Wololo - Reception

Reception

Although not as acclaimed as the later games in the series, the first Age of Empires was generally well received by critics, and scored highly on review aggregator websites including an 8.3 out of 10 on Metacritic, an 87% on Game Rankings, an 85 out of 100 on MobyGames, and an 8.4 out of 10 on GameStats.

Game Revolution categorized the game as "a cross between Civilization II and Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness", while GameSpot lamented that it was "a simple combat game rather than a glorious empire-builder", describing it as "Warcraft with a hint of Civilization." While Computer Gaming World's Elliott Chin compared the game extensively to WarCraft II, he said that it has "great depth, and when compared to its real-time brethren, it has to be the most sophisticated of the bunch". GameVortex wanted less of a combat-oriented gameplay, but praised the modes of play, commenting that "the random map generation really keeps the game spiced up." GameSpot decried the level of micromanagement necessary to control the game (which was due to absence of production queues and low AI of the player's units) calling it "a poor idea", which "seriously diminishes AOE's enjoyability." GameVortex echoed this criticism, while PC Gameworld pointed out the subsequently released patches improving some of the faulty AI programming. Elliott Chin criticized the game's population limit, which he thought to be its "most serious grievance".

While noting the similarities with Warcraft II, PC Gameworld praised the uniqueness of each playable civilization, and noted that the "graphics are extremely detailed and have a hand-painted feel to them. It's rare to see a game this beautiful with such detailed unit movements." Game Revolution was impressed by the amount of different units of the game, and noted that the developers "obviously did research here, and the result is a well rounded, historically accurate product (at least for a game)". The soundscape of the game was also criticized, with GameVortex stating that "the oral clues just aren't enough to let you differentiate just what's going on." With a view to the future of the game, Game-Revolution emphasized the scenario editor, which "allows you total control in the design of scenarios and campaigns", a "tool at your disposal to create a scenario exactly to your liking."

The game won numerous awards, including Gamecenter's 1997 Game of the Year and the 1998 AIAS Computer Strategy Game of the Year award.