2)

[thecrazyd]

Aww man.. This game is pretty awesome. The demo sold me on it. It playes like AOE2, but without some of the shitty micromanaging. And the ships? The ships are fucking awesome. Evil was right. This game kicks ass.

[jacob.armitage]

what are the reqs? cant find 'em anywhere.

(didnt look very hard, in a rush)

[captainstrombosis]

Dunno where all these bad impressions are coming from. The UI takes up the normal amount for an RTS (you must have bad monitors). Btw you do not repair with the settlers, You repair from the buildings own menu. It costs some wood and cant happen while the building is being damaged or for a short time after.

The game itself plays much similar to any of the other age games. The artillery is the biggest jump for me. Very fun IMO. The game runs amazing for me even on the highest settings. One thing I cant seem to find is the population tally.

The homecity thing is a great addition. I love it. Having it lvl up with me is such a nice touch. Not to mention being able to customize your shipments to add some personality to your gaming.

I definatly cant wait for this game to come out. Dawn of war: winter assault and Age of Empires 3 are gonna keep me occupied for a long long time.


*edit* Found the population...lol, The population is above the food indicator and then theres a "total villagers" indicator below those.

[Varsity]

Have they toned down the visuals for the demo, or is it just my ATI card?

+ Artillery
+ Home city
+ No dropoff points
+ AOE

- Clunky UI
- Some buildings can look similar at first
- A few gameplay bugs

[Morratut]

hahahah I love that I can click on the Microsoft Download link and get 550+ KB/s.

Microsoft fucking rules.

LOL.

I've to try this but i found that funny.

I loved playing AOE,AOE2:AOK. Fantastic. Looking forward to looking at this.

[Indefatigable]

I can't install. It keeps canceling itself right at the end and telling me to try later.

[H.Bogard]

okay i just played thru it and i`m like WHAT THE HELL?
this game is TOTALLY different from the previous AOEs :(

no tutorials either .....remember the TURN HELP ON button in aoe 2? i learnt all from that!

[Borgboy]

what are the reqs? cant find 'em anywhere.

(didnt look very hard, in a rush)

From Age of Empires III Heaven (http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=1,23491,0,10):

Here are the min specs for everyone
- WinXP

- 1.4ghz Processor

- 256 RAM

- 64 MB Video Card that supports HW T&L

- Approximately 370MB of Hard Drive space (not including installer).

- DirectX 9c

[Borgboy]

Damn this sucks. It says it can't initialize Direct3D on my XPS laptop.

From one of the developers on Age of Empires III Heaven (http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=11,23521,,10):

This error which some people have reported seems to happen mostly if you run a widescreen monitor. I believe the problem has been fixed since the demo was put together so it will work in the full version of the game.
I actually got the error on my own machine when I installed the demo and I've found I think two work arounds on my own machine to fix it.

1.) Delete the file NewProfile.xml in your /Age of Empires 3 Trial/Users/NewProfile.xml directory.
1A.) Set your screen resolution to 1024x768, then rerun the game.

or.

2.) Open NewProfile.xml and fine the line that specifies the optiongrfxres and change the res to say 1024x768. In my particular case it was initializing to 1280x768, which my machine did not like much.

For some reason it initializes to a resolution some video cards have problems with if you have a widescreen monitor (I have the 24" widescreen at home and had this problem)

It seems to only happen the first time you run the game, I believe once you get it up and running once, it doesn't happen again.

Hope this helps, it worked for me.

P.S. Please reply if this worked for you. It seems about half the help threads are about this issue.

[Borgboy]

Doesn't support Windows 2000.

Someone got it working (http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=1,23491,0,10#post14) on Windows 2000. Although they needed XP to do it.

The demo _DOES_ run under Windows 2000. I just installed it on my WinXP laptop and copied the folder "...\Age Of Empires III Trial" over to my Windows 2000 workstation. Executed age3.exe and BINGO! It came up without a problem.

Another info: it even runs quite smooth on the laptop that carries only a 32MB Radeon Mobility 9000.

[Nesta]

It was a fun little demo, but it says something that when I was done, I couldn't wait to get back to Codename Panzers. I wasn't a huge, huge AoE2 fan, so that may have something to do with it. I'll probably pick it up used 6 months after it comes out.

[Tia]

hahahah I love that I can click on the Microsoft Download link and get 550+ KB/s.

Microsoft fucking rules.

:eek: Is it legal to say this on Evil Avatar?

:p

[Ernst_Jager]

:eek: Is it legal to say this on Evil Avatar?

:p

Yes this isn't Slashdot.

[Thenetcase]

Yes this isn't Slashdot.

Yes, fuck Slashdot. Bastards are spineless cowards who make "annonimous" slandering quotes when they don't have the balls to stand up for what they want to say. They are also anti-free speech.


I can't install. It keeps canceling itself right at the end and telling me to try later.


Apparently your computer hasn't reached level 14 yet. At level 14 you get your first travel power.
Oh wait.. never mind.

-TNC-

[Varsity]

I've been playing this all day. I think that qualifies as a success. ;)

Does anyone else find the random maps not very random at all? The only differences are aestheic. At least in the previous games you wouldn't be able to click on an unexplored minimap and know what you would find there.

[Savok]

Note to devs, when releasing demos, stick a fucking tutorial in there, dumping players into the middle of god knows what does not excite some people.

[thecrazyd]

okay i just played thru it and i`m like WHAT THE HELL?
this game is TOTALLY different from the previous AOEs :(

no tutorials either .....remember the TURN HELP ON button in aoe 2? i learnt all from that!
It plays EXACTLY like AOE2. And there is a tutorial in the full game.

[dojoteef]

From one of the developers on Age of Empires III Heaven (http://aoe3.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=11,23521,,10):


YEAH! I it works now! I'll have to bitch at the guys at Ensemble for this.

[OldeWolf]

This is my first time posting but I think it's worth posting now that Age of Empire III is out.

For those who doesn't know how to repair, just click on the hammer when you click on any buildings that you think has been damaged.

It did take me a 5 minute work on trying to figure out what I'm doing but after that, it's a breeze. If this is but just a demo, I can only imagine what the full game will be like.

I don't mind helping anyone figure this little demo out if needed.

[Varsity]

Is it possible to get your home city past level nine?

[Rirath]

Well, having never played much of AOE2, I must admit I'm quite lost and just poking around at random. Learn to Play seemed like a no brainer. *wonders off in search of newbie-primer*

I have a 19" LCD at 1280x1024, and that is indeed a heck of a lot of GUI.
Music is all cracks and pops to boot, had to turn it off. Lots of bug reports.

[Borgboy]

Is it possible to get your home city past level nine?

The full version has I think 104 levels. But for obvious reasons, they restricted it in the demo. So I'm guessing nine is the limit for the demo (I seem to remember that, too).

[Oddmaker]

This rocks! brings back memorys ;)

[Mason]

Eh, Ensemble keeps taking these baby steps away from cliche RTS micromanagement, but lacks the vision of Timegate or Big Huge Games to make substantial changes in that regard. I mean, no auto-explore? Gigantic housing sprawl? The villagers are still pretty dumb. You can't stick the rally flag for barracks onto a unit, and thus it won't auto-add the new units to preexisting groups. The list goes on.

Maybe I missed how some of these features were implemented, and if so correct me, but if they are in fact missing it is pretty ghetto for a RTS released in late 2005. I like a lot of what they added, the card and home city system is very interesting, but in the end the micromanagement is almost as bad as AOM.

And from what I could tell, it seemed like micromanaging a horde of priests to give yourself an immortal army will be the dominant strategy. Not a good thing, in my book.

[OldeWolf]

That's the whole reason for playing a brand new game; the chance to try something brand new, be it the layout of the menu's or the way the game is being played as, etc. I for one rather not use the tutor since I will have alot more fun finding out on my own and maybe a few months later, realize that I could've used a certain thing and suddenly the game is new again to play with.

[H.Bogard]

Note to devs, when releasing demos, stick a fucking tutorial in there, dumping players into the middle of god knows what does not excite some people.


Amen brother

took me a couple of hours to figure out how EVERYTHING works, i have yet to learn proper combat though (which troops are good against which ones etc)

AND WHERE THE HELL ARE ADVANCED FORMATION COMMANDS?? AND I ALSO WANT MY GODDAMNED RELICS BACK!!!

the trade route rocks though....the trains look soooo pretty..

And lastly , does this game require pixel shader 3 for running it in HDR?

[CapnAJ]

The game turns off my computer everytime I play, usually after 45mins. Nothing else I use on my computer has this effect, just this game. If the game weren't so tedious, I might be a bit annoyed.

[Borgboy]

AND WHERE THE HELL ARE ADVANCED FORMATION COMMANDS??

Did you check in the options? Pretty sure there were some settings in there that affected advance/easy button setup.

And lastly , does this game require pixel shader 3 for running it in HDR?

I'm not sure. I know that they said it would look *best* with shader 3, but I have no idea if it's required for HDR.

[OldeWolf]

I'm rather surprised that theres no "Save Game" in the demo that I could find...Anyone else find it?

[Savok]

As I recall none of the previous AOE demos had saving, so I think it's normal.

[OldeWolf]

Actually, Age of King had the saving figure for it's demo.

[Savok]

Well there you go.

[H.Bogard]

Did you check in the options? Pretty sure there were some settings in there that affected advance/easy button setup.

Yes i did check them and i found the option, turned it on and nothing happens, i spent some serious time trying to build up my town and trade routes AND THERES NO GOD DAMN SAVING FEATURE!
one half assed demo ensemble has thrown us :mad:

[Borgboy]

Haha, chill dude. It's a demo. You can't expect to do everything. :-P It's just supposed to give you a taste of what the full game is like, enough so that you will want it. I'd say ommitting a save feature is perfectly logical. Somewhat annoying, especially if you don't usually have time to play a whole game through, but no reason to call it "half assed".

[Savok]

How are we supposed to taste it if we don't know how?

[Borgboy]

How are we supposed to taste it if we don't know how?

*shrugs* Beats me. I didn't have any trouble, it's pretty straightforward if you ask me. Just like any other game, point, click. But maybe it's because I'd much rather toy with things and learn it myself than have some silly little tutorial tell me how to left click.

[Savok]

A monkey could work out the basics of the interface. I'm talking what each unit, building and all the new features that have come with the game before toying with the lives of my men.

[Borgboy]

You mean like what unit counters what unit and stuff?

[Savok]

There's that, the Home City thing and what I can do with it (besides that extra boost to my main guys every now and then). I didn't realize that trading posts had to be built on special sites until after a lot of running around, that sort of thing.

[OldeWolf]

The demo can only go up to level 9 right?