Age of Empires are, by far, my favorite games.
I truly liked the first one. Though I always thought it was a bit slow and with a bit of a difficult gameplay. The expansion version gave it a big history and enhancement boost. The difficult and slow gameplay remained but it was a great game due to it's richness. It was called "The Rise of Rome"! We could play with or against Rome. It was great!
The second one, "The Age of Kings" was a great improvement on everything!
In my opinion, the biggest boost was given here. The gameplay became faster and easier to navigate. We got a LOT of new units (in fact, almost all of them were new) and the "Nation" system was inputed. The nation system is a feature that allows you to chose the nation you want from a big variety, not just 1 out of 2.
Here, we were introduced to great past nations such as the Spanish, the Chinese (I love the chinese archers, by the way - they throw 3 arrows instead of one) and the Japanese (whose unique unit is a samurai - slow, but one of the most powerful in the game). Each nation had an exclusive campaign with actual historical facts and wars.
The expansion, called "The Conquerors", added a lot more campaigns and some more nations, including the Mayans and the Aztecs.
Now, Age of Empires III is focused on beauty: the detail is amazing. The gameplay is pretty much the same as AoE2.
On this game, we follow the history where AoE2 left at. This game focus on the European nations and their attempts to colonize America.
This one is a very good game and I highly recommend it.
The first expansion for AoE3 is called "The Warchiefs".
It focus on the Americas and the various civilizations attempts of control over the local tribes.
The second, and most recent, installment of the AoE franchise is also an expansion. AoE3: The Asian Dynasties.
As expected by just reading the title, this expansion introduces the Asian civilizations, being the Indians, Chinese and Japanese, and their rich and historical influences in the Eastern world.
These are rich, educating and entertaining games and, because there are NEVER two games played exactly in the same way, you'll never grow tired of it. Definitely worth the buy.
