Age of Empires 2 HD Edition announced!

[Djuntas]

I have no problems with AI lag inn AOE2 HD version. Just for instance played a chaotic 1.24 hour long game fast speed goth on Arena vs 3 AI on hardest. Nothing, ever.

AI has not been nerfed. Its VEEEEEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY random. The 3 AI's I had one sucked very badly, while the 2 others performed about the same. It differ's so much sometimes - Even if its 1v1.

I have no problems with pathing. All units works the same as it did inn orginale AOE2 for me

Defaulth hotkeys? Erhm, just use your own hotkeys - Who uses defaulth.

Sorry but I have no problems with AOE2 HD version. Had it for about 2-3 months after releases, witch I tough by then they had patched it enough for it to be fine, and it was.

[May90]

This is weird. Steam forums are also very ambiguous on this matter. Many people list the same problems I have, some even have problems that I don't. Other people say the game runs fine and such.

But I have it right here. Two installed games: AOE2 original version and AOE2 HD: Forgotten. In original version I can play 4v4 for hours without any FPS drop at all, while in HD after 10 minutes the game becomes unplayable, and in original version our team was crushed in 4v4 Hardest AI, while in HD I alone destroyed all the opponents while my allies were sitting on their bases and only moved out from time to time only to be slaughtered by castles.

Maybe it is my rig. But, really, a 15 years old 2D game should not have any performance drops in any circumstances. How they managed to make the game experience performance issue is beyond me.

- - - Updated - - -

Here is an almost 600 comments thread of people complaining about FPS as well. And there are dozens of such threads on Steam forums alone.
http://steamcommunity.com/app/221380...5361222761471/

[Wyrllish]

There is hardly any difference, lmao.

[May90]

There is hardly any difference, lmao.

The only significant difference I found is an official multiplayer support (official servers for the old game were shut down long time ago, so people now have to use some workarounds in order to play), everything else, such as HD resolution, Forgotten Empires expansion and such, can be done by downloading unofficial patches.

And, since I am not really interested in multiplayer component (just wanted to play a few games for fun, that's all), I don't see much point for myself to play the HD version.

[Djuntas]

We'll I have no idea why it lags for you. Maybe its a resolution thing? I don't play inn the standard 1920x1200, I go quit abit down, cause pencil sized units dosen't look good, but doubt that is the problem...Just an idea.

Anywho I have played alot off AI games on HD version (proboaly over 100 by now) and then some 300 online games (only 1v1 trough) and I never lag, so it seems odd that so many people report it as laggy.

- - - Updated - - -

The only significant difference I found is an official multiplayer support (official servers for the old game were shut down long time ago, so people now have to use some workarounds in order to play), everything else, such as HD resolution, Forgotten Empires expansion and such, can be done by downloading unofficial patches.

And, since I am not really interested in multiplayer component (just wanted to play a few games for fun, that's all), I don't see much point for myself to play the HD version.

Yea this is true. I mostly bought it for playing online, cause I was getting tired of the shithole that Voobly is (We'll its okay but to many rating trolls keeps being there).

[May90]

We'll I have no idea why it lags for you. Maybe its a resolution thing? I don't play inn the standard 1920x1200, I go quit abit down, cause pencil sized units dosen't look good, but doubt that is the problem...Just an idea.

Anywho I have played alot off AI games on HD version (proboaly over 100 by now) and then some 300 online games (only 1v1 trough) and I never lag, so it seems odd that so many people report it as laggy.

I have no idea myself. Graphically, the game certainly should run fine on average video cards released in 2000. The lag then is either caused by the processor cap, or by the engine itself. Processor cannot be the reason since the original game runs fine with 8 players having ~200 units each. The only reason, hence, is the engine that was modified somewhat wrongfully and caused performance to crash down.

Really. I have stable 120 FPS in Starcraft 2 4v4 games with every player having full supply and all units clashing in the middle. And yet I cannot play a 15 years old game with ~100 units for each player since my FPS drops below 5. I just cannot grasp it.

[Rennadrel]

This is weird. Steam forums are also very ambiguous on this matter. Many people list the same problems I have, some even have problems that I don't. Other people say the game runs fine and such.

But I have it right here. Two installed games: AOE2 original version and AOE2 HD: Forgotten. In original version I can play 4v4 for hours without any FPS drop at all, while in HD after 10 minutes the game becomes unplayable, and in original version our team was crushed in 4v4 Hardest AI, while in HD I alone destroyed all the opponents while my allies were sitting on their bases and only moved out from time to time only to be slaughtered by castles.

Maybe it is my rig. But, really, a 15 years old 2D game should not have any performance drops in any circumstances. How they managed to make the game experience performance issue is beyond me.

- - - Updated - - -

Here is an almost 600 comments thread of people complaining about FPS as well. And there are dozens of such threads on Steam forums alone.
http://steamcommunity.com/app/221380...5361222761471/

The game has always had FPS issues, get over it.

[May90]

The game has always had FPS issues, get over it.

The thing is, I have 900+ constant FPS in original AOE2 now, on the same rig. It is installed right here, in a neighboring folder. And 5 FPS in this, with the only changed things being several visual effects. It makes no sense. 60 times FPS drop just cannot happen: they should have seriously screwed something in their code for this to happen.

No matter what they say about how hard it is to optimize the game for the modern systems, this 15 years old game cannot have worse FPS than Starcraft 2 on Ultra in 4v4 during massive unit clashes. If it does, then they broke the code somewhere. Maybe it is a horrible memory leak, maybe something else. I'm not going to bother checking, I'll better just play the old version with widescreen fix.

[Djuntas]

The game has always had FPS issues, get over it.

Always? Woulden't say so First time I hear about anyone complaning about FPS lag inn AOE2. And I have played proboaly above 1k games now since I started it (Yes I play to much AOE2 last 1 year lol, but no other good games out meh)

[May90]

Always? Woulden't say so First time I hear about anyone complaning about FPS lag inn AOE2. And I have played proboaly above 1k games now since I started it (Yes I play to much AOE2 last 1 year lol, but no other good games out meh)

I played AOE 2 back in 1999, a few days after it was released. Some of my specs: NVidia GeForce 2 with 16 Mb on board, Pentium III processor with 600 MHz, 128 Mb operative memory. I had zero problems playing 4v4 with AI on gigantic maps, and the game started lagging only a very little bit by the end, when all players had ~200 units and kept fighting each other.

The thing is, I'm not the only one having this problem. There are thousands people complaining on forums as well, and all of them also say that they have 900+ FPS in the original AOE 2. It is clear that something is broken in the game.

This reminds me of SWTOR support. This is the only game I have ever had the overheating problem in, and many other people have this problem as well and also only in that game. And yet developers kept saying to us, "The problem is on your end, dudes. Clean your PCs and you will be fine!". As far as I'm concerned, the problem hasn't been fixed yet. And I doubt they will fix the FPS issue in AOE 2 HD either. So tomorrow I'm asking for the refund, the first time in my life.

[Nerraw]

The rather unique problem with AoE2HD is that it is based on technology that is obsolete at best, and completely outphased at worst. Having to get those things to work on today's hardware is a recipe for trouble.

[Rennadrel]

I played AOE 2 back in 1999, a few days after it was released. Some of my specs: NVidia GeForce 2 with 16 Mb on board, Pentium III processor with 600 MHz, 128 Mb operative memory. I had zero problems playing 4v4 with AI on gigantic maps, and the game started lagging only a very little bit by the end, when all players had ~200 units and kept fighting each other.

The thing is, I'm not the only one having this problem. There are thousands people complaining on forums as well, and all of them also say that they have 900+ FPS in the original AOE 2. It is clear that something is broken in the game.

This reminds me of SWTOR support. This is the only game I have ever had the overheating problem in, and many other people have this problem as well and also only in that game. And yet developers kept saying to us, "The problem is on your end, dudes. Clean your PCs and you will be fine!". As far as I'm concerned, the problem hasn't been fixed yet. And I doubt they will fix the FPS issue in AOE 2 HD either. So tomorrow I'm asking for the refund, the first time in my life.

You are aware that the only graphical change made to this game is the ability to use HD resolutions right? And old games don't have framerate caps, not to mention I highly doubt you actually get more then 60 fps and any lag you think you are seeing is actually part of the original game design.

[Funkyjunky]

The thing is, I'm not the only one having this problem. There are thousands people complaining on forums as well, and all of them also say that they have 900+ FPS in the original AOE 2. It is clear that something is broken in the game.

People should learn to put a cap on FPS.

[May90]

The rather unique problem with AoE2HD is that it is based on technology that is obsolete at best, and completely outphased at worst. Having to get those things to work on today's hardware is a recipe for trouble.

Them why would the original game perform excellent on my PC?

You are aware that the only graphical change made to this game is the ability to use HD resolutions right? And old games don't have framerate caps, not to mention I highly doubt you actually get more then 60 fps and any lag you think you are seeing is actually part of the original game design.

Again, I have 900+ FPS in original game with widescreen fix and, in lategame, 5- FPS in this. There is nothing wrong with original design since it performs fine. It is the HD version that performs horribly slow.

People should learn to put a cap on FPS.

Lol, I have learnt how to do it back in 1995 or so. There is no need to do this for most of the old games though since they do not need that much resources anyway.

[Bumbasta]

I can't wait for this! This give me hope we will see a Rise of Nation HD in the near future.

Yay! RON > AOE2

[Nerraw]

Them why would the original game perform excellent on my PC?

Don't know but it could very well have something to do with the emulating process not working properly on some setups, seeing as only some people are having problems. It's definitely a hardware or software mismatch somewhere so it's very unlikely that it'll ever get fixed completely.

And it's funny that you mention how your old version works fine while the new one does not. In my case the exact opposite holds true. My old copy runs like absolute crap, but I have had zero issues with the HD version.

[May90]

And it's funny that you mention how your old version works fine while the new one does not. In my case the exact opposite holds true. My old copy runs like absolute crap, but I have had zero issues with the HD version.

Well, it's quite a unique case actually. I've browsed through Steam forums and haven't seen anyone with this situation, but seen over 100, at least, people with my situation.

- - - Updated - - -

OK, so I just played a 4v4 with Hardest AI in original and, I must admit, most of the complaints I wrote above are not unique for the HD version. Actually, all of them, except for performance and default hotkey setup. After playing Starcraft 2 for over a year, I just forgot how clunky the old RTS games actually were. Pathing is just horrid in this game, not even pathing, but unit grouping: units keep changing the shape of their formation all the time, sometimes just moving around instead of attacking nearby units. A lot of manual micro is required in order to make units fight.
AI is exactly the same as it is in HD. Again, I just rolled through all 4 enemies alone without any trouble with maxed Paladin group, maxed group of Elite Skirmishes and 10 Trebuchets. I remember having a really hard time against Hardest AI just a bit more than a year ago, but now it feels like a joke. It seems my micro and macro skills seriously improved after playing SC2, and I just dominated everything economically, even though Hardest AI cheat (they essentially have infinite resources). Looks like completion of all campaigns on Hard is going to be quite easy.
Some things are even better in HD. Lack of queuing in multiple buildings and queuing of upgrades seriously hurts my soul, and attack move, while quite badly realized in HD, is still useful sometimes.

But, as I said, performance is perfect in the original. I didn't have my FPS drop below 800 a single time, while in HD it is 5 FPS after 20 minutes. So I'm going to stick with the original. And maybe even stop playing it quite soon, since I'm not really interested in multiplayer, and AI doesn't seem to pose any challenge for me any more. I don't think the campaign will challenge me in any way: I completed most of the missions on Hard even when I was quite bad, and now it will be a cakewalk, probably.

[Djuntas]

We'll ofcourse you're gonna find AI easy if your a seasoned RTS player. Its the same for me on maps I choose.

You can always make it hard and pick stuff differently; Say 2v1 AI hardest on water fucking sucks, cause they get the early start.

Or try win 3v1 on arabia with no walling; very hard imo.

[May90]

Well, I've just easily won 1v1 against Hardest AI, and I think I can take down, at least, 3-4 of them alone on any map. Their macro is OK and unit composition is quite good, but their micro... Jesus! Most of the time it is possible to destroy their entire army before they stop moving with turtle's pace and start fighting back. They keep attacking from the same directions all the time, so, once you know all the spots, you can easily keep moving between them and not let anything come through. I didn't even need walls, towers or castles in that game; all I did was place 20 Janissaries in concave at where they are coming from, and put 4 Monks behind for healing - this defense was impenetrable and I didn't lose a single unit since then.

I think Janissary is just too good a unit for a computer: it is quite hard to fight even for humans, but computer just sends his units right at them and loses them all. With massed Janissary it should be theoretically possible to destroy 7 Hardest AIs, provided you survive long enough to get them. And it is quite easy to survive: place 4-5 towers around your base with 1-2 workers for repairing near each, and the enemies will keep suiciding their units at them. Well, it might be quite hard against 7 AI, but I'm pretty sure 4 AI is manageable, and I will try it tomorrow.
With walling... I think even 1v7 is not that hard. Computer has absolutely no idea how to deal with walls and loses ridiculous amount of melee units trying to bash through them.

This reminds me late 90-s, when I tried to survive 1v7 in Warcraft 2. It was a lot of fun: you have to build many Guard and Cannon Towers, and you can survive against the combined early rush this way; but when Catapults and Ballistas show up, the real fun begins. As long as I remember, I managed to win 1v6 once, but 1v7 was too much...

[Djuntas]

We'll thats the problem with the AI, as I mentioned before; You can easly abuse it. I haven't played modern RTS games like SC2, but I guess the AI is smarter there, cause the AI inn AOE2 can't stop up and say "hey....this is bad?". A good example is this; I started a game earliere 1v1 arabia and waited how long the AI took to win over me doing nothing...30 minutes it lasted! And they we're even huns - Cause they didn't make siege to take my towncenter down - Just normal units getting killed by my town center.

Basicly, its dumb and can get abused.