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Age of Empires loads surprisingly quickly (even from an MMC), and one can soon be in the middle of a random level, chopping wood just like the old days. No slowdown was experienced - ZioSoft appear to have done a good job of porting the code efficiently. Worth the wait, clearly. On a platform such as the Pocket PC, control is often a major stumbling block for games designers. Fortunately, Age of Empires is extremely intuitive. Selecting a person or a group is merely an issue of tapping or tap-and-dragging on them, and from then assigning orders is achieved through tapping on a tree, enemy soldier or whatever - the game works out what you want to do. Tap-and-hold has no function. Moving the map is achieved with the D-Pad, independently of the stylus.
 | | Ill: ZioSoft |
The other major issue with a Pocket PC game is use of screen real-estate. Age of Empires is arranged similarly to the desktop version, with a tiny toolbar at the top of the landscape-oriented (either way, depending on whether you’re left- or right-handed) screen, and a larger one along the bottom. The top toolbar indicates resources, current evolution level (eg. ‘stone age’) and allows access to the diplomacy and main menus. The bottom menu displays the statistics of the currently-selected character, links to actions for them (build, stop), a few buttons for statistics, sound and so on, and a representation of the map for easier navigation. Along the right side of the frame are a selection of tiny buttons to return you to your home and other shortcut places and people. Most importantly, a button in the bottom corner of the screen acts as a help button, allowing any subsequent tap to reveal the function of a button. Very useful. All of this makes it very easy to play the game even without reading the manual or being familiar with the original desktop version. Super.
The game’s implementation has resulted in an extremely transparent experience in which the quality of this classic title has really shone through. Any player of the PC version will appreciate the hard work that has gone into making the game enjoyable on the restricted hardware of the PPC platform, and new gamers will enjoy a gaming experience that is in the higher echelons of PDA gaming in graphics, sound and depth.
However, it does have some prohibitive downsides. Firstly, it requires an enormous amount of space both to install and to run - space that many users will not be able to afford. Secondly, although ZioSoft have retained many of the options and customization facilities of the PC version, they have had to economise on some features: notably, multiplayer. As we have seen with the surprisingly non-multiplayer release of Everquest for the PPC, it seems that game developers are still unwilling to realise the potential of PDAs for ubiquitous multiplayer gaming over WiFi, Bluetooth, IR or even GPRS.
Availability
ZioSoft Age of Empires: Gold Edition will be available shortly from Ziosoft's website, and is compatible with all ARM and MIPS Pocket PCs.
Conclusion
Despite being a port of an old title based on an even older concept, Age of Empires remains great fun to play, and it works well in PDA format. Ultimately, despite its problems, ZioSoft’s port is an impressive achievement, and a worthy addition (or should that be ‘addiction’?) to any mobile gamer’s arsenal.
- What's positive: Huge, pretty and addictive - a great port of a great game
- What's negative: Takes a lot of space, no multiplayer
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Price and availability
The will start selling for TBA () in November 1999.
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