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Rise of the Rajas adds four: the Khmer, the Malay, the Vietnamese, and the Burmese.

RTS expansion packs are made or broken on one thing: the new civilizations. The HD Edition made these sprites much more richly detailed than their original counterparts, and with Forgotten Empires’ track record with the last two expansions it’s no surprise that the new textures and building sprites added in Rise of the Rajas are an absolute feast for the eyes.īut enough about the presentation. The use of sprites rather than 3D models has given the art of AoE2 a timeless quality when compared to the bricky polygons of something like Dawn of War, or even Age of Empires III. While there’s still no LAN (and the developers have made it clear there’s never going to be because of how difficult it is to decouple the multiplayer from Steam), I think it’s safe to say that the new multiplayer is improved to the point that you won’t miss it.Īlso, this should go without saying at this point, but the game is gorgeous. Even more excitingly, it’s finally possible to save and restore multiplayer games, which is great if you’re playing with friends and find yourself called away. No longer is multiplayer a roulette game of “Will it desync?”, and in the week I’ve been playing the expansion I haven’t experienced any lag at all. Patch 5.0, released in tandem with Rise of the Rajas and available to anyone who owns even the base game, finally fixes the vast majority of these issues. I like the HD Edition of the game and it remains my favorite way to play, but I can’t deny that, especially at launch, it’s had more than its fair share of bugs and technical issues. Rise of the Rajas is the fourth official expansion for Age of Empires II and the third created for the HD Edition that was released in 2013 (you’ll need a Steam account to play, though that’s likely not an issue for most of our readers.) It adds four civilizations, each with a new campaign, along with a host of technical improvements, new environmental textures, new maps, and more.Īlthough it’s a relatively minor portion of the many additions the expansion comes with, I’d like to start by lauding those technical improvements. And the fact that Forgotten Empires is managing to produce really good content every single year, without any of the new expansions feeling like tacked-on excuses to grab cash…well, that might just be the most welcome surprise of all. That the juggernaut company would trust Forgotten Empires, a tiny group of AoE2 modders, with this responsibility is incredible. That Microsoft would still be releasing official expansion packs for a 17-year-old game with a passionate but relatively small fanbase is astonishing. Let’s all take a moment to appreciate the existence of Rise of the Rajas.