The Greek Gods

The Age of Mythology (abbreviated AoM), is a mythological based strategy computer game. The game was developed by Ensemble Studios and published by Microsoft Game Studios. The game was released on November 1, 2002, in the United States first and in Europe a week later. The game centers on the myths and legends of the Egyptians, Greeks, and the Norse. The plot of the game is about Arkantos, an Atlantean admiral, who has to travel through the lands of three different civilizations in the game and hunt for a Cyclopes who turned Poseidon against Atlantis. The game sold over 1 million copies just four months after it was released.

Age of Mythology is a strategy game which involves the building of towns, gathering resource items, creating armies, and of course destroying enemies and buildings. The players defeat and conquer the rival towns. There are other versions of the game where one can upgrade to the Classical Age, The Heroic Age, and the Mythic Age. Each upgrade will unlock new challenges for the players.

Each of the three civilizations (the Greek, Egyptians, and the Norse) have three major gods and they are Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon (the Greek gods), Isis, Ra, and Set (Egyptian, and Thor Odin, and Loki (the Norse gods). The player gets to choose the god they want to portray. Each time the player advances to another stage, they choose a minor god. Some examples of the minor gods are Aphrodite and Bast. Each god has a specific ability just as in the real myths, each god had a certain task and represented a certain symbol. There are four main resources in the Age of Mythology game. They are food, wood, gold, and favor. The game does not have the stone resource which was included in the other Ensemble Studios games.

The armies are comprised of human soldiers. Each player has a maximum population to play with. The players do not begin to use the whole population in the beginning of the game. By building more houses or Town centers (which is the main building in the player’s town) increases the population for the player. The population slots the player gets depends on the unit, some worth more population slots than others. Also the units can be upgrades. The units are classified by seven different categories. They are infantry, archers, cavalry, naval units, heroes, siege-weaponry, and myths. There are also three different types of naval units, the arrow ships, siege ships, and hammer ships. The battles are based on the rock, paper, scissors, style of fighting. The same method is used for the ships.

This game is a multi-player game with one free multi-player account. Many computer multi-player games are played online on Ensemble Studios or through a direct LAN or IP connection.