AoE4 Relic Entertainment interview now

[I_HaRRiiSoN_I]

Really short noticed, was alerted from the official aoe discord

https://www.twitch.tv/relicentertainment

[Cocaine]

Legit no time to watch this. Anything good?

[duckzilla]

Wasn't able to watch it all, but I saw the French civilization and the Abbasid Dynasty (which also includes the Mamluk Sultanate) being discussed. I also did not know the entire civilization setup before, that is:

• English
• Mongols
• Chinese
• Delhi Sultanate
• French
• Abbasid Dynasty
• Holy Roman Empire (to be discussed soon)
• Rus (to be discussed soon)

What I find confusing is that the "civilizations" are not all either countries or dynasties or people, but a mix of it. E.g. the Holy Roman Empire is a specific politlcal body, maybe a country. It is certainly neither a dynasty nor a people. The English on the other hand are a people and neither a dynasty nor a country. Finally, the Abbasid Dynasty is a dynasty that seems to neither represents a specific people or a country.

[I_HaRRiiSoN_I]

Wasn't able to watch it all, but I saw the French civilization and the Abbasid Dynasty (which also includes the Mamluk Sultanate) being discussed. I also did not know the entire civilization setup before, that is:

• English
• Mongols
• Chinese
• Delhi Sultanate
• French
• Abbasid Dynasty
• Holy Roman Empire (to be discussed soon)
• Rus (to be discussed soon)

What I find confusing is that the "civilizations" are not all either countries or dynasties or people, but a mix of it. E.g. the Holy Roman Empire is a specific politlcal body, maybe a country. It is certainly neither a dynasty nor a people. The English on the other hand are a people and neither a dynasty nor a country. Finally, the Abbasid Dynasty is a dynasty that seems to neither represents a specific people or a country.

The English are most definitely a country! haha! You might be getting confused with the English (country) and the British (nationality). In the medieval times i believe Wales was a state or effectively part on England, but Scotland were most definitely and independent nation. In modern time (also in simple terms) Great Britain and NI refers to the collection of countries which make up the United Kingdom of England Scotland Wales and Northern Ireland.

[duckzilla]

The English are most definitely a country! haha! You might be getting confused with the English (country) and the British (nationality). In the medieval times i believe Wales was a state or effectively part on England, but Scotland were most definitely and independent nation. In modern time (also in simple terms) Great Britain and NI refers to the collection of countries which make up the United Kingdom of England Scotland Wales and Northern Ireland.

I might have expressed my point suboptimally. Of course, the English have a country. That's England. And the Mongols have a country. That's Mongolia. Now for AoE4, it is not the countries (England/Mongolia) that were announced as playable civs, but the people (the English and the Mongols).

My point is that this is confusing when it comes to playable civs like the Holy Roman Empire, because in contrast to "the English" the Holy Roman Empire is not a people. It is a country. That would not necessarily be a problem, if there is a specific people that can be assigned to said country, e.g. the Spanish and Spain. But whose country is the Holy Roman Empire? The Germans? The Italians? The Burgundians? The Bohemians? The Austrians, Bavarians, Saxons, Westfalians? The Dutch?

The introduction of a dynasty (Abbasids) further increases this inconsistency. In this case, we are neither playing the Arabs, Egyptians, Mesopotamians, Syrians, Palestinians, nor Egypt, the Mamluk Sultanate or Mesopotamia. We are playing specifically the dynasty of the Abbasids. How does this compare to playing the English as a people?

Of course it is difficult to use a dynasty to describe an English civilization, given that England was not unified in the early time period and was conquered somewhere in the middle, replacing an old dynasty with a rather unrelated new one.

[Dolan]

@duckzilla You're expecting historical consistency from a game whose purpose is to turn real history into commercial replayable content. They simplify things for the sake of turning history into entertainment.
You know before the French Revolution there wasn't much of a national identity, people had local identities and your ethnic identity was less important than your social status in the medieval fiefdom scheme.
I mean, talking about "the French" during medieval times is a gross simplification, but having Burgundians, Normans and Basques in the same game would make the game have too many civs.
They just take history and chop it up according to notions of pop history that people currently have.

[duckzilla]

This was not meant as fundamental criticism. You can do that of course. I just stumbled across it and it did not make much sense to me at first sight. It is also a deviation from previous AoE games, where civilizations were usually represented by peoples (e.g. the Celts/Britons/Franks/Turks or the British/French/Indians/Aztec). As such, I found it interesting enough to mention it here.

[Peachrocks]

@duckzilla You're expecting historical consistency from a game whose purpose is to turn real history into commercial replayable content. They simplify things for the sake of turning history into entertainment.
You know before the French Revolution there wasn't much of a national identity, people had local identities and your ethnic identity was less important than your social status in the medieval fiefdom scheme.
I mean, talking about "the French" during medieval times is a gross simplification, but having Burgundians, Normans and Basques in the same game would make the game have too many civs.
They just take history and chop it up according to notions of pop history that people currently have.

I... actually wouldn't mind France getting chopped up like that and having the culture grouped together similar to how you had the Egyptian culture for example in Age of Mythology and then divided 3 ways between three gods who had different styles but still had some similarity between them. This would work better for the HRE too and would allow more civs to get into the game without it feeling bloated or too generalised.

Granted it wouldn't work too well with say Great Britain, you 'might' get away with Wales due to the period having the English more or less conquer them but Scotland and Ireland are distinctively different, though there'd be no hard rule of how many you could put into the 'English' or whatever you want to call it group. Just a suggestion that will never make it into reality .

[Dolan]

This was not meant as fundamental criticism. You can do that of course. I just stumbled across it and it did not make much sense to me at first sight. It is also a deviation from previous AoE games, where civilizations were usually represented by peoples (e.g. the Celts/Britons/Franks/Turks or the British/French/Indians/Aztec). As such, I found it interesting enough to mention it here.

I think, in the past AOE games, the logic was to include past empires and dominions and slap a label on them that made them more recognisable to a modern audience.

But, you know, this kind of product is made from the point of view of an American audience. And for them history is like an interesting menu from which you could pick some item, like: Iberico ham, Brie cheese, Weihenstephan beer. So you have: the French, the Celts, the Holy Roman Empire, as if there were some people back then called Holy Romans. Well, there were some people called Romanians in the Eastern Roman Empire, but they weren't that holy and the empire wasn't theirs.

[jesus3]

In the end, it's still only a video game

[RefluxSemantic]

This was not meant as fundamental criticism. You can do that of course. I just stumbled across it and it did not make much sense to me at first sight. It is also a deviation from previous AoE games, where civilizations were usually represented by peoples (e.g. the Celts/Britons/Franks/Turks or the British/French/Indians/Aztec). As such, I found it interesting enough to mention it here.

I think, in the past AOE games, the logic was to include past empires and dominions and slap a label on them that made them more recognisable to a modern audience.

But, you know, this kind of product is made from the point of view of an American audience. And for them history is like an interesting menu from which you could pick some item, like: Iberico ham, Brie cheese, Weihenstephan beer. So you have: the French, the Celts, the Holy Roman Empire, as if there were some people back then called Holy Romans. Well, there were some people called Romanians in the Eastern Roman Empire, but they weren't that holy and the empire wasn't theirs.

It's not that the product is made from the pov of an American audience, that's such bullshit.

They just tried to reduce the amount of civs in the game (due to more unique civ design compared to aoe2) while still trying to represent as much of the world as possible. That's why they tried to group certain entities together in ways that are still somewhat historical. Realistically, the HRE should be a bunch of different people like in aoe2, but that's not possible with this super unique civ design, so they just group them together. Which is completely fine because it's a game. I'm looking forward to the fun reference to history and the different peoples that made up the HRE. It's similar to the aoe3DE design they did with the age 1 shipments for USA, which thematically speaking is really awesome.

[Dolan]

@RefluxSemantic
If they wanted to cut down on the number of civs, they would have made a game with 3 civs, if that was the most pressing issue. Euros, Asians, Natives. That's it. Something like a SC2 with a historical theme and the most minimalistic choice of civs.
Or they could have launched the game with a starting bunch of civs, without representing as much of the world as possible, then add more as DLC, which is how they usually do anyway. Do you really think they're just going to stay with a fixed number of civs and not try to sell some more civs as DLC later? I doubt it.
Duckzilla raised a valid point: is this a game about peoples or countries? Because countries changed a lot throughout history and the French had lots of smaller countries or were part of a bigger Holy Roman Empire at some point. So were those people from Alsacia who were part of the HRE not French? Are they not part of the history of French people because back then they were part of the HRE?

Game designers don't care about these academic niceties, they just want a product with lots of interesting items in it, because that's what sells. It's the commercial objective that made them group them like that and that's typical for American consumerist culture. For them "culture" is some quirky cool shit you can turn into a product and sell as "Chinese food", "European history", "Italian pizza".

[RefluxSemantic]

So you're saying it's not possible that they wanted to make a game with only 8 civs rather than 20+? So you can only go for 20+ or 3, and nothing in between?

Or is it possible that they decided that, with how unique they wanted civs to be, they'd go for ~8 civs with more added after expansions like in aoe3? And thus decided to not go for EU4 level of historical accuracy, as is completely in line with games like aoe?

[Dolan]

Tbh I think they just used the original AOE2 as a guide. AOE2 without expansion packs had 13 civs, so they thought let's launch the game with a basic bunch of 8 civs first, then add more as we go.
It's possible they went with an initial number of 8 civs simply because it was an easier workload for their team.

[helln00]

The English are most definitely a country! haha! You might be getting confused with the English (country) and the British (nationality). In the medieval times i believe Wales was a state or effectively part on England, but Scotland were most definitely and independent nation. In modern time (also in simple terms) Great Britain and NI refers to the collection of countries which make up the United Kingdom of England Scotland Wales and Northern Ireland.

I might have expressed my point suboptimally. Of course, the English have a country. That's England. And the Mongols have a country. That's Mongolia. Now for AoE4, it is not the countries (England/Mongolia) that were announced as playable civs, but the people (the English and the Mongols).

My point is that this is confusing when it comes to playable civs like the Holy Roman Empire, because in contrast to "the English" the Holy Roman Empire is not a people. It is a country. That would not necessarily be a problem, if there is a specific people that can be assigned to said country, e.g. the Spanish and Spain. But whose country is the Holy Roman Empire? The Germans? The Italians? The Burgundians? The Bohemians? The Austrians, Bavarians, Saxons, Westfalians? The Dutch?

The introduction of a dynasty (Abbasids) further increases this inconsistency. In this case, we are neither playing the Arabs, Egyptians, Mesopotamians, Syrians, Palestinians, nor Egypt, the Mamluk Sultanate or Mesopotamia. We are playing specifically the dynasty of the Abbasids. How does this compare to playing the English as a people?

Of course it is difficult to use a dynasty to describe an English civilization, given that England was not unified in the early time period and was conquered somewhere in the middle, replacing an old dynasty with a rather unrelated new one.

I think thinking of the English and Mongols here as a people might be misleading. the English during this time does hold lands in mainland France and effectively had an empire in Europe such that a comparison to the Holy Roman Empire I think would be apt. Same to the Mongols, even the confederation that first united would not have been pure ethnic Mongolians or even pure Mongolian speaking, and once they start expanding the Mongol empire was definitely made up of various more people group.

Empires will always be messy enough that you can sort of draw various lines and call it what you want really.

[duckzilla]

I think thinking of the English and Mongols here as a people might be misleading. the English during this time does hold lands in mainland France and effectively had an empire in Europe such that a comparison to the Holy Roman Empire I think would be apt. Same to the Mongols, even the confederation that first united would not have been pure ethnic Mongolians or even pure Mongolian speaking, and once they start expanding the Mongol empire was definitely made up of various more people group.

Empires will always be messy enough that you can sort of draw various lines and call it what you want really.

I think your comment shows exactly the kind of confusion that I meant. Did really "the English" as a people hold lands in mainland France or was it the country "England" or was it the Norman dynasty? I would answer that question with the latter. It was a Norman duke who conquered England, ruled over the English, and set up a new hierarchy of noblemen, often of Norman descent (Earls and stuff). Beforehand, the Kingdom of England was created in 927 and ruled by the House of Wessex. The English, as a people, have been ruled by a number of minor Saxon, Anglian, and Danish Kingdoms before 927. Then by the House of Wessex. Then by the House of Normandy, who happened to also hold lands in mainland France. Then by Anjou/Plantagenet, Lancaster/York, and finally the Tudors. But while all of these houses had different contexts and claims to various territory, the English as the people living in what we call England today did not change so much.

The view that the Kingdom of England had an empire in Europe that could be comparable with the Holy Roman Empire is quite far off, imo. The Holy Roman Empire was the undisputed hegemon in Western and Central Europe over the course of the medieval age, although the various Emperors themselves were not. Nominally, all Christian Kingdoms were subordinate.

[helln00]

I think thinking of the English and Mongols here as a people might be misleading. the English during this time does hold lands in mainland France and effectively had an empire in Europe such that a comparison to the Holy Roman Empire I think would be apt. Same to the Mongols, even the confederation that first united would not have been pure ethnic Mongolians or even pure Mongolian speaking, and once they start expanding the Mongol empire was definitely made up of various more people group.

Empires will always be messy enough that you can sort of draw various lines and call it what you want really.

I think your comment shows exactly the kind of confusion that I meant. Did really "the English" as a people hold lands in mainland France or was it the country "England" or was it the Norman dynasty? I would answer that question with the latter. It was a Norman duke who conquered England, ruled over the English, and set up a new hierarchy of noblemen, often of Norman descent (Earls and stuff). Beforehand, the Kingdom of England was created in 927 and ruled by the House of Wessex. The English, as a people, have been ruled by a number of minor Saxon, Anglian, and Danish Kingdoms before 927. Then by the House of Wessex. Then by the House of Normandy, who happened to also hold lands in mainland France. Then by Anjou/Plantagenet, Lancaster/York, and finally the Tudors. But while all of these houses had different contexts and claims to various territory, the English as the people living in what we call England today did not change so much.

The view that the Kingdom of England had an empire in Europe that could be comparable with the Holy Roman Empire is quite far off, imo. The Holy Roman Empire was the undisputed hegemon in Western and Central Europe over the course of the medieval age, although the various Emperors themselves were not. Nominally, all Christian Kingdoms were subordinate.

Can be any or all of the above really, depending on who you ask. Especially in the case of England where it was area where various cultures lived and mixed together as well. I dont agree with you that the people living in what you would call England didn't change. Their language changed and in the cases of some areas, their laws and people changed as well, depending on the time and place, with things like the Daneslaw and the Norman conquest, names changed, languages changed. Heck the English language still contains the relics of the ethnic differences between those who inhabit England. Human organizations are always going to be more complicated then any one concept is able to capture so being flexible about this helps.

One of the funnier situations where this comes up I think is again English related but the Glorious Revolution, which depending on who you ask, was just the English kicking out their king, or when the Dutch conquered England ( which arguable made them part of the Dutch empire??)

[n0el]

good thing we know video games are very realistic.

[duckzilla]

good thing we know video games are very realistic.

That's not the point. We are talking about changes between the Age of Empires that we know and a new one. The older games were more clear in who they address with the civilizations than the new one. I think the original approach was less confusing but also had certain limitations.

Up to now, I don't really see why they did not just change it to a country-based view, which would yield the following eight civilizations:

• England
• Mongolia
• China
• Delhi Sultanate
• France
• Abbasid Dynasty
• Holy Roman Empire
• Rus

The Abbasid Dynasty would still not refer to a country in a strict sense. But at least the level of confusion with single peoples would be reduced without really changing a lot.

[Dolan]

@duckzilla
It's the logic of consumerism that dictated how these picks were made. They just think about history like a menu from which you could pick a pizza, a steak, but also a bowl of pasta.
Who cares they're not all the same thing, it's food, it will sell.

I mean, just think of how cool a label like "Holy Roman Empire" sounds slapped on a civ. It should boost sales.

[helln00]

I mean the game is Age of Empires, not Age of Countries, so any group that has any claim to empire technically can join.

Though tbh this convo has been a thing since the start of the franchise. I think I heard a convo with one of the old devs in Age 1 and apparently there was controversy back then cause Greece and Macedon were 2 seperate civs

[duckzilla]

Can be any or all of the above really, depending on who you ask. Especially in the case of England where it was area where various cultures lived and mixed together as well. I dont agree with you that the people living in what you would call England didn't change. Their language changed and in the cases of some areas, their laws and people changed as well, depending on the time and place, with things like the Daneslaw and the Norman conquest, names changed, languages changed. Heck the English language still contains the relics of the ethnic differences between those who inhabit England. Human organizations are always going to be more complicated then any one concept is able to capture so being flexible about this helps.

One of the funnier situations where this comes up I think is again English related but the Glorious Revolution, which depending on who you ask, was just the English kicking out their king, or when the Dutch conquered England ( which arguable made them part of the Dutch empire??)

Of course the English society changed over time and has been rather complex. But it is entire clear that the Norman possessions in France have never been part of the Kingdom of England. Both were part of the Angevin Empire, which was dynastic. In that sense, the English are the people that lived in the Kingdom of England. When I say that they did not change, I mean that they did not become "Angevins" or whatever.

The observation that the inhabitants of the Kingdom of England, called "the English" by me, were a heterogeneous bunch is correct. And that is true for any country of that time period, maybe even on a larger scale in the case of the HRE with its internal division within the Kingdom of Germany and then between the Kingdoms of Germany/Italy/Bohemia/Burgundy on top of that.

[Kanoo]

Up to now, I don't really see why they did not just change it to a country-based view, which would yield the following eight civilizations:

• England
• Mongolia
• China
• Delhi Sultanate
• France
• Abbasid Dynasty
• Holy Roman Empire
• Rus

The Abbasid Dynasty would still not refer to a country in a strict sense. But at least the level of confusion with single peoples would be reduced without really changing a lot.

Barring one ruler, for a short period of time, Delhi Sultanate at best held only the northern half of India. A country based view would do no justice really.

[n0el]

AoE2 doesn't use countries and it is the same time period. Why would aoe4?

[helln00]

Can be any or all of the above really, depending on who you ask. Especially in the case of England where it was area where various cultures lived and mixed together as well. I dont agree with you that the people living in what you would call England didn't change. Their language changed and in the cases of some areas, their laws and people changed as well, depending on the time and place, with things like the Daneslaw and the Norman conquest, names changed, languages changed. Heck the English language still contains the relics of the ethnic differences between those who inhabit England. Human organizations are always going to be more complicated then any one concept is able to capture so being flexible about this helps.

One of the funnier situations where this comes up I think is again English related but the Glorious Revolution, which depending on who you ask, was just the English kicking out their king, or when the Dutch conquered England ( which arguable made them part of the Dutch empire??)

Of course the English society changed over time and has been rather complex. But it is entire clear that the Norman possessions in France have never been part of the Kingdom of England. Both were part of the Angevin Empire, which was dynastic. In that sense, the English are the people that lived in the Kingdom of England. When I say that they did not change, I mean that they did not become "Angevins" or whatever.

The observation that the inhabitants of the Kingdom of England, called "the English" by me, were a heterogeneous bunch is correct. And that is true for any country of that time period, maybe even on a larger scale in the case of the HRE with its internal division within the Kingdom of Germany and then between the Kingdoms of Germany/Italy/Bohemia/Burgundy on top of that.

The Angevin Empire is a concept developed by historians to describe the dynamic of the landholdings of the English Kings and the resultant geopolitics from that so the fact that the English didnt become Angevin is purely because it didnt officially exist, for various reasons (in the medieval christian world there could be only 1 empire and that was the HRE). People form different groupings and trappings for different reasons, so trying to draw a consistent logic out of it that would encompass all of them is foolhardy. Like the English didn't become Angevins but later they did become British, and why one happened but not the other is not some kind of logical science that can be neatly categorised, its history.