Empires Apart Review Summary

A fun free-to-play RTS with great audio that rivals Age of Empires, but suffers from pay-to-win mechanics, paywalled content, frequent crashes, and poor optimization.

Better than Age of Empires: The game is frequently compared favorably to the Age of Empires series, with players noting it is more accessible, faster-paced, and innovative. These comparisons often position it as a superior alternative.

Fun free-to-play RTS: Players enjoy the game as a fun, quality RTS that is free to play. The base game offers sufficient content for a free experience, making it an attractive option for the genre.

Great music and audio: The soundtrack and sound design receive positive comments for being beautiful, fitting, and nostalgic. Audio quality is considered a strong point of the game.

Good graphics and visuals: Players consistently praise the game's graphics as pleasant, clean, and not tiring to the eyes. These visual qualities are highlighted as meeting or exceeding expectations.

Addictive multiplayer modes: Multiplayer is described as addictive, with smooth PvP and PvE experiences. Ranked matchmaking and variety of modes keep the gameplay engaging.

Pay-to-win and paywalled content: Many civilizations and factions are locked behind DLC or microtransactions, creating a pay-to-win dynamic. Players feel nickel-and-dimed with expensive DLC packs and lootboxes.

Game fails to launch or crashes: Many players cannot launch the game due to black screens or crashes after pressing play. Frequent crashes occur during matches, especially with large armies or in skirmish mode.

Poor performance and optimization: The game suffers from severe optimization issues, including FPS drops to 8-12 in larger matches, stuttering on various hardware, and overheating. Many players find the game unplayable due to poor performance.

Stupid AI with poor behavior: The AI is widely criticized as being dumb, either cheating with infinite resources or passive on low difficulty. It behaves poorly in survival mode and often makes illogical decisions like attacking walls with holes.

Game abandoned by developers: Multiple players report that the game is abandoned by developers with no updates or fixes, leading to a dead player base and no support.

Classic RTS with civilizations: The game is a real-time strategy title with six or seven unique civilizations, reminiscent of Age of Empires and StarCraft. It includes empire development, resource management, building construction, and troop recruitment.

Unique civilization mechanics: Civilizations have distinct mechanics, such as Mongols moving buildings and Aztecs upgrading units from combat and sacrificing prisoners. This adds strategic depth and asymmetry.

Inspired by Age of Empires: The game heavily borrows from Age of Empires II and Age of Mythology, with similar mechanics, visuals, and gameplay feel. It is often described as an AoE clone or classic formula.

Multiple single-player modes: The game includes survival, small battle, challenge, and tutorial modes for single-player. This variety caters to different play styles and learning curves.

Multiplayer modes available: The game offers multiplayer modes, including ranked and unranked play, and is described as multiplayer-focused with an active community. This indicates a strong online component.

Frequent crashes and instability: The game crashes constantly during gameplay, with some players experiencing errors within 20 minutes. Auto-save provides some relief, but crashes remain a major issue.

Poor overall optimization: General poor optimization leads to lag, stuttering, and unplayability. Performance patches have not resolved these issues, and problems persist on both low-end and high-end systems.

Severe FPS drops: FPS drops to below 10 every 10 minutes regardless of graphics settings, making the game unplayable. The issue affects various hardware configurations.

Game fails to launch: Players report that the game will not start or launch properly from the launcher. This issue affects multiple computers, suggesting a widespread launch problem.

Server crashes in multiplayer: Engaging large armies in multiplayer causes server crashes, and there is general lag and bugs in multiplayer modes. This severely impacts the multiplayer experience.

Not recommended overall: Multiple reviews express a lack of recommendation for the game, citing various issues such as quality, monetization, or abandonment.

Recommended for RTS fans: Players who enjoy real-time strategy games, especially competitive or multiplayer aspects, find the game enjoyable and recommend it to fellow RTS enthusiasts.

Decent free alternative: The game is seen as a worthwhile free option to pass time or for RTS fans seeking faster matches without cost.

Needs more polish: Reviews indicate the game requires further updates and improvements to be fully recommended, especially for non-RTS or historical fans.

Good for multiplayer: The game is considered ideal for playing with friends in multiplayer, but less suited for solo or single-player experiences.

Community fair range: $12.00 - $15.00.

Session length: 0.4h.

Player reports are mixed: some enjoy the game immediately due to RTS experience, but many find the fun quickly fades or never materializes due to lack of content, bugs, and dead multiplayer.

Friction: no singleplayer campaign; dead multiplayer; bugs and crashes; unbalanced civilizations.

Competitive Multiplayer Enthusiast: 1v1 ranked duels, fast-paced, competitive. Motivation: Mastery and climbing the ranked ladder. Stance: sale.

Casual Co-op Player: Co-op skirmish, group multiplayer, casual. Motivation: Social fun and nostalgic group play. Stance: buy.

Disappointed Single-Player Fan: Single-player skirmish, scenario play. Motivation: Traditional single-player RTS experience with campaign and good AI. Stance: no buy.

Monetization: The game uses a free-to-play base with significant content locked behind paid DLC (most civilizations) and a cash shop with loot boxes. While some players consider it balanced, others highlight aggressive monetization through content gating and randomized purchases. The overall model is aggressive, relying on real-money transactions for core content and cosmetic loot boxes.