Please consider creating a Japanese civ. I will happily pay for it.

They are on our radar. Maybe one day we can tremble at the majesty of the Carthaginian Empire.

 

Following design rules are up to us, but we consider the opportunity to expand AoEO a privilege so we take great care to try to reverse engineer the mindset of the original Devs so we can pick up where they left off and produce something that follows the game’s natural trajectory as best as possible. Certainly the more content we create the further we get from the original game and the more speculation is necessary and the larger the likely margin of error. Maybe we are 100 percent certain the Romans were next at civ 7. But it’s anybody’s guess who would have been 8 or 9.

If we were presented with an opportunity to continue development of new civs, we would have to choose very carefully. It’d be a discussion lots of players would be keenly interested in. So we would again want to be transparent and explain our reasoning.

We’d start by looking at the original six or seven civs and do our best to identify patterns in those civ selections. Are there patterns observable in the geography of those civs? In their eras they rose to power? In their neighboring rivals and allies? In their historical demographics? In their ingame Units and Buildings and Playstyles? If we can identify any patterns, can we follow them forward and predict what other civs match those answers? Would any make good candidates for new civs? In what ways would those both fit into our roster of civs but also bring new ideas to the game?

It’s a complex dance with perhaps multiple strong answers. I’d be lying if I suggested I haven’t worked out my own answers to many of these. But I’d love to see us all discuss them.

Candidly, much of what has made developing the Romans such a joy is our watching everyone's excitement boil over as we go. Almost everyone bought into the Romans immediately. They were hands down the most requested piece of content for years.

But there’s no close second. There’s probably 10-15 civs fighting for the 8th seat at the table. And if we ever announced one of them, that’s 14 fans who have to settle for something different than they hoped. So if we are going to knowingly disappoint, we would be wise to show you all our analysis. Just like when we cut popular units and blog about their obituaries (like the Veles and Numidian Horseman and Quinquereme), we owe people the respect of explaining how we arrived where we arrive. So hopefully even if some people disagree they at least understand how we decided and see we are doing our best.

 

TLDR Carthage is the most likely 8th civ?

 

TLDR: it’s not that simple.

 

Even better news for the players then I spose, 9th and 10th civ confirmed... by 2025

Cheers for the writeup on the decisionmaking though, I did initially read more than just that paragraph lol

Those cut units won't be in vain in the long run methinks

 

Carthage always has a place in my heart and a chair at my table. Whether it is the 8th chair is to be determined though. haha

 

I think it'd be among the favourites if you polled all possibilities

 

That’d be a fun poll

 

I really like the Idea of a poll.

 

I would vote for Punic war ... fits right in with Romans and OK the Greeks can get Jealous LoL

 

The beauty of the punic war is you can cover it from both perspectives then too if Carthage is the favourite to be introduced. There's just the overwhelming task of making another civ after Romans. Let's not forget anything in the future WILL be much harder due to the lack of an existing semi fleshed out concept and a bunch of assets, and it is possible the Celeste team may opt to never develop another full scale civ in the future, instead choosing to release (some of the) future questpacks with subfactions to play as during some/all of the pack, as it is a much more feasible task to accomplish.

 

I had a nice big reply about how ideas alone aren’t helpful and may be detrimental if I have no skill so I’m learning to blender. Skills might give you more sway... it might not but hey if it fails to work here you have a graphic design career to fall back on now or coding if you go that route.

 

Call it work experience! Never know what kind of connections you might make when you get involved too.

As far as I'm concerned *Trump voice* We have great broadcasters and commentators. The best. We have better commentary than starcraft 2 or warcraft 3. They suck. There is just no life with their broadcasters, no life at all. If there was a casting competition I think our boys would win it handily. No competition at all actually! Artosis lies awake at night wishing he was the spaniard and tasteless wishes he could smoke as much as Ardeshir. Age of empires 2 can be second, but age of empires online is first. We're going to build an empire and we are going to make nobody pay for it.