Its a first DS review for HiiperDrive as I review Backbone's PC port, Age of Empires; Age of Kings.
Firstly, AoE; AoK's positives, I must have to concede first how impressed I was with the games interface, very polished and with easy navigation, which opens the account of Backbone's release well. Furthermore, there is a tutorial which helps very kindly in learning the basics as this is basically the first of its kind, with you helping Joan of Arc on her march to reclaim France from Britain etc. Also while playing in this section of the game I began to take note of how excellant the visuals looked, for a DS game at least, as I believe it would of been hard to determine which angle is best for the game to operate at to give the player the best viewing point. When I got into the campaign I honestly thought that AoE would crumble miserably as the possibilities of pulling of a decent campaign semt rather slim at this stage, but, I was intrigued to see that the campaign does play very well and that it is of a very good length which certainly kept me entertained for a long period of time to say the very least.
Also I am very pleased because AoE keeps simpally the most enjoyable aspect of any RTS or TBS game, Skirmish Mode, with the five nations (or, in this stage in history, better known as factions) to choose from the outstanding amount of maps to choose from and the nice feature to customise what style you want the apposing AI to fight in (agressive, defensive, both etc) is especially good.
To add to AoE seemingly endless amount of positives, also there are lots of unlockables to attempt to get by earning 'Empire Points' by winning games and rankings for your profile to go up in, which is accompanied by a 'Library' to view the history of the different campaigns, civilisations, heros and buildings the game has an outstanding amount of replay value for you to enjoy.
Even so, AoE does have some negatives to dumb down the seeming euphoria that arised when I first purchased the game, a little dissapointed is that animations in the fighting scenes could have been a little more crisp and generally enjoyable to watch. Also, it would have been nice to be able for your cities to have a little more freedom by building structures more spaced out rather than looking more congested and hard to distinguish the buildings from the units, and lastly it also would have been nice to see single-cart multiplayer options and also WiFi, which would of really made this game something very special (although in my eyes it already is.).
As a conclusion to my first DS review since joining Gamespot, I would like to reccomend this game to any Rts or Tbs lovers who have the priviledge to own a Nintendo DS. It has a wide range of single-player options and the opportunity to play in multiplayer, although as I said it would of been nice to see the single-cart play and WiFi, the game does succeed in creating a decent, if not itself a classic, port from the PC original AoE; Age of Kings.
/HiiperDrive Out\