Age of Empires: Castle Siege Review

Developer: Microsoft Corporation
Price: FREE
Version Reviewed: 1.10
App Reviewed on: iPhone 5

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[Need to get your empire up to snuff? Take a peek at our Age of Empires: Castle Siege beginner's guide.]

I’ve got a friend who regularly asks me if there are any games quite like the majesty of the Age of Empires series. Every time, I can refer him to something that’s a little like it but not quite up to par. Every time, we both feel a little disappointed, remembering just how wonderful those games were once upon a time. Age of Empires: Castle Siege might have the name and the license, but it’s no replacement for those great titles.

Instead, Age of Empires: Castle Siege is a Clash of Clans style take on the popular RTS. Feel free to sigh at any time. It’s not a bad freemium strategy game but it will disappoint those wanting the full Age of Empires experience.

Establishing a base involves you picking an empire and running with it. There’s the usual elements of upgrading your keep, while also maintaining farms and lumberyards to ensure that you have a steady supply of resources at all times. Visually, Age of Empires: Castle Siege does away with cartoon style graphics meaning your base can actually look quite impressive. Progress far enough and bases can easily invoke memories of the original games, looking quite wondrous and imposing.

That’s going to take you a long time to get to though, as Age of Empires: Castle Siege loves timers. With a fairly stingy method of dishing out premium currency and a lot of slow timers, there’s a lot of sitting back and watching Age of Empires: Castle Siege, rather than actively participating.

Battling it out is reasonably fun if a little disjointed, with a mixture of real players and historical one-off missions, thanks to you being able to accurately manipulate your troops, but you still suffer from losing all your troops and being back at the start for the next mission.

While Age of Empires: Castle Siege offers moments of good thinking, they’re too few; then it ends up feeling like every other Clash of Clans clone, albeit with a nostalgic skin.