Nostalgia and a faithful, polished remaster
Mentioned in ~1 in 3 positive reviews
“The Definitive Edition is a master class in what a remaster should be.”
Steam review · 175.5 h played ↗
Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition
Worth buying? What 300 Steam reviews say.Worth buying? Here’s what 300 Steam reviews actually say.
Very Positive · 95%Very Positive · 95%World's Edge, Forgotten Empires, CaptureAge, Tantalus Media, Wicked Witch, Feral Interactive2019RTS · City Builder · Strategy
The verdict
A timeless, deep RTS with huge content, campaigns and steady updates. Skip it if you want casual ranked play, dislike pricey DLC, or need Mac–PC crossplay.
Great for
Strategy fans, nostalgic veterans, history buffs, and campaign or AI-skirmish players
Main risk
Brutal ranked ladder and patch-induced crashes or bugs, plus ever-pricier DLC
What players love
One of the best RTS ever made
Mentioned in ~1 in 4 positive reviews
“Hands down best RTS ever made.”
Steam review · 86.1 h played ↗
Constant updates, new civs and DLC support
Mentioned in ~1 in 5 positive reviews
“The dev team does an amazing job of keeping it fresh.”
Steam review · 1001 h played ↗
Huge amount of campaigns and content
Mentioned in ~1 in 11 positive reviews
“the campaigns are VERY rich with content even if you don't buy the DLCs”
Steam review · 46.3 h played ↗
Deep strategy with huge civ variety
Mentioned in ~1 in 12 positive reviews
“The balance is excellent, the civ variety is huge, and the gameplay still rewards skill and knowledge over gimmicks.”
Steam review · 43 h played ↗
Teaches history through campaigns
Mentioned in ~1 in 19 positive reviews
“i have learned more from this game than my History book could ever teach me”
Steam review · 308.9 h played ↗
What players complain about
Update bugs and crashes
Mentioned in ~1 in 5 negative reviews
“Game started just crashing on game start or a few minutes after game start some time start of the year and it still hasn't been fixed. Literally unplayable.”
Steam review · 502.6 h played ↗
Brutal ranked: smurfs, matchmaking and penalties
Mentioned in ~1 in 7 negative reviews
“There is no penalty for leaving games so there is a huge smurfing problem.”
Steam review · 294.7 h played ↗
No crossplay between Mac and Windows
Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews
“THIS GAME DOES NOT HAVE CROSS PLAY BETWEEN MAC AND WINDOWS. PLAY ON WINDOWS IF YOU WANT TO PLAY ONLINE”
Steam review · 102.4 h played ↗
Expensive DLC and pay-to-win civs
Mentioned in ~1 in 9 negative reviews
“How does a game that is nearing 30years old have nearly £90 of DLCs?”
Steam review · 9.1 h played ↗
Anti-cheat, Xbox sign-in and voice chat intrusions
Mentioned in ~1 in 10 negative reviews
“Game kills itself if it detects Wand or CheatEngine open.”
Steam review · 305 h played ↗
Aggressive, cheating or dumb AI
Mentioned in ~1 in 15 negative reviews
“the DE AI spams units non stop to the point where it's not enjoyable anymore”
Steam review · 484.8 h played ↗
System requirements
From the Steam store page
Steam Deck: Playable15 GB
Minimum
OSWindows 10 64bit
ProcessorIntel Core 2 Duo or AMD Athlon 64x2 5600+
Memory4 GB RAM
GraphicsNVIDIA® GeForce® GT 420 or ATI™ Radeon™ HD 6850 or Intel® HD Graphics 4000 or better with 2 GB VRAM
Storage15 GB available space
Recommended
OSWindows 10 64bit
Processor2.4 Ghz i5 or greater or AMD equivalent
Memory8 GB RAM
GraphicsNvidia® GTX 650 or AMD HD 5850 or better
Storage15 GB available space
OSWindows 10 64bit
ProcessorIntel Core 2 Duo or AMD Athlon 64x2 5600+
Memory4 GB RAM
GraphicsNVIDIA® GeForce® GT 420 or ATI™ Radeon™ HD 6850 or Intel® HD Graphics 4000 or better with 2 GB VRAM
Storage15 GB available space
More games to check
Other games we’ve read the reviews for
Total War: WARHAMMER II
Very Positive · 93%+ Best entry in the Warhammer trilogy
− Expensive DLC locks core content
analyzed 29 min ago
Company of Heroes 2
Very Positive · 81%+ Immersive sound, visuals and destruction
− Heavy DLC paywalls and microtransactions
analyzed 32 min ago
Age of Empires II (Retired)
Overwhelmingly Positive+ Timeless classic RTS
− Retired and obsolete next to the Definitive Edition
analyzed 33 min ago
Palworld
Very Positive · 95%+ Pals as workers and base building
− Late-game grind
analyzed 19 h ago
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