Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties

Lore & Background

The gameplay of The Asian Dynasties follows a similar format to the original Age of Empires III, focusing on new content rather than new methods. A key addition is the 'export' resource, available only to the three Asian civilizations, used to hire foreign troops and research technologies from the consulate. Export is generated automatically when villagers gather, but at a slower rate than other resources. Each Asian civilization has monks instead of explorers, with unique abilities such as stun, critical hits, or divine strike. Six new native civilizations are available for hire: Sufis, Shaolin, Zen, Udasi, Bhakti, and Jesuits.

Reader's Guide

The Asian Dynasties introduced three distinct civilizations with unique mechanics. India has no villager cards at the Home City but receives one villager with almost every shipment; villagers cost wood instead of food, and they build Sacred Fields to generate experience from livestock. China gets a single Shaolin monk explorer with a disciple, can train disciples in the Discovery Age, and has a higher population limit of up to 220. Japan features Daimyō and Shogun units that train troops, and villagers cannot hunt or herd but build shrines near animals for resource trickle. The expansion includes three campaigns, one per civilization, returning to historical, civilization-based single-player scenarios. The Japanese campaign covers the unification of Japan and the Tokugawa shogunate, the Chinese campaign loosely follows the 1421 hypothesis of a Ming treasure ship discovering the New World, and the Indian campaign is set in the Mughal era. The game received generally positive reviews, with critics praising graphics but sometimes criticizing predictable aspects, earning a 79% on GameRankings and 81% on Metacritic.

Did You Know?

• The Mac version was ported, developed, and published by Destineer's MacSoft.
• A mobile game of the same name was released in 2010 for J2ME, as a sequel to the 2007 mobile game Age of Empires III.
• The Chinese civilization has a higher population limit of up to 220, rather than the usual 200.
• Japanese villagers cannot gather food via herding or hunting, but build shrines near animals for resource trickle.