It's been so long since I played Age of Empires for the first time. My mate Andy's dad had bought a new PC and bought Age of Empires with it, and I used to sit and watch Andy playing on it and then go home and tell my parents how good it was, hoping that they would cave and buy me a PC to go with the N64 they had just bought. It would be a couple more years until we had the room for a PC in the new house we moved into and Age of Empires was the first game that I bought for it. I revelled in all of the medieval world-building and massing armies. It's the stuff dreams are made of.
If you have fond memories of the game like me, then this 128x128 pixel demake that's free to download or play in your browser will definitely put a smile on your face. It's the product of creator taxicomics and oNek and features all the same resource mining, house building and job delegation that the original game had, just with an incredibly retro vibe that makes you feel like you're firing up the ZX Spectrum. Play with a mouse or your controller as you tackle 5 different scenarios.
So far at the time of writing I've built a wall, a house, and acquired a new worker. The gameplay feels like someone has put Age of Empires and Lemmings into a blender and served up the end result, and I'm not angry about it. It's like an amalgamation of some of the earliest games from my childhood and a nice little game to mess around with when you should be sending emails or filling in spreadsheets.
Head to the project's Itch.io page to check it out for yourself!
