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Age of Empires III demo

I'm starting to get the hang of this game, and in fact, I think it has the potential to be every bit as good as Age of Empires II, which to me has been Ensemble's best game so far. There are a number of changes, it's true, but fundamentally it still looks, feels and plays like the same game, which is good enough for me: if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

The basic changes I've noticed so far are:

• Home cities are the biggest difference. Essentially, you play a force that is colonizing part of America, and every time you accumulate enough experience, you can send a "shipment" (reinforcements, goods etc.) from your home city back in Europe to help you out.
• You get experience, which is gained by killing enemies, finding treasure, establishing settlements, and so on.
• Gathering units no longer have to return the resources they've picked up to a building. Sure, it's unrealistic, but it simplifies things a great deal.
• You get a "settler" type unit, who can build settlements (and later, town centres), and who seems to be pretty much unkillable. If he loses all his hit points, he is knocked out, but he regenerates slowly, and once he's back to full health he's as good as new.
• You can now train up to five of the same type of combat unit at once.

That's about it. If it doesn't sound like a massive list of new features, then that's because the changes that have been made to the game are minimal. Essentially, in the last seven years (or thereabouts), very little has changed. Most of the additions alter the game in subtle ways or make it more intuitive at performing menial tasks, but fundamentally this is essentially Age of Empires II in 3D a few hundred years later. That's exactly what I was hoping for, and despite my initial apprehensions about it, I think Microsoft have a winner on their hands. I'll definitely be buying the retail version when it comes out.

15:02