I did have some pushback. First, some people at Ensemble wanted to claim that Carthage was the same as Phoenician. I agreed they had a lot in common, but felt that Carthage had developed enough to be something new. Also oddly enough I got a lot of flak from Greece - they were

The best part, for me, was at the end of 1999, when MicroSoft came to Ensemble Studios, all pompous and snide, and said, "We have learned that doing expansions for RTS games is really smart. Do one please." I looked at the MS goons and just said, "Yeah? Who taught you that?" And

@SandyofCthulhu My takeaway from this short thread is that Microsoft had not planned to include the epitome of what an EMPIRE is in a game series called Age of Empires. The DAMN WORD IS ROMAN in origin. Dammit, 90s Microsoft was DUMB.

@SandyofCthulhu Did you also work on AOM? That was my jam.

@SandyofCthulhu I enjoyed both your CoC role-playing game as a teen and Rise of Rome expansion as an adult. Thanks for the fun from some random guy on the internet.

@SandyofCthulhu Your thread is creating a buzz! #TopUnroll https://threadreaderapp.com/th... 🙏🏼@clubchristopher for 🥇unroll

@SandyofCthulhu http://Zone.net baby 🥷

@SandyofCthulhu I like Age of Mythology that was a really good one

@SandyofCthulhu I've been on this app for 10 years waiting for someone to write AOE origins content thank you 🙏

@SandyofCthulhu I'm gonna be honest - I always preferred the setting of Age of Empires 1 to 2 because holy shit the Bronze Age had such fantastic architecture and fashion.

@SandyofCthulhu eXpAnSioNs aRe AlWaYs FaiLUrEs Takes a lot less work to ship an expansion for a successful game vs creating an entirely new game. Besides a good expansion can alter a franchise's entire future.

@SandyofCthulhu How do you feel that people are still playing a game you worked on in the 90s today. It has to feel really good.

@SandyofCthulhu I bought it because of you! So well done. Many, many, many hours of fun.

@SandyofCthulhu It’s really cool I found you on X. AoE1 expansion has a very special place in my heart. It was the first video game I played with any serious commitment. I played for hours with my step dad on IPX. I still remember today the sound of him spam clicking his mouse as he builds

@SandyofCthulhu The rise of Rome gold edition was probably one of the first games I actually played a lot, vs random NES or DOS games JACK BE NIMBLE

@SandyofCthulhu I used to try playing as the Palmyrans (with camel special unit and advanced trading). Everyone who multi-playered hated teaming with a Palmyran civ and would really rag on it. Gotta go with Hittite!

@SandyofCthulhu Keep telling these stories!

@SandyofCthulhu Best game ive ever played, thanks for the memories!

@SandyofCthulhu That’s awesome! I played both, and they kept me quite busy for some time. Nicely done!

@SandyofCthulhu @twaddle_inc and @TheGroupLens have you guys heard this story?

@SandyofCthulhu You built a big part of my childhood

@SandyofCthulhu Loved age of empires gold edition, and then age of mythology was my go to. So relaxing and fun to play as a kid

@SandyofCthulhu @threadreaderapp unroll

@SandyofCthulhu Thank you. One of the game series I grew up on. 😁

@SandyofCthulhu Thank you for adding unit queues to aoe

@SandyofCthulhu You need to create a you tube video about it

@SandyofCthulhu I bought this game on day one when it came out. Love it! Thanks for the good times.

@SandyofCthulhu Ok but that capital S in Microsoft is killing me. What is it, 1992?

@SandyofCthulhu You still working with Microsoft? Please stop ! You are amazing and talented ! You don't need them.

@SandyofCthulhu What an iconic cover

@SandyofCthulhu did you ever make sorceress

@SandyofCthulhu Thank you for this. I played AoE Rise of Rome a lot when I was a child. One of my favorites games. It was a difficult game for me back then because of my lack of understanding of English. I was always confused about why I couldn't build a Wonder like the Colosseum (it was due to

@SandyofCthulhu Loving these posts, absolutely fascinating.

@SandyofCthulhu Sandy, what happened with RTS?! Why did they fade out?!

@SandyofCthulhu Thanks for sharing your story. I love these types of posts!