Empire Earth (series)

The "Empire Earth series" is a franchise of real-time strategy computer games developed by Stainless Steel Studios and Mad Doc Software, and published by Sierra Entertainment, Activision, and Vivendi. The games in the series are historical RTS games that are similar to "Age of Empires".cite web | url=http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/empireearth/review.html | title=Gamespot rating | publisher=Gamespot | accessdate=2006-12-30] Rick Goodman, who designed Empire Earth and Empires: Dawn of the Modern World, was one of the lead designers of Age of Empires. The games use the Titan and Titan 2.0 engine, which was sold after SSSI closed.

Chronology

ImageSize = width:200 height:200PlotArea = left:50 bottom:10 top:10 right:0

DateFormat = yyyyPeriod = from:2001 till:2007TimeAxis = orientation:vertical order:reverse ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:1 start:2001ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1 start:2001

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# there is no automatic collision detection,
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PlotData= bar:Games anchor:till color:red width:15 textcolor:blue align:left fontsize:S mark:(line,white) shift:($dx,-4) from:2001 till:2007 at:2001 text:"Empire Earth" at:2002 text:"" at:2003 shift:($dx,-14) text:"" at:2005 text:"Empire Earth II" at:2006 text:"" at:2005 shift:($dx,-14) text:"Empire Earth Mobile" at:2007 text:"Empire Earth III"

The first game of the series, "Empire Earth", was released in 2001. It was developed by SSSI (Stainless Steel Studios), and published by Sierra Entertainment. The game was praised for its in-depth gameplay, and received positive critical acclaim. The 2 million unit sales were enough to spawn an expansion pack and several sequels to the game. The game had 14 epochs in it, which totaled 500,000 years. The game also included 21 nations, from every age and location. It was also developed for the mobile phone in 2005.

Released in 2002, "" was an expansion pack for the first "Empire Earth". The expansion pack added several new campaigns and features to the game, but was received negatively due to the fact that there were many small bugs that were never addressed by Mad Doc Software. The expansion pack was released in 2002, after the release of Empire Earth but before the release of "Empires: Dawn of the Modern World".

"" was not technically the sequel to "Empire Earth", but it was released in 2003 and sometimes called the Spiritual Sequel to "Empire Earth". [cite web |url=http://pc.gamezone.com/gzreviews/r21660.htm |title=Empires: Dawn of the Modern World |accessdate=2007-04-15 |date=November 12, 2003|publisher=GameZone ] The game was also designed by Rick Goodman and the SSSI team, and had many throwbacks to the first "Empire Earth". "Empires: Dawn of the Modern World" was much more condensed, with only 1,000 years and only nine civilizations. Even so, the game received positive acclaim as a good RTS, but not very innovative.

"Empire Earth II" was released in 2005, a couple years after "". "Empire Earth II" was developed by Mad Doc Software and published by Vivendi, since Stainless Steel Studios left the project to develop "Empires: Dawn of the Modern World". "Empire Earth II" used revamped graphics and weather affects, but still retained the feel of the original "Empire Earth". The game was received relatively well (about 79% on average according to MetaCritic), a little lower than the original "Empire Earth" and "Empires: Dawn of the Modern World.""" was released in 2006, and was an expansion pack for "Empire Earth II". The expansion pack added several new campaigns, civilizations, units, and features to the original "Empire Earth II" game. However, the game was received worse than its expansion pack predecessor, and was considered bad for its lack of innovation with the new campaigns it offered.

"Empire Earth III", also called EE3, is a real-time strategy computer game by Mad Doc Software and released by Vivendi Universal on November 5,2007 It was received very poorly in contrast to its predecessors.

"Empire Earth Mobile" is a "Civilization"' style RTS developed by Vivendi and published by Wonderphone. It is quite smaller than any other title in the series, with only four epochs and other condensed features.

Marketing

The series' tag line for marketing (which is also the ending statement to the in-game video at the loading of "Empire Earth") is:

as the games are very epoch diverse. [cite web|url=http://pc.gamespy.com/pc/empire-earth-2/529488p1.html|title=Empire Earth 2 (PC)|work=GameSpy|publisher=IGN|accessdate=2007-06-20|date=2004-07-09|first=Allen|last= Rausch]

Reception

"Empire Earth", the first in the series, was well received by the critics, averaging an 82% overall. [cite web |url=http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/376328.asp?q=Empire%20Earth |title=Empire Earth |author= |accessdate=2007-03-21|publisher=GameRankings] "Empire Earth II" did not do as well as its predecessor, with only a 79% average. [cite web |url=http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/920489.asp?q=Empire%20Earth |title=Empire Earth II |author= |accessdate=2007-03-21|publisher=GameRankings ] The expansion packs were given mediocre reviews at best, with "Conquest" averaging 66% and "Supremacy" averaging 61%. [cite web |url=http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/561395.asp?q=Empire%20Earth |title=Empire Earth: The Art of Conquest |accessdate=2007-03-21|publisher=GameRankings ] [cite web |url=http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/930536.asp?q=Empire%20Earth |title=Empire Earth: The Art of Surpremacy |accessdate=2007-03-21|publisher=GameRankings ] "" had a closer rating to "Empire Earth" than anything else in the series, with an 81% average. [cite web |url=http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/589675.asp |title=Empires: Dawn of the Modern World |author= |accessdate=2007-03-21|publisher=GameRankings] "Empire Earth mobile" averaged about 77%. [cite web |url=http://www.gamerankings.com/htmlpages2/930409.asp?q=Empire%20Earth |title=Empire Earth |author= |accessdate=2007-03-21|publisher=GameRankings ] Empire Earth 3 was received poorly, averaging a press score of 4.8 according to Gamestats.

References