Ah, Rise of Nations, one of the great examples of how a Real Time Strategy should be.
There were three more nuke detonations until Armageddon, and nobody would accept an alliance from me. The Incas were on their last toes from the bombardment Russia was handing them. I offered to turn the tides and form an alliance with the Inca people, just to get the reply " Because of your previous actions, we demand 2000 oil."

That being said, I nuked the Incas, declared war and nuked Russia, and then nuked myself.

Armageddon/10.

Oh Rise of Nations, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN DURING MY CHILDHOOD?

I have probably a couple thousand hours into RoN. I think the reviews speak for itself. It's a phenomonal game.

A strategic game with super cool strategic battles. That is, until someone stars a countdown timer to victory then everyone panics and it turns into a battle of who can nuke the fastest.
10/10

Fun RTS game, played it while I was young and it is very nostalgic.

I've been playing Rise of Nations for about ten years, since I was little. Probably the best RTS I've ever played.

General:
> Citrus repairs nuclear-powered aircraft carriers.
> Titanium intensifies the Russian Winter.
> Sheep make your civilization smarter.
> War Elephants instantly transform into tanks.
> Horses make tanks cheaper.
> Papyrus makes it cheaper to invent electricity.
> Rafts with bonfires instantly transform into nuclear attack submarines.
> Bears make it cheaper and easier to create the Department of Homeland Security and institute the draft.
> The Aztecs can field tank divisions.
> The Mongols support their horse archers with fighter jets.
> American Hoplites and Cataphracts.
> You can bribe trebuchets to transform into howitzers.

Conquer the World Campaigns:
> Play as Alexander the Great; beat up Indians and steal their elephants.
> Play as an European or Native American power; beat up Carribbean islanders and steal their rum.
> Play as Napoleon and stop Lewis & Clark's nefarious expedition.
> Play as Mikhail Gorbachev, eliminate Jimmy Carter's NATO and steal Ronald Reagan's nukes.
> Help the Americans and Chinese fight the Mongols and Ottomans in World War I for control of Mongol-held SIberia.

11/10

This review is dedicated to my friend Gary who died of cancer.

He introduced me to this game and I have a big soft spot for its simple mechanics. Its easy to pick up and difficult to put down.

This game only came on Steam a year or so ago. We played the retail release. This new version adds Twitch support and is a lot more friendly to modern systems and resolutions. I've not clocked long on it mainly due to the bitter sweet memories. I like the units in this game. My only complaint with this has been that there could have been more nations to choose from. But that is minor. Its right up there with Age of Empires et al.

Goodnight Gary. I'll keep winning for you.

One of the best game revivals.

RoN became very fast my favorite strategy games once it got released at 2003 and later with its expasion at 2004. I love it as it consists of gameplay of all eras. Starting with your slignshots and swords, and improving until you get missiles and stealth bombers.

It's story is quite good and reminds you of the glory days with some great battle. Multiplayer is one of its best elements. Playing with your friends co-op versus with AI or just an all out battle! Customise the teams as you want and also the battle's options like map size, technologies and winning methods.

Now let's talk about Extended Edition. <---Skip here if you just want to learn the differences.
The game graphics look quite similar but definitelly smoother. You can feel the overall gameplay and animations of the charaters being so smooth while moving and fighting.

Multiplayer is here once again with leaderboards! As gamespy is dying the game now has multiplayer once again and better than ever! I am hoping to see an ever bigger map though and more units instead of just 200/300. I bet it wouldn't be much of a problem nowadays with the new updated and powerful computers.

Twitch! Do you like streaming and showing off your gameplay? This will be very handy for you. Log in, hit the record button and show your fans all your strategy tactics on how you beat your opponent!

The only downside for me is that the game looks quite similar, yet some small very handy improvements will make it quite better.

Bigger maps, yes bigger than Big Huge. People using the editor can remake their countries and some of their battles with a proper big terrain.

More units! Setting the unit price to lower and having more units in battle will totally increase the fun of the game.

More players? With bigger maps, more players can be added as well. 12 or something like that.

Overall?
If you liked the original, you are gonna like this one as well.
If you haven't played the original, then if you like real time strategy games, you are gonna love it too!

These nations are extremely balanced:

-Russia has increased attrition within ALL borders.
-Egypt has EXPONENTIAL food/wonder bonuses
-Bantu have an AMAZING population perk.
-Chinese can create citizens INSTANTLY.

-Romans save 25% on a fort.

10/25%off Would play as Romans again.

It's like Civilization and Age of Empires had a baby and Steam just now got around to sending out cigars, even though the kid's like 10 now.

Cool kid though, great game!