I got this game a long time ago and never got around to playing it. Looking for some strategy game i could just pick up and play i settled on this. I booted it up, played the tutorial and thought: "Wow, this has so many things i love!".

• A campaign map where you pick the location to attack.
• Upgrades based on resources gained from the territories held on the map.
• Good ol' RTS gameplay with bases, resource gathering and building big armies.

There's just one tiny little problem. It's dull. I played an embarassing amount of Dawn Of War: Dark Crusade which is similarly designed, but that game is just better in every way. You had a player character who got stronger. Regions had specific threats and gave specific bonuses. The units where super-fun. Combat was engaging. It was a somewhat visceral experience with explosions, big monsters, tanks, et cetera.

EE3 is just boring. Regions give generic bonuses. Combat is super-awkward with people attacking the air (??) several meters away from the enemy. Units only have two different lines (maybe three) that they say every single time you give them orders. The enemy didn't seem to be doing anything in the first mission, they never attacked me.

Even resource production is just... off. You build warehouses next to pre-determined sites to gain building resources and markets that send carts to town centers to gain gold. You have almost no influence on this other than buying more workers at either site.

This game came out after Age Of Empires 3 and DOW: Dark Crusade and both of those are just so much more interesting. Maybe this picks up a bit later on as you advance through the ages, but i can't muster up the willpower to sit through boring gameplay for several hours to get to that point. Seriously, there isn't even a storyline or anything.