Age of Empires Franchise Tops 50 Million Players - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 01 March 2024 / 3,375 Views
Publisher Xbox Game Studios and developer World’s Edge announced the the real-time strategy franchise, Age of Empires, has surpassed 50 million players.
"50 million players means even more wololos, castles, and sheep to scout — the Age community has been busy this past year!," reads a tweet from the official Age of Empires Twitter account.
The developer also revealed there have been 200 million wololos, 350 million castles built, and 1.5 billion sheep to scout.
The first Age of Empires was released in 1997, while the most recent new release, Age of Empires IV, launched in 2021. The next entry in the series, Age of Mythology: Retold, will launch for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, PC via Steam and Microsoft Store, and Xbox Game Pass later this year.
We put together some fun in-game metrics for the series in 2023, including the five most-played civs from #AgeIIDE, #AgeIII, and #AgeIV! #NewYearNewAge
— Age of Empires (@AgeOfEmpires) February 29, 2024
50 million players means even more wololos, castles, and sheep to scout — the Age community has been busy this past year! 🐑 pic.twitter.com/xngEbzYN4R
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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One of the GOAT franchises! Just the theme song alone is one of the most recognizable in gaming history. Hard to believe it went from being a dead IP to probably a top 3 IP for Xbox imo.
Can't wait for Age of Mythology: Retold!
Shows you what happens when you do a series right with it's releases.
I remember my grandmother getting my the first Age of Empires in 1997 for Christmas, she had no idea what it was about.
I probably spent years playing it every day, online... On Zone.com via 33.6kbps dial-up modem.
Eventually around 2001-ish, there was a promotion where you got a free full physical copy of Age of Empires with Kellogs cereal, which was brilliant as my old disc had seen better days from lots of use... But it also promoted the game a big way.
Bruh, during the AoE's 25th anniversary livestream in late 2022, there was a mini documentary of some Knight actor going over the history of the franchise and at one point, he mentions that there was a special promotion in Australia where you could get the full game in some cereal boxes and I just went "lmao, what?!?!" that's awesome you were actually a part of that!
Yeah here it is! At the 2:02 part of the video! Were they actually called Wolol-o's? xD https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vawIkk8uei4&t=68s
Pretty sure it was Nutri-grain I got my copy from, I think Wolol-o is a modern thing.
Although in the digital world, it wouldn't be hard to just drop a small carboard card with a unique QR code to download a free game.
I.E. Microsoft could give away Halo Infinite before they drop the next Halo game.
There was also a time where you could order pizza in Australia and choose a free game like Need for Speed Underground, the Sims etc'.
That's probably the order by number of players. AoE II, AoE IV, AoE III.
Most likely. AoE II is still by far the most popular in the series. The DE has been out for over 4 years now and never once to this day dipped below 10,000 concurrent players just on Steam! lol there's a reason why it's about to receive its 6th expansion since the DE released!
I know I'm in the minority, but I love AoE III the most in the mainline series xD
Seriously! Idk if it’s because the DE of AoE 1 released before World’s Edge was established but they refuse to acknowledge it lol.
Only way they do is the Return to Rome expansion in AoE 2’s DE that includes all of AoE 1’s civilizations. You just can’t play that games campaigns. Probably will eventually with another expansion lol
Based on Steam numbers, that seems to be the case. In the last 24 hours, the peak concurrent players were about 23k for AoE 2 DE and AoE 2 combined, 18k for AoE4, about 6k for AoE 3 DE and AoE 3 combined, 2.4k for Age of Mythology EE, and 1k for AoE 1 DE.
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