Age of Empires 3 has always been the black sheep, the unloved mercenary of the series that, whatever its achievements, was never accepted by the rest of the troops. It was a sequel to a genre-defining game that turned out to be the best of a dying real-time strategy genre. Add to that the fact that Age of Empires 2 was a masterpiece of isometric pixel art. This lost aesthetic, like a sturdy antique, shines beautifully with a little polish (as Fraser states in his review). On the other hand, "Age of Empires 3" was from the era of 3D graphics, and while everything in this genre seemed stiff and lumpy, much of it was hidden by the large pixels and scanning lines of the monitor, so I didn't notice.

The remastered Age of Empires 3 is like watching a historical battle reenactment on a 4K screen and realizing it is being performed by creaky animatronic soldiers. The increased frame rate and resolution bring out the middling animations and seemingly unimproved textures of this 15-year-old game. The physics engine has been updated, but it was only concretely felt when the cubic mass of a collapsing building bounced off a neighboring building as if it were a weightless block of polystyrene. [Age of Empires 3 is not much to look at. But its strengths lie elsewhere, and the myriad little conveniences and quality-of-life refinements may make it more appealing than its predecessor to series newcomers.

The flow of the game is much the same as in the rest of the series: build a town center anywhere on the map, create villagers, harvest food, wood, and coins from the land, build an army, improve your technology, or wipe out enemies.

One of the most fun things about Age of Empires has always been the diversity of factions, and that tradition continues here: there are 16 civilizations to choose from, each with its own distinctive units and quirks. India has sacred fields that heal and buff units, the British get free workers by building houses, and Russia can't shake the Soviet stereotype of the ruthless people's factory cum meat grinder by producing infantry at an alarming rate.

Sweden gets cheap mercenaries and attractive wooden taupes to gather resources, while the Incas can garrison their troops in many buildings and use their priestesses to draw enemies to their side.

Age of Empires 3 requires a cohesive strategy, quick clicks, and the mental motivation to remember a thousand hot keys. And even the prologue missions can be grueling without retraining hotkeys for jumping to the town center, production queues for villagers, and jumping between hero units. In this sense, even the campaign missions feel more like a warm-up for online play than a strong, immersive story.

As demanding and intense as it may be, Age of Empires 3 is much simpler and less laborious than its predecessor, thanks to the various modernizations made in 2005 and in this definitive version.

Nostalgists can opt for the cleaner original UI, minus the excessive wooden veneer that encapsulated the action of the 2005 version (for my part, I wanted the original UI in all its screen-hogging glory). For most people, however, the "Definitive" UI would be preferable, with the valuable resource counter displayed in a large, clear view at the top of the screen. Whatever your preference, options are available to resize the UI to its initial size.

Additionally, various mechanical tweaks have been made to smooth things out. Also, special buildings for storing resources are no longer needed, reducing the complexity of managing them. A card system that allows players to set up decks between battles and use timers to call in supplies from their home cities is also fun.

All of this makes for a fast-flowing game that condenses centuries of military and technological advancements into battles that last from 10 minutes to an hour; because it squeezes five technological eras into just the colonial period, it does not have the dramatic While you won't see any evolution, it's still a satisfying journey punctuated by flashy new units that reflect your progress.

Age of Empires 3's problems really begin when you zoom in and see up close how messy and stale things are. When you try to pull off a special move with your hero unit, instead of shoulder to shoulder into the front lines of a skirmish, they retreat and circle around you like a metal concert garrison. If you charge the Rohirrim cavalry into enemy lines, they will stop just before impact and swing their swords courteously at the enemy, who can instantly turn to face you without a turning animation.

This sort of thing was understandable in 1999 with "Age of Empires 2," but in 2005, when games like "Total War" and "Battle for Middle-Earth" had already found ways to make combat feel impactful, it was a bit subtle. That is obscene in 2020. It's odd that for a game that brags about its updated physics engine, the physics of combat make it seem like everyone is wielding weapons and armor forged with north-facing monopole magnets. [Age of Empires 3 remains a solid skirmish-style RTS, but it would have fared better had it not been released right after a game that is clearly Microsoft's favorite strategy baby. In Age of Empires 2 had several expansions over the past decade, including a completely new one for Definitive Edition, "Age of Empires 3" has no new campaign beyond the base game and the two expansions released at the time. In 2005, in-game cutscenes and a more cinematic -like atmosphere may have been enough to compensate for the small amount of content, but today it does not offer much in the way of compelling storytelling or writing (the WarChiefs expansion's generation-spanning narrative is the best of the bunch there).

If you have little interest in single-player campaigns and are instead looking for an exhilarating RTS to play online with friends, this is the path of least resistance to becoming a hero of the genre, with plenty of familiar quality-of-life touches (the It's also available on Steam at a very reasonable price, and is also available on Xbox Game Pass). Existing Age of Empires 3 fans will find this to be the best way to play it in the future, albeit with a degree of improvement that reflects the fact that it is the least beloved entry in the series.

Age of Empires 3 requires less patience than Age of Empires 2, but is also less rewarding in the long run and falls short of the elegance of a game that has been updated and improved for 21 years.