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The first game by Ensemble Studios is a well conceived RTS in the vein of Warcraft II, with a dose of inspiration from Civilization for its anthropological bent and tech trees. Despite Civ trimmings, it is a purebred RTS; economy is only linearly more complex than that of its predecessors, and serves only to bring in resources to be spent on building and improving your army. Like others of its time, it is rough around the edges with frugal interface concessions, pathfinding issues, and imbalanced units. The subject matter of human history stands in appealing contrast to the fantasy and science fiction offered by Warcraft and Command & Conquer, and the attention to detail is commendable. Structures visibly improve as your technology advances from stone age to iron age and beyond, detailed tilesets for each side distinctly represent the architecture of four major empires of antiquity, and well researched Civilopedia-like tooltips and help screens both educate of history and inform of play mechanics. The tutorial campaign is a bit clumsy - the demo actually has a better one - but the rest have good design without excessive repetition and a well paced difficulty curve, and some interesting historical notes before each mission. A random map mode for skirmishes is a standout novel feature.
An expansion, Rise of Rome, adds new campaigns, new civilizations, new units, and a variety of improvements from AOE2 (which was in early development at the time of its release), and is included in the re-release Age of Empires: Gold, but is missing the base game's music, as detailed in You're playing it wrong.
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