Bugs / suggestions for AoE2

[Laptop]

Below are some bugs / suggestions I have noticed for AoE2HD, there may be some other bugs mentioned for the other AoE games, but this thread is mainly for AoE2HD. These are in no order of priority as the devs already have their own bug tracker.

1.

The game FPS slows right down if I open up the Steam overlay. Before, it would also happen if someone messaged you and the Steam notification popped up, but this no longer happens. There is still a slight lag effect whenever the Steam notification pops up, it does not impact performance a lot but is still noticable. However, it still lags down like hell if you SHIFT + TAB the overlay.

2.

Age of Empires: Online was made no longer be available to play after July 1st 2014.

I think the playerbase of those who played AoE:O would appreciate it if you could somehow get the game to be ported offline like the other AoE games. I understand Skybox have nothing to do with AoE:O, but anything is better than having no game at all. From a legal point of view, MS has done nothing wrong, but it would make a lot of players happy if they would be able to continue playing this, especially players who had purchased premium content for the game (like I did). Even if it is just brought back with no dedicated servers and Steam handles the online matchmaking, people will be happy.

3.

The actual display resolution on the intro videos to the game is far too low. Would it be possible to have the same videos but change the resolution on them to 1920x1080, or even a higher one? If you view the actual source video in the Steam folder, the resolution is actually much higher than what is displayed. So my suggested fix is to allow the intro sequence to have the same resolution as your current desktop (like the game does it). This would stop the Steam overlay resetting every time you start the game up and stop my desktop icons being knocked around.

4.

The William Wallace campaign game speed is locked to 1.5 and has always been like this. All other campaigns have had their game speed unlocked but the tutorial. It could be that this was left locked intentionally so that new players cannot knock the game speed up accidentally and thus the tutorial is too difficult for them as time goes too fast. If this is the case, could the speed at least be unlocked so it goes from 1.0 – 1.5 – 2.0 speeds? I do like to play the tutorial sometimes for nostalgia reasons but playing at 1.5 is just too slow, especially with the systems we have in this day and age. If not fully unlocked, at least let us change the speed to up to 2.0. 1.5 just feels too "eugh" after playing on 2.0 or higher.

5.

If you go onto the main menu and hover the mouse over some of the buttons, you will see that some of the buttons light up before the mouse cursor actually touches them. The borders for a lot of the main menu are quite out of sync with what the visual borders look like. Perhaps they can be re-drawn?

6.

Metacritic rating

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/age-of-empires-ii-hd-edition

Unless the reviewers on Metacritic are willing to update their reviews (which, I don't know even happens unless you pay money), the stupid Metacritic rating should just be taken off the front of the store page for AoE2HD on Steam (seriously, they don't even have Skybox listed as the current developers on there). Even if you release a buggy game on release, and then patch it so in the end it is a work of art, the review number is highly unlikely to change at all. People may be considering on buying the game, and then they see the Metacritic rating and will go "oh, it must suck then!" and you lose a sale.

This suggestion is also valid for Age of Mythology on Steam.

7.

The ® copyright symbol appears in the AoE3 title name in the Steam library, it is not meant to show up here, but in the store page only instead. Please can it be removed as no other AoE title has this.

8.

The in-game Tech Tree:

The in-game Tech Tree looks 'okay', but I really think it needs to be looked at and possibly re-done for the HD edition. I don't think there are any higher resolution assets for those icons in there, so I would suggest asking the art and design dept. to see if they can do very, very similar icon assets for it, but at a much higher resolution (obviously).

9.

Remastered intro videos:

The original AoE2 intro, along with the Ensemble Studios one still looks okay, but I really think that if this is to become a true re-master, the intro videos are gonna have to be looked at at some point. The Ensemble Studios one might seem a little pointless as they are not around anymore (and the majority of people that are, are Hidden Patch now, who are not working on this game). However, the intro videos are the FIRST things anyone will see when they start the game.

The Ensemble one wouldn't really take a lot of resources / budget to re-do for a HD remaster, but as they're not around anymore, it may feel pointless for it to warrant a remaster (however again, that is only just under 20 seconds of animation).

I don't see any reason why Microsoft or Skybox wouldn't be able to do a true HD version of the Ensemble Studios intro (believe me, if I was that much of a good video animator, I would have done it for you for free already!). I feel they deserve the respect of the HD intro as they made the game in the first place and are one of few good game developers to sadly no longer be around.

As for the AoE2 intro, itself (the game intro, with the battle / chess game) that would be quite a lot more resources + time to re-make for a HD version. The un-cut version that never made it to the retail release in 1999 is nearly 3 minutes 20 seconds! Even if you think it is not worth it right now, it should still be written down for the future. It would certainly shine out at the front of the game so to speak.

10.

Original in-game assets

Some in-game assets were modifed in the game for the HD release. Some were changed back eventually (i.e. the new farms), but some you still have to mod back in.

For the flames, I really think the old flames should be an in-game option (like the water is, you can choose between old / new). I think there should be a "3D Burning Flames" option in the game options. So, if you enable it, you have the flames you have now that came with the HD edition, if you disable it, you have the old original flames. There's nothing wrong with the new ones, just if you played the original years ago, you may be used to the older flames.

The same goes for the food icons, the old farms were restored, but I feel the option to have the old icons at the top left should be there as an in-game option also. Maybe "original resource icons" as a tickbox in the game options?

Finally, the cliffs. This one is a little tricky as the default cliffs you see in-game are the beta ones that were originally not meant to go into AoE2 as the final release (but for some reason that happened anyway). The 'new' cliffs now are the ones that were supposed to be in AoE2, but I'm not sure what you'd name them both under in the options if the option to choose between one or the other was implemented.

11.

"Game Paused"

The text for this is pretty small the higher up the resolution you go. Is it possible to have this text scale depending on your resolution size? While we're on the topic of pausing games, the option to have the game auto-pause and then un-pause when you open and then close the Steam overlay would be pretty sweet. Some games on Steam have this already (Mainly the Valve games), but it would still be pretty awesome to have this done.

12.

Trebuchets don't deal damage after beginning to pack

If you unload a Trebuchet, fire it on something, then pack it while that rock / fireball is still up in the air travelling toward the target, it will NOT deal damage if you have begun packing the Trebuchet. This bug has been around since the original game.

Thanks for reading and I hope these bugs / suggestions can be considered and hopefully approved!

[FE_HockeySam18]

Pinning this for now as it is both important and relevant. Thanks, Laptop65!

[ModPositive]

Originally posted by Laptop65:

Below are some minor bugs / suggestions I have noticed for AOE2 + AOM: EX.

1.

The AOM store page has the original game's metacritic rating. This would be a pretty good idea for the AOE2HD store page also. Although there is a seperate metacritic rating for AOE2 and the HD edition, metacritic has a really big review flaw which reviewers will review something on release, and then very rarely ever touch that review or rating ever again.

So you can release a buggy game on release, but no matter how much of an amazing job you do with patching it, that metacritic rating will always stay the same. My suggestion for this is to simply replace the stupid 68 HD edition rating to the more deserving 92 rating on Metacritic. This is in no way illegal or misleading customers as it is the same game with core gameplay being pretty much the same.

This has got to be the stupidest thing I've ever read. Please tell me you're kidding, right? If not, know that it's people like you who allow companies to release broken-ass games without any semblance of responsibility. I paid full price for pre-purchasing AoE2HD, I damn well better have a working product on release date. Otherwise what was the point of pre-purchasing and paying a higher price than everyone who buys the game months later on sale? To be an alpha tester while the developers sort out the issues?

It's going on 1+ year now and the game is still far buggier than the original, with far worse multiplayer (horrendous FPS lag when 50+ units are on screen, no smooth scrolling, many new Out of Sync/drop issues, game room glitch where a kicked player is stuck so the whole game has to be remade, etc.). And lest you think the problems are confined to multiplayer, the facts are that the standard single player AI has been broken for months, and many custom AIs that have been a part of the community for years are no longer compatible after patch 3.x.

You do realize that critics review games based on what is released right? If the game wasn't ready to be reviewed, don't release it- it's as simple as that. Do you even think about why the original AoE/AoM games got such high metacritic scores? It's because Ensemble Studios was highly dedicated to their games, and their effort showed in the quality of the product on release. Watch this video to learn about the making of AoM:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pBnAFcUqIU

tl;dr:
The game was broken to the point of being unplayable on release, and rightly deserves it's low review scores. Next time, think twice before releasing a broken product.

[El Daddy]

Minor AoE2HD/AoF bug - the "buy" and "sell" indicators in the Market are missing. I can buy and sell things fine, just which icons are which are not clarified.

[Laptop]

I'm not about to write an essay here but the core gameplay is the same, which is pretty much what a game is about at the end of the day. The AOE2HD core gameplay was the same as AOE2 (1999), so aside from that there is not much difference.

And I've already brought up my point about Metacritic's big flaw with games. You can release a terrible buggy game on release and get say for example a 65 metacritic, and then 1 year later it has a range of amazing patches that have fixed plenty of bugs, but guess what? That rating is still going to be the same because they don't re-review the game unless they keep a close eye on it (which never happens).

Originally posted by El_Daddy:

Minor AoE2HD/AoF bug - the "buy" and "sell" indicators in the Market are missing. I can buy and sell things fine, just which icons are which are not clarified.

Make your own thread in the "support" section in AOE2HD and they'll look at it.

[ModPositive]

Originally posted by Laptop65:

I'm not about to write an essay here but the core gameplay is the same, which is pretty much what a game is about at the end of the day. The AOE2HD core gameplay was the same as AOE2 (1999), so aside from that there is not much difference.

And I've already brought up my point about Metacritic's big flaw with games. You can release a terrible buggy game on release and get say for example a 65 metacritic, and then 1 year later it has a range of amazing patches that have fixed plenty of bugs, but guess what? That rating is still going to be the same because they don't re-review the game unless they keep a close eye on it (which never happens).

Did you not read my post above or are you purposefully ignoring it? It doesn't matter if the core gameplay is the same, when you CAN'T even PLAY the game properly on release! Imagine if they aren't able to fix the game (I mean, it's only been one year, WTF?) and a rating of 90+ for AoC was shown vis-a-vis metacritic. That would be highly misleading, wouldn't it?

[Laptop]

Originally posted by known2own4sho:

Did you not read my post above or are you purposefully ignoring it? It doesn't matter if the core gameplay is the same, when you CAN'T even PLAY the game properly on release! Imagine if they aren't able to fix the game (I mean, it's only been one year, WTF?) and a rating of 90+ for AoC was shown vis-a-vis metacritic. That would be highly misleading, wouldn't it?

I could play AOE2HD on release, plus it's in a much better state than last year. So...

[FE_HockeySam18]

Guys, we know these arguments don't go anywhere. Instead of squabbling and producing no result other than personal gratification, why don't we stick to the purpose of this thread and report bugs and suggestions in a constructive and polite manner?

My experience with life is that being civil and considerate gets better results than the opposite option.

[ModPositive]

Originally posted by AoF_HockeySam18:

Guys, we know these arguments don't go anywhere. Instead of squabbling and producing no result other than personal gratification, why don't we stick to the purpose of this thread and report bugs and suggestions in a constructive and polite manner?

My experience with life is that being civil and considerate gets better results than the opposite option.

Do you honestly think the minor issues described in the original post warrant a sticky? AoE2HD has far bigger issues right now, and any time people report minor issues, we are told that they are lower on the priority list of things to get done.

There's minor issues that have been reported for a while, many since the game launched that still haven't been fixed (e.g. pop 500 scenario from scenario editor doesn't work, lobby auto-rename glitch to someone's name when they leave the game room, bitmaps in custom scenarios don't work properly, ratings disappear from user sporadically in lobby, no way to turn off the double-click resize at the top of game window, no resolution changing options, no official leaderboards that were promised since launch, no separate AoF/AoE2HD ratings that was promised in video blog, etc.).

And those were just the minor issues I could think of off the top of my head! The major issues- I them posted above.

[ModPositive]

Originally posted by Laptop65:

Originally posted by known2own4sho:

Did you not read my post above or are you purposefully ignoring it? It doesn't matter if the core gameplay is the same, when you CAN'T even PLAY the game properly on release! Imagine if they aren't able to fix the game (I mean, it's only been one year, WTF?) and a rating of 90+ for AoC was shown vis-a-vis metacritic. That would be highly misleading, wouldn't it?

I could play AOE2HD on release, plus it's in a much better state than last year. So...

Good for you- many people couldn't, or could barely play with crashes to desktop all the time. Multiplayer lagged miserably (FPS-lag) even on 1v1s. In fact, all users with Windows XP couldn't even start the game at launch because AoE2HD was referencing a dll that is non-existant on XP systems, despite the fact that XP was listed as a supported OS. They didn't even bother running the game once on a supported OS, come on.

Yes single-player might be in a better state now, but multiplayer has gotten worse since patch 2.8. For those like me who pre-ordered and paid full price for a broken product, we were pretty much screwed over since now you can get the game for $5 on sale.

[FE_HockeySam18]

Originally posted by known2own4sho:

Do you honestly think the minor issues described in the original post warrant a sticky? AoE2HD has far bigger issues right now, and any time people report minor issues, we are told that they are lower on the priority list of things to get done.

I stickied this thread because it offers itself as a place where gamers can collectively compile suggestions and bug reports as a group. If you read the title of the thread, you will see that it refers to both AoE2HD and AoMEX. Individual threads reporting single issues are somewhat disorganized, but I make it part of my job to read these forums a lot and note all of the issues that are reported so that we (AoF team) can fix ones pertaining to us and pass on the ones that are not in our field of expertise to those who can.

I don't quite see what you hope to gain by flaming me for pinning a thread that makes the reporting of game issues more organized, but you would have far more to gain by contributing positively to this thread rather than making blatant attempts to derail it. I'm glad you care enough to post issues you have found- I truly appreciate it. Frankly, you can add me (I'll add you back) and if you so desire you can say whatever you want, no matter the nature, to me over the private chat, but please do Laptop65 (and the community) the courtesy of keeping this thread on topic. You want the game to be better- threads like this have the potential to make it better.

That's all I've really got- I'm not mad or anything, just making an appeal for civil, human courtesy. Cheers mate.

[ModPositive]

Originally posted by AoF_HockeySam18:

Originally posted by known2own4sho:

Do you honestly think the minor issues described in the original post warrant a sticky? AoE2HD has far bigger issues right now, and any time people report minor issues, we are told that they are lower on the priority list of things to get done.

I stickied this thread because it offers itself as a place where gamers can collectively compile suggestions and bug reports as a group. If you read the title of the thread, you will see that it refers to both AoE2HD and AoMEX. Individual threads reporting single issues are somewhat disorganized, but I make it part of my job to read these forums a lot and note all of the issues that are reported so that we (AoF team) can fix ones pertaining to us and pass on the ones that are not in our field of expertise to those who can.

I don't quite see what you hope to gain by flaming me for pinning a thread that makes the reporting of game issues more organized, but you would have far more to gain by contributing positively to this thread rather than making blatant attempts to derail it. I'm glad you care enough to post issues you have found- I truly appreciate it. Frankly, you can add me (I'll add you back) and if you so desire you can say whatever you want, no matter the nature, to me over the private chat, but please do Laptop65 (and the community) the courtesy of keeping this thread on topic. You want the game to be better- threads like this have the potential to make it better.

That's all I've really got- I'm not mad or anything, just making an appeal for civil, human courtesy. Cheers mate.

I'm not quite sure why you think that I flamed you. I never personally attacked you at all- all I asked was if you thought that the original post warranted a sticky. Now if that construes flaming in your eyes, I can't help you.

In addition, where have I made blatant attempts to derail this thread? I simply explained why the low metacritic score is not an issue and is appropriate given the broken state of the game upon release. In fact, as you mentioned, I have already contributed positively to this thread by listing off a series of both major and minor issues with the game.

If by appealing for "civil, human courtesy" you mean simply agreeing with the original poster, I'm sorry, but I cannot do that.

Sure- I'll add you. I'm all for improving the quality of the game, and as a software engineer by profession, I have, in fact, even volunteered to drive to Redmond (~3 hours away) to help out on AoE2HD issues ever since launch. I was even at the Microsoft campus visiting friends as late as November of last year, before the launch of Xbox One.

[FE_HockeySam18]

Seems like a misunderstanding then. Added you back, and looking forward to chatting with you if you like!

[Jao Le]

AOE 2 The Forgotten (is that the same as aoe 2 hd?), can't save games past a certain point in the scenarios. It seems to be about 20-30 min. into a scenario. After that point if I save a game and then load it, the whole game reinitializes and I lose my game. I'm on win7 64bit

[King Jon]

AoF_HockeySam18: I am bit confused by the types of bugs that we are supposed to put in this thread. Are they marketing-related bugs, or what?

I included the following bugs in a thread from a few months ago, and unless I am mistaken, none of these very minor bugs have been addressed (Feel free to delete this post if the point of this thread is different than the list that I am making below):

Minor Bugs: (these bugs represent functionalities that are missing/broken within the game)

1. Taunt menu doesn't work - If you pick taunts from the taunt menu rather that typing the number, the taunt doesn't play. If you type the number manually it DOES play.
2. Can't search by location in Lobby Browser - The only option for location is "Any" on the location pull-down menu.
3. Lobby Browser filter for match type "Friends/Public/Skill" doesn't work properly - Despite setting this filter to Friend, public games still appear. Usually resetting a few times will fix this problem, but it almost never works the first few times.
4. Replaying recorded games controls bug - Clicking the "<|" button to start the replay again makes the replay controls disappear.
5. Game speed resets to normal (1.5) after each session - The game used to remember what your last speed setting were in single-player, but it no longer seems to.
6. The economic minimap description doesn't match up with what it does - Only Markets, Docks and idle villagers are displayed, when according to the help function (bottom left) it is supposed to display all drop off points (lumber & mining camps, mills and TC's), Blacksmith, Monasteries, trade units, etc.
7. Food type bug - In AoF food is supposed to be conserved when villagers switch between resources. This was not working in 3.0 and persists in patch 3.1. berries <-> sheep, berries <-> shore fish, shore fish <-> sheep, shore fish <-> deer, sheep <-> deer have all been tested, and in all cases the food carried by the villager is lost.
8. Enemy AI's tribute resources during treaty mode - During the treaty period, enemy AIs will send you aid, even if you didn't ask for aid! Obviously this is a buggy behavior.
9. Vertically and horizontally placed gates can still be passed while being built - This is not true of diagonally placed gates and any other building. This bug has been around since the original version.
10. Changing settings changes player number - When you edit the game settings, your player number changes to the last player number you left the set-up screen with if you change any of the settings for "Game", "Map Style", "Other Players", "Reveal Map", and "Victory". So if you played as Player #3, switch to player #1, and then change the victory conditions, it goes back to player #3 and you have to switch it again to player #1 if you want to be player #1.

Very Minor Bugs: (these bugs have little/no affect on gameplay and are generally cosmetic in nature)

1. "AOE Website" button in the launcher links to a non-existent page - I should be removed entirely or linked to something that actually exists.
2. Cost of cartography is listed as "Cost: 100 food, 100 gold0" - There's an extra zero.
3. "Shepherds" is INCORRECTLY spelled "Sheperds" - This is spelled wrong only in the list of things villagers are doing in the economic view of the minimap. This has been spelled wrong since the beginning of this game 14 years ago. Also, the list should be consistent as to plural or not.
4. The word "chieftain" is misspelt as "chieftan." - This mis-spelling is found in the Franks section on the History pages.
5. Improper punctuation in Saladin #2 Lord of Arabia - Reynald's Raiders and Pirates, all instances need to have apostrophe 's not s' apostrophe.
6. Music track repeated - In the sound files for the game, track 'xmusic11' and 'xmusic14' are the same track (xmusic14 is a bit longer). Track "Voodoodoodoo" is missing and should go in place of 'xmusic14' which should go in place of 'xmusic11'.
7. History section has missing graphics - In the "Caste Evolution" section, the Italians and Renaissance sections, etc. there are missing graphics.
8. The new AoF civilizations still appear in the base game’s history section – Also, these use original AoE II artwork, which has nothing to do with them. Also, the new civs from AoF are not in alphabetical order with the existing civs.
9. Briton's tech tree in AoF is incorrect regarding Elite Cannon Galleons - Britons CANNOT build Elite Cannon Galleons, but the tech tree in AoF indicates otherwise.
10. 2nd save of a single-player game adds a "." to the end of the save name - This doesn't really appear to cause any problems, but it doesn't occur all the time and it seems to show up in AoF rather than the base game (at least for me).
11. Gate foundations display bug - With the Teutons build set, only on gates that are vertical in orientation, and only in the Forgotten DLC, foundations of gates currently being built are displayed as having already been completed. This is a display bug only, as the gate still must be built normally. Does this bug exist with any other civilizations?
12. Monk cursor display bug - The shape of the monk cursor is an elipse rather than a circle in both the base game and AoF. This started in patch 3.0.
13. Progress bar in restoring game problems - Progress bar when transferring restore game file is not in the right place (should be under the person downloading's name).
14. Resolution bug after game end - After a game ends, if you view the achievements without quiting the game, when you go back into the game, the resolution has changed to be very zoomed in (800 x 600?).
15. Units walk backwards - Sometimes units walk backward. This appears to have no effect on their effectiveness doing anything at all, but it is an obvious animation bug.

[FE_HockeySam18]

Originally posted by King Jon:

AoF_HockeySam18: I am bit confused by the types of bugs that we are supposed to put in this thread. Are they marketing-related bugs, or what?

Any bugs! Just please organize them in orderly fashion (which it appears you have already done!)

Thanks for the long post! I'd love if you were to link the other thread from a few months ago too.