Starcraft 2 vs Age of Empires Definitive

[Tricky Nicky 101]

Which game do you prefer and why?

[FloosWorld]

AoE because I overall prefer games with a historic setting.

[Hoplite]

wololo

[Still River]

Starcraft 2 is mostly only for multiplayer players. There isn't a lot to do there in singleplayer. You finish a medium long campaign and that is about it.

So unless you are a multiplayer genius, AOE 2 is better in every single way.

[Quintem]

Both, but I've focused on AoE2 more lately.

[ChimaereJade]

I like both games on their own.

AoE2 is my childhood and the number of aviable campaigns is amazing! Also getting new factions after all the time was a big surprise - but indeed a positive one. As a child I loved to learn about history, building beautiful cities or maps and getting better against AI.

SC2 was a game I just started when hearth of the swarm got released. After a long time allmost just playing historical or fantastic setting-games, the sci-fi-note was a nice change for me. I loved the story, read into the lore of SC1 and started to play the game online with friends, first time having the ambition to better my micro and makro a lot.
It's sad after the Nova-DLC there didn't come more story-releated stuff.
Coop-Commanders where a nice idea and I enjoyed leveling them. But everything get's old after some time.

At the moment I returned to AoE2D with the "return of rome"-expansion, because the AoE1D was a really bad joke in terms of pathfinding and now I can enjoy the first RTS I played as a child (but not that much, as AoE2) again.

[MassMetalizer]

I haven't played Starcraft 2, only 1, but I just vastly prefer the setting of AoE.

[jonoliveira12]

AoE2, as SC2 quickly devolves into a speed contest, rather than one of strategical decisions.
The -craft games all have way too much emphasis on micro, they are the Fighting Games of RTS.

[Quintem]

Originally posted by jonoliveira12:

AoE2, as SC2 quickly devolves into a speed contest, rather than one of strategical decisions.
The -craft games all have way too much emphasis on micro, they are the Fighting Games of RTS.

Micro is generally the more fun part, that's why MOBAs are so popular. You spend your time microing one thing. Also AoE2 is full of micro. In fact I think micro is the biggest skill expression in good RTS. So many people learn great macro but poor unit control leads to bad trades.

[nightingale2k1]

sc2 is fast paced game. aoe slower and more macro. sc2 need good micro as well to play.

[Flakstruk]

SC2 came out years after AOK. Sc1 is fair comparison

[kucsidaveee]

Originally posted by Flakstruk:

SC2 came out years after AOK. Sc1 is fair comparison

I think they want the comparison because AoE2 and SC2 are the 2 most well renowned RTS games out there still.

Now on topic, this is a tough one for me.
I am primarily a SP gamer, and therefore play AoE2 far more, considering the number of campaigns.
But here's the thing. I prefer sci-fi over historical stuff, and SC 2 gave a lot more fun campaign only units to play around with than AoE2.
In MP there are the coop commanders which are good, but I truely believe that SC2 could have made full on split tech trees to subfactions for skirmish too in order to increase replayability. For reference, something similar to C&C 3 Kane's Wrath did an excellent job at this concept.
Now, I think both are iconic in their own right, but I wastly prefer the gameplay loop of AoE2 as well.
Overall, I would say that I prefer AoE2 much more than SC2, despite my preference of setting.
But then again, you are on the AoE2 forum, most people here will tell you that AoE2 is better, and if you go to the SC2 forums, people will tell you SC2 is better.
if you want a more neutral perspective, go to a neutral place, and try to filter out responses coming from fans of those franchises.

[Noobert]

Starcraft

You don't start a team game with 850,700,600,700 ELo vs 1000,900,800,700

And I don't even play SC.

I sound like crybaby but seriously, game release like 24 years ago and people still not make units in team game, or make a few spearmen as Turks when it's too late and Opponent has 30 Cavaliers

[Zhen]

Originally posted by jonoliveira12:

The -craft games all have way too much emphasis on micro, they are the Fighting Games of RTS.

Starcraft is almost the standard RTS experience.

Prefer AoE2 for these reasons:
- original take on the RTS genre (what SC2 does, it does very good, if not the best, but it's kind of played out by now)
- random map scripts (there's a sense of discovery in AoE that SC completely lacks)
- four resource gathering (I don't remember any RTS game that did this before AoE1, this was such a game changer in the genre)

[Mia Wallace]

AoE 2 DE because of the map generation and micro macro aspect.

[Lend_of_the_Word]

Comparing aoe2 to starcraft 2 is like comparing oranges to grapefruit, and everyone knows that grapefruit is better than oranges, and which one is the grapefruit