We’ve got another expansion to make, so where to start! We’re all joyously filled with crazy, weird ideas, bouncing them off the wall and eachother. But we’ll have to squeeze those ideas into a proper game. So where to start? Just like last time, it starts with the core of the new content, the new civilizations.
A Theme
In Age of Empires II HD: The Forgotten, we were presented with a rather obvious civ choice. Ensemble Studios had left hints behind on which civs they would’ve loved to add to the game. Some were nations that appeared in campaigns but were never turned into a proper, playable civ. Those were the easy choices, but now that we’ve used the most obvious ones, where do we go next? Over the last year(s), we’ve received a lot of feedback from players on possible new civilizations. Ranging from Medieval powerhouses like the Normans and the Khmers to less obvious or specific suggestions such as the Kingdom of Jerusalem or the Principality of Pannonia. But unlike our broader approach to AoF, we’ve decided to build out more of a thematic flair and pay a visit to a continent south of Europe with a rich history: Africa. We’ll be covering civilizations both born within the content, as well empires that held great power in the region – including one that has been requested many, many, many times by the fans.
But to keep things a bit exciting, they will all be revealed over the coming weeks, so feel free to speculate 😉
Oh except for the first one!
The Berbers
The Berbers (~700 AD) are the first African civilization to be seen in the new expansion pack. We caught a glimpse of them in the original El Cid campaigns in “The Conquerors”, where they are portrayed in a more generic term as Saracens. Berbers, however, are more than worthy of becoming an Age of Empires civilization. With dynasties across Northern Africa, the ancient Berbers will primarily be a Cavalry & Naval civilization. They’ll have 2 unique units and will also feature a unique technology that affects the entire team.
3D Model of the Camel Archer, one of the new Berber Unique Units
Since we’re early in development, we don’t have a lot of screenshots yet, but the Camel Archer is already properly functional in the game and looking good. As if it has always been hopping around in the Age of Empires II universe. It was of course teased with the overall expansion announcement.
A band of Camel Archers, guarding the road for unsuspecting enemy trade carts
And last but not least, the Berbers will have their own campaign, but we’ll share more on that later as well.
So this will be it for the first dev blog, it’s more of a tease than a proper “dev” blog, but we’ll certainly dig a bit deeper in the next episodes. We’re hoping to do these monthly, make sure you don’t miss out 😉
How ’bout triple unique techs?
the original 2 from the Castle, and the other one from another building(like barracks, mill, blacksmith,university, etc…)
yeah, if the unique tech is reasonable and attractive, i would like see more.
Yeah, I thought exactly the same. It could also be unique upgrades to already existing technologies, just like Indians are the only faction able to upgrade heavy camels at the time being.
YEEEEESS!!!!!!!!
THANK YOU AOE 2 FOR GIVING THE BERBERS THEIR RIGHT IN THIS GAME
! 🙂
now game on! 🙂 gooooooooooooooooooooooooooooood job AOE
So when can I update to this new berber civilization? when does it come out?
It’s still in development, this is the only info avaliable at the moment (plus the dev blog #2), so you’ll have to wait quite a bit until it’s avaliable to play.
Thank you Leovigildo, Can’t wait. Hope they give us a release date soon
Here’s something for you:
https://www.forgottenempires.net/age-of-empires-ii-teasing-at-e3-2015
Apparently they say Fall 2015, so there you go, mate.
AFRICA, YEES! I hope you guys will consider the egyptian as well as authentic african kingdoms like shona, zulu, maasai and aksum!!!
Weren’t the Berbers of the turk civilization in the 6th El Sid scenario “Reconquinsta” ? They also appeared as “Berbers” in the Battles of the Conquerors “Tours (732)” scenario, being turks as well. So, they’ ll have the middle – eastern architectural style ?
probably
Sweetness! Looking forward to adding to my collection at some point. I already got plans at trying to get my hands on HD and The Forgotten. AoE2 never gets stale! A true nostalgic wonder in the world of gaming.
ITALO-NORMANS! for a brief period of time they had a Kingdom in northern Africa stretching from Tripoli to Tunisia, so they would be plausible to add! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italo-Norman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Africa some examples as for which bonuses they could have : give them cheap (high rate of fire) Sicilian archers, free careening, lanced knights (with low health but lots of armor + 1 range like the kamayuks) from castles, knight line limited to cavalier, scout line limited to scout cavalry, full infantry line, Britons style navy line, archery range line limited to crossbowmen (with the Sicilian archers available) Fransk style Castles, Huns style… Read more »
At best they’d make a Norman civ, but only in a later expansion, not something as specific and short-lived like the Italo-Normans.
In the battle of Hastings campaign (or scenario) you get to play the Normans as Franks, which makes sense since at the time they were heavily influenced by France, despite their Scandinavian origin.
i suppose, and i can agree with that. but they did create their own identety too, and were very flexible, unlike the Franks. still they would be a direct mix between Britons and Franks, later Italian, as one would suggest. and as you say they were rather short-lived in the Mediterranean, especially Africa. i’m just glad they Mentioned them at all, and i post this to confirm my support for them 🙂 as i am very excited for this DLC, i would be equally excited for an eastern-European DLC, with more specific civs like Poland, Kingdom of Rus, Bohemia, Estonia,… Read more »
The Slav faction should clearly be split, and we still need some eastern-European non-Slav factions such as Vlaques or Lituanians (nobody’s ever talking about Lituanians).
I strongly support the idea of a Bohemian faction, it would be the perfect oportunity to have a siege weapon as special unit :p
Aye!
I’m getting real tired of those people who see “African expansion” and think “Yay! A great oportunity to add more European factions!” Portuguese are almost confirmed and people keep asking for Valdals and Normans (or Italo-Normans …) while we’ll probably get only five factions. How much do you need African people to be invisible before you’re happy?
Doesn’t have to be this DLC, nor do i mind them adding more than 5 civs, they could add 10 African civs for all i care, i just think Normans would be an Awesome civ, as well as Rus ‘n Poles. no need to think of me as a Racist 😛
I don’t think it’s racist, but it looks quite ethnocentrist when people keep asking again and again for new European stuff when it’s clearly not the time.
point noted.
To be fair, all the civs have most certainly been chosen already, and these suggestions are not going to affect the roster. And if anything, these suggestions show the devs there’s a demand for more content beyond AoAK, which is always good. Personally I hope that down the line, because the demand was there, we’ll get our south eastern Asian architecture and expansion, that India will get fractioned and get its own architecture like Ensemble Studio planned to before they ultimately chose Mesoamerica as the new architecture to be introduced in the Conquerors, that Nordic, Central and Eastern Europe will… Read more »
Yeah, it would be a good start :^p
How many african nations were really important in Middle Ages?
Well… The Ghana, Malian and Songhai Empires, Ethiopian Empire, nubian kingdoms (Makuria, Alodia and Nobatia), somali sultanates (Mogadishu, Ajuran), shona kingdoms (Zimbabwe, Mutapa…), swahili city states (Malindi, Mombasa, Zanzibar and so on), Kingdom of Kongo, Kanem-Bornou…
The fact that you didn’t hear about them doesn’t mean they weren’t powerful states with impressive civilisations, it only means the colonial states and slave traders from the XVIth tp the XXth centuries did an impressive job at denying their cultures and destroying their recorded history.
Actually, Medieval Africa means enough source material for at least two different expansions.
Yea, you’re probably right, I’ve got to read about it sometimes
EDIT: Oops… Glitch.
Normans were specifically mentioned as one of the civs that wouldnt be added – it’s right there in the blogpost youre commenting on.
and scratsch is right – i love how ‘african’ is declared the theme, and everyone immediately imagines the possible /european/ civs that might be added in it. like wow.
(nothing against you bro, there’s just a lot of comments like this – maybe normans well be added at some point, but for now id much rather see the Ethiopians, Congolese, Zimbabweans, and at least a dozen other african civs that are /actually/ african)
point noted,
I feel you that this african theme is a good mindset! Nevertheless i feel that one
European nation is missing, and it is a VERY obvious one: Portugal. They
were one of the leading colonizing empires at the time and they are
still not included.
Portugal will be included, it’s almost certain after E3.
https://www.forgottenempires.net/age-of-empires-ii-teasing-at-e3-2015
ok cool, good to know thanks
In middle ages Portugal was basicly a small useless kingdom. They took their position as a giant empire in 16-17 centuries, which are not medival times.
Indeed. Al-Andalus or even Aragon would be more historically-influential (throughout the ‘Medieval’ timeline) Spanish civilizations to add, if any.
I suppose if there’s one expansion it could feasibly be added in, it would be this one, though, at the very least. The Conquerors and The Forgotten did push the game partially into a post-Medieval world, after all.
So will you bring back the Story teller that you had totaly forgotten within the forgotten DLC? I missed him and was totaly disapionted with an unvoiced campain!
I don’t think they forgot it, it was probably just not a priority to hire so many people for voice acting.