Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition - Return of Rome Review (rrø)
General: This expansion is generally good, and in some places it is better than AOE1 Definitive Edition. However, there are several things there it is just worse.
AI: I have no idea why, but the AI is really bad for some reason compared to Definitive Edition. The computer player does not know how to defend or raid. The also do not know how to micro, and some units refuse to attack ships on water.
New Campaign: The new campaigns are decent. But because the AI is bad how they fix the issue in the campaign is just to spam units even though the enemy does not have necessary resources. It should not be the case to do these kind of cheap tricks in 2023. It is so annoying when strategy games does this. Like what is the point of raiding villagers? The only strategy is building up and army and destroying the military buildings.
Old Campaign: The old campaign is a worse version of the definitive edition. Everything looks worse and works poorly. Take for example Glory of Greece: "The Siege of Athens". What did they do to the city? Why does it looks so bad? The main issue is still the AI. I easily completed all the campaign on hard without any issue which I cannot do in the definitive edition version. related to difficulty in the original and definitive edition when you played on the hardest difficulty the enemy started with extra resources, making scenarios such as: Xenophon's March extra difficult, but whoever made this expansion clearly did not know that.
Changes: Some changes are good, like the new technologies, but some changes are weird. Like why not still having all the buildings in the same main window. I honestly do not understand the changes to the tool age units, towers and catapult? Towers are too strong now; the game is not suppose to be so defensive.
Camera: Like why can't the camera zoom as much as in the definitive edition? And also why is things in the edges so unclear?