Empires & Allies (2015 video game)

Lore & Background

Empires & Allies was developed by Zynga, with the concept originating from Mark Skaggs. The project was initiated and completed entirely under the tenure of Mark Pincus, who had returned as CEO in April 2013, before development began in 2014.

The gameplay of Empires & Allies is single and multiplayer war strategy, and it is a reskin of the Disney game Star Wars Commander, which had been released one year earlier, with different factions, units, and balance. In 2020, Zynga took over publishing and development of Star Wars Commander under license (Disney retained the IP) and promised improvements to its large player community, but then announced the game's cancellation in September 2020, shutting it down in December 2020, roughly three months after the announcement.

On January 30, 2023, Zynga announced that Empires & Allies would be closed at the end of March 2023, after eight years of development. During the closure period, daily login bonuses granted 1,000 gold each day, and all processes requiring time and premium currency were greatly reduced.

Reader's Guide

Empires & Allies holds significance as a freemium mobile strategy game that directly mirrored the design of Star Wars Commander, a Disney title. Its development history reflects internal leadership changes at Zynga, with the game started under Don Mattrick and finished under Mark Pincus. The game's legacy is intertwined with Zynga's controversial acquisition of Star Wars Commander in 2020, where the company promised improvements to that game's community only to cancel it six months later. This event highlights the volatile nature of the mobile gaming industry, where corporate decisions can abruptly end popular titles. The closure of Empires & Allies in March 2023, after eight years, marked the end of a game that had been a direct competitor to its own acquired property. Its freemium model and war strategy gameplay were typical of the era, but its identity as a near-clone of another game sets it apart in discussions of originality and corporate strategy in video game development.

A Record-Breaking Debut

Empires & Allies arrived on June 1, 2011, as the first title from Zynga's Los Angeles studio and the company's initial foray into combat and strategy gaming. Released simultaneously in twelve languages, the launch drew significant attention; G4TV.com's Jake Gaskill described it as the most ambitious rollout Zynga had ever attempted. The numbers backed that claim up quickly. Within just nine days of going live, the title had attracted close to ten million players. By the third week of June, monthly active users had climbed to thirty-three million, propelling the game into the top four most-played titles on Facebook. Its freemium structure—free to enter, with optional premium purchases—lowered the barrier to entry and helped fuel that explosive growth curve, establishing the title as a major pillar of Zynga's social gaming portfolio almost overnight.

A Cartoonish War of Revenge

The world of Empires & Allies is a colorful military cartoon built around archipelagos, where each player starts on a single island and can eventually expand to four. The narrative kicks off with a devastating enemy assault that nearly destroys the player's nation, dragging them into a war of vengeance. As the campaign unfolds, the true motive surfaces: the player's island harbors a rare ore essential for the antagonist's super weapon. The villain, fittingly called "The Raven," earned his name because he failed to catch an eagle and settled for a raven instead—a detail that captures the game's lighthearted tone. Along the island-hopping chain, players encounter comedic enemy commanders with humorous biographies. Four advisors guide the player: civic, military, construction, and mission. Notably, this was Zynga's first graphics-based title to depict modern warfare and military hardware, a departure from the peaceful aesthetics of CityVille and FarmVille, while still retaining their familiar visual style.

Building, Battling, and Trading with Friends

Gameplay in Empires & Allies splits into two intertwined loops. First, players construct an island city, erecting buildings that generate the raw materials needed to train military units and unlock further structures. Second, they engage in asynchronous turn-based combat using a rock-paper-scissors style type system, where different unit categories hold advantages over one another. Experience points earned through both combat and production let players unlock progressively stronger units and more efficient buildings. The social layer is deeply baked into the design: each player can typically produce only one type of ore, yet crafting many units and advancing through campaigns demands multiple ore types, forcing players to request resources from friends. Empire Points serve as a secondary currency for selling items, starting at fifteen and obtainable through in-game purchases, Zynga's website, retail game cards, or completing specific objectives. The title also ran multiple concurrent limited-time events that awarded exclusive items upon completion.

Shutdown and a Mobile Rebirth

On April 24, 2013, Zynga announced that Empires & Allies would be shut down alongside three other titles: The Ville, Dream Zoo, and Zynga City (the latter available through Tencent). The official closure date was confirmed on May 16 as June 17, 2013, ending the Facebook era of the game. However, the franchise's story did not end there. On May 5, 2015, Empires & Allies was revived and re-released as an entirely different mobile game, available worldwide on both Apple's App Store and Google Play. The original Facebook page was repurposed to serve as the hub for this new mobile iteration. This second life represented a complete reimagining rather than a simple port, marking a significant shift in both platform and design philosophy for a title that had originally been a cornerstone of Zynga's social gaming lineup.

Gallery