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PC | Strategy | Age of Empires III: The WarChiefs

Boxart for Age of Empires III: The WarChiefs
Age of Empires III: The WarChiefs 11 screen shots
  • GRAPHICS: 4.50
  • SOUND: 4.00
  • CONTROL: 4.00
  • FUN FACTOR 4.25
  • AVG USER SCORE 4.8
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 4.2

Review: Age of Empires III: The WarChiefs

Review by The Watcher | 10/18/2006 | 13:50:45 PM PST

Empires are not built in a day, unless, of course, you play video games, in which case they're built and destroyed with reckless abandon in mere hours. And what better game allows for this clash of civilizations than Ensemble Studio's Age of Empires series? The latest, Age of Empires III, pushed the RTS genre to new technical and visual heights, but was still rooted to a largely traditional formula. Age of Empires III: The Warchiefs adds some new combatants to the conflict but does this latest addition add fuel to the fire or does it douse the flames of war?

Chief Among Us

First, let's get the new features out of the way. Warchiefs brings to the table three new Native American civilizations: the European-like Iroquois; cavalry-centric and quick-moving Sioux; and the powerful, all-infantry Aztecs. Like the prior civilizations featured in Age of Empires III, each of the three new Native American factions have their own unique units, including a WarChief unit that represents their respective faction.

Other new features include a revolution option that allows you to revolt from your home city and gain new access to a new revolution home city that's largely combat-centric. To further your nationalist abilities, you can also create a trade monopoly that, if undefeated in a set amount of time, garners an automatic win.

Of course, there are also some additional units and buildings for the original European civilizations, some of which are particularly interesting, especially the stealthy spy unit and the saloon where you can recruit mercenaries and outlaws.

In all, these new features blend well into the game and make an already well-made RTS that much more entertaining. Another welcome addition comes in the form of random maps. AOE III offered an acceptable selection of maps when it was first released, but with Warchiefs a new random map feature offers a much wider variety, which greatly increases the replayability of the skirmish and multiplayer mode.


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