One of my favorite games of all time was taken out behind the shed and put down like a dog.

After a DLC announcement for the game during the Age of Empires 25th anniversary that felt tacked on as an afterthought in order to tell the community "don't worry, you weren't left out!" and the subsequent delay of the DLC for over a year, World's Edge has announced within the last couple days (at time of writing) that the DLC has been cancelled and that the game will no longer be receiving updates of any kind.

Ever since the launch of the original Age of Empires 3 in 2005, this game has been treated like the red-headed stepchild of the franchise, which is a shame because I find it to arguably be the most fun out of the franchise. Each civilization feels unique (most likely because they actually are unique, compared to Age of Empires 2 really having only one tech tree for the entire game but restricting a unit or tech here and there at random) and the Home City mechanics add additional strategies and twists that can affect the tide of battle if played correctly. For those that complain the RTS genre is dead or has stagnated, your disavowment of AOE3 20 years ago is heavily to blame (outside of the gigafried attention spans of the younger generation(s), but that's not important right now).

Microsoft, Xbox, or whoever the hell is in charge of their gaming resources seems to believe that they can just keep making AOE2 over and over again and that it'll be fine. Except that the people that play AOE2 will just keep playing AOE2 and the rest of the franchise will be left to suffer - just take a look at AOE4. I'm willing to bet that the Age of Mythology remaster will be abandoned shortly after their contractually obligated DLC release that they HAVE to do for everyone that preordered the game, and AOE4 will most likely be next.

The worst kick in the gut for me is that one of the last things World's Edge said in their announcement is that if you really, really want more content for AOE3, just play with mods. And you know what, I would. I would gladly be playing the Wars of Liberty mod for legacy AOE3 right now, if it weren't for the fact that legacy AOE3 was removed from Steam, a decision that makes no sense whatsoever as previous releases of Age of Empires II and Age of Mythology on Steam are both still available for purchase if you so desire.

I would like to make it clear that I absolutely, 110%, recommend this game, and want more people to play and enjoy it, but I do NOT recommend supporting the developers in any capacity. Which, unfortunately, would make getting the most out of the game difficult. A conundrum, really.

Shame on World's Edge. Shame on Microsoft. Justice for Denmark. Justice for the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.

One of my favorite games of all time was taken out behind the shed and put down like a dog. After a DLC announcement for the game during the Age of Empires 25th anniversary that felt tacked on as an afterthought in order to tell the community "don't worry, you weren't left out!" and the subsequent delay of the DLC for over a year, World's Edge has announced within the last couple days (at time of writing) that the DLC has been cancelled and that the game will no longer be receiving updates of any kind. Ever since the launch of the original Age of Empires 3 in 2005, this game has been treated like the red-headed stepchild of the franchise, which is a shame because I find it to arguably be the most fun out of the franchise. Each civilization feels unique (most likely because they actually are unique, compared to Age of Empires 2 really having only one tech tree for the entire game but restricting a unit or tech here and there at random) and the Home City mechanics add additional strategies and twists that can affect the tide of battle if played correctly. For those that complain the RTS genre is dead or has stagnated, your disavowment of AOE3 20 years ago is heavily to blame (outside of the gigafried attention spans of the younger generation(s), but that's not important right now). Microsoft, Xbox, or whoever the hell is in charge of their gaming resources seems to believe that they can just keep making AOE2 over and over again and that it'll be fine. Except that the people that play AOE2 will just keep playing AOE2 and the rest of the franchise will be left to suffer - just take a look at AOE4. I'm willing to bet that the Age of Mythology remaster will be abandoned shortly after their contractually obligated DLC release that they HAVE to do for everyone that preordered the game, and AOE4 will most likely be next. The worst kick in the gut for me is that one of the last things World's Edge said in their announcement is that if you really, [i]really[/i] want more content for AOE3, just play with mods. And you know what, I would. I would gladly be playing the Wars of Liberty mod for legacy AOE3 right now, [b]if it weren't for the fact that legacy AOE3 was removed from Steam,[/b] a decision that makes no sense whatsoever as previous releases of Age of Empires II and Age of Mythology on Steam are both still available for purchase if you so desire. I would like to make it clear that I absolutely, 110%, recommend this game, and want more people to play and enjoy it, but I do NOT recommend supporting the developers in any capacity. Which, unfortunately, would make getting the most out of the game difficult. A conundrum, really. Shame on World's Edge. Shame on Microsoft. Justice for Denmark. Justice for the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth.