We'll never turn down a chance to play more Age of Empires, so when Microsoft, Ensemble and Big Huge Games announced a brand new expansion pack for Age of Empires III, we were all for it. The new game adds three new Asian civilizations, each with new units and buildings and their own five-mission campaign. It's not surprising that the expansion maintains the excellent unit balance and exciting presentation that the series is known for. Still, while the new Asian civs are enjoyable, the campaign lacks some of the drama and variety that we'd hoped to see.

Asian Dynasties steps away a bit from the more fictional campaigns of previous games in the series in favor of a slightly more historical approach. wow gold Still, the fictional main characters in the campaigns give the designers room to tell a relatively unique story set within a firm historical framework. The Japanese campaign kicks things off by retelling some key events in Tokugawa's efforts to unite Japan. From there, we see a mutiny in the Chinese navy as the Treasure Fleet moves first to India and then to the New World. Finally, the Indian campaign puts players in charge of a British officer who decides to lend his support to the cause of Indian independence.

The Asian armies have all the cool units you'd expect, from samurai, to firework rockets, to howdahs. Big Huge Games has really captured the flavor wow gold of the combat very nicely with a wide range of colorful units that provide significant enough advantages to encourage players to create a well-rounded army. As with the other Age games, creating small groups of balanced forces that can deal equally well with infantry, cavalry and artillery keeps you from having to micromanage the target priorities in each and every encounter.

Interestingly, the wonders are also the way that Asian civilizations advance to new Ages. Rather than simply shucking resources out the window to wow powerleveling gain access to new technology upgrades, new units and new shipments, the resources you spend to build wonders actually result in a persistent benefit that sticks with you throughout the game. Each time you Age up, you'll have the chance to pick from one of the five wonders available to you civilization.

Finally, the multiplayer side of Age of Empires has been enlarged with a new game type, King of the Hill. In King of the Hill there's a large central fort that the players have to capture and hold. The delicate equation here is whether or not to race to grab it right at the start and hope that your initial force can hold out long enough for you to reinforce it, or to hang back a bit and let the other players bloody themselves in a back and forth battle before coming in with your own fresh armies that you've been building in the meantime. Since Asian Dynasties wow powerleveling isn't on a lot of PCs yet, we've only really been able to dig in to the game type in skirmishes against the PC but so far it seems like a game type that's going to be fairly popular.

Finally, the visual and audio work in the expansion are right up there with what we've come to expect from this series. The units and buildings are well designed and full of lots of lively detail. The wonders look particularly awesome with loads of intricate detailing. And while that's where most of your attention is, the small touches here and there really bring the game to life. Seeing green birds drift high above the carnage, or seeing smoke plumes from burning houses just adds that much more believability to the game. Likewise, the excellent voiceovers carry the drama nicely and are supplemented with the types of music and sound effects we've already come to love in the series.