Gas Powered Games – MMO Fallout

Age Of Empires Online Shuts Down Today

Age of Empires Online takes its last breaths today. The pseudo-MMO adaptation of Microsoft’s popular series never fully caught on thanks to its limited content and rather expensive cost of purchases, as well as the cheaper, more readily available alternative titles in the series. We learned last year in January that content development had ceased, and finally in October that the servers would come down in July due to the closure of Games for Windows Live services.

With full Age of Empires titles on sale for cheap, players found little reason to throw down $20 to unlock a single civilization. Following an unsuccessful Kickstarter campaign for an RTS called Wildman, Gas Powered Games laid off a number of staff and sold off to Wargaming.net.

Reminder: Age of Empires Online Shutting Down July 2014

Games For Windows Live may have been a hulking pile of poorly managed trash, but it was the pile of trash keeping Age of Empires Online…online. In case you missed it, earlier in August Microsoft accidentally updated the Age of Empires Online page to reveal that the service is shutting down on July 1st, 2014. The news wasn’t so surprising, after all the development on Age of Empires had ceased, the folks at Gas Powered Games no longer had anything to do with the game by this point, and the game could no longer sell currency or bring in new players due to the GFWL marketplace being shut down.

Games for Windows Live will be discontinued on July 1, 2014. Although it is available through Steam, Age of Empires Online requires features of the Games for Windows Live service. You can continue to enjoy all the features of Age of Empires Online as the service will remain 100% operational until July 1, 2014 when the server will shut down.

While a growing number of Games for Windows Live titles are already jumping ship and heading over to Steam, Age of Empires Online will be left behind to go down with the ship. This will leave Age of Empires Online with a server lifespan of nearly three years, and a development lifespan of sixteen months until development of new content ceased.

Age of Empires Online Isn't Shutting Down, Content Development Ceases

You like Age of Empires Online just the way it is, right? Hopefully you do, because Gas Powered Games has announced that future content development has ceased. A small amount of content will be released in the coming weeks, but after that Age of Empires Online will only see a few small changes to fix bugs as they crop up, as well as maintenance to keep the game running. Following this little bit of content, the game will be set as it is forever. Granted, this doesn’t mean that Age of Empires Online is close to shutting down.

Far from it in fact, rather Microsoft Studios notes in the announcement that nothing will change for current gamers:

However, nothing else changes for players, nothing that currently exists will be removed. You can still play everything you own, earn EP, and purchase any content you do not currently own. We will still fully maintain and support the game and its players; no one is losing anything that you have earned or bought. Our Community team will continue to support the game by way of Community Challenges, streams, contests, PvP tournaments and more.

The cause for the sudden cancellation is due to a reported high cost of developing content for the MMO.

(Age of Empires Blog)

Age of Empires Online Isn’t Shutting Down, Content Development Ceases

Far from it in fact, rather Microsoft Studios notes in the announcement that nothing will change for current gamers:

However, nothing else changes for players, nothing that currently exists will be removed. You can still play everything you own, earn EP, and purchase any content you do not currently own. We will still fully maintain and support the game and its players; no one is losing anything that you have earned or bought. Our Community team will continue to support the game by way of Community Challenges, streams, contests, PvP tournaments and more.

The cause for the sudden cancellation is due to a reported high cost of developing content for the MMO.

(Age of Empires Blog)

Age of Empires Online: Servers Merging This Summer

As far as free to play goes, Age of Empires developer Gas Powered Games will not rest until their MMO is completely free. I have already discussed the Alliances update going live this month in part. Once Alliances goes live, Age of Empires Online will use Empire Points as its real-money currency, allowing players to earn said currency through the Alliances game.

Unfortunately, all silver linings surround a cloud (or however the saying goes), and the update isn’t all great news. The Alliance update will only be implemented on the most popular eight servers. Players on the remaining six servers will need to transfer over in order to enjoy the update, and several weeks after the Alliance update goes live, the six servers will be shut down with anyone remaining transferred off. What GPG would like you to know is that the server mergers are not due to population issues.

We are closing the servers not for financial reasons, but for game design and player experience reasons. In fact, the player base tripled after the Spring Update (Celts, Steam, and more). We are doing it because the game is more fun when more people are concentrated in fewer places. If we start running into performance issues, we will reopen servers as needed.

Check out the patch notes below:

(Source: Age of Empires Online)

Age of Empires Online Will Be Free To Play, Not Free To Try

Age of Empires Online has had something of an identity crisis. Although enjoyed by plenty of players, the team at Gas Powered Games has been on the receiving end of some harsh criticism that the game isn’t so much “free to play” as it is “free to try.” Premium civilizations aren’t so much an optional add-on as they are a necessity to compete, adding a considerable road block at $10 a piece (they used to be $20).

Starting this summer, players will be able to obtain Empire Points either through buying them or by playing the game. Premium civilizations aren’t going anywhere, but by playing Age of Empires Online a player could accrue sufficient Empire Points to purchase the premium packs without paying a dime. According to GPG developers, a regular player might take two to three weeks of playing daily to obtain a premium civilization.

Age of Empires Online becomes more free to play this summer.

(Source: PC Gamer)

Get Age of Empires Online: Skirmish Mode While It Is Free

Age of Empires Online has always had one major downside: You had to do some major grinding in order to unlock all of the units in the game’s standard leveling mode. What ever happened to a fun skirmish in Age of Empires with everything available? Well the team over at Gas Powered Games has heard your pleas, and has introduced the Skirmish booster pack, allowing for just what the doctor ordered: Massive battles without the need to grind out your units.

The pack is free, but only for a limited time. You’ll still need to go through the process of buying it from Games for Windows marketplace, however.

Age of Empires Online: Your Mom’s Video Blog

Ya ever had a corn sandwich? The wounds from Ensemble Studios’ closure may still be fresh, but the guys over at Gas Powered Games want you to know that they are putting their full attention into Age of Empires Online. Hopefully this studio, known for their Dungeon Siege and Supreme Commander games, will be able to make the transition to MMORTS.

Age of Empires Online is currently in beta.

Age of Empires Online: Your Mom's Video Blog

Age of Empires Online is currently in beta.

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