Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition News

VOTE! Your Ranked Map Rotation starting May 18!

It’s that time again! Visit the official Age of Empires forum to vote for your Ranked map pool for the next two weeks.

This Week's Dev Picks

[h3]1v1 Random Maps[/h3]
✔ ARABIA
✔ ARENA
✔ CRATER
✔ MIGRATION

[h3]Team Games[/h3]
✔ ARABIA
✔ ARENA
✔ BLACK FOREST
✔ MEGARANDOM
✔ TEAM ISLANDS
✔ TEAM MOATS

Cast Your Vote Now!

To participate in the community ranked map pool vote, you will need to login to the official Age forum using your free Microsoft account. Then, click the images below to jump to this week’s polls.

:alertalert: Polls are open until NOON Pacific on Sunday, May 16 (or 3:00p Eastern / 19:00 UTC), so be sure to cast your vote and check back to see which maps emerge victorious!

Age of Empires 2 ranked play to lose deathmatch mode and gain Empire Wars

While we wait for more news regarding Age of Empires 4, the current Age of Empires entries are still receiving decent amounts of love and attention from World's Edge and the stable of developers it has working on them. Some of this support comes from new DLC, but the competitive scene is still a major part of the present Age of Empires community and gets just as much care.

Microsoft has announced a key change coming to Age of Empires 2: DE's ranked environment, namely that deathmatch mode is out, and Empire Wars is in. Empire Wars was introduced at the start of 2020 as a new fast-paced game mode where you begin straight in the Feudal Age. You have a small town already pre-built and 27 villagers to instantly send out into the wilderness.

Will McCahill, the series' business and data team lead at Microsoft, went into more detail regarding this change in an official blog post. To summarise, the community has long been asking for a shorter game mode for competitive play, and AOE2 now has several options. Empire Wars represents the one that's growing in popularity the quickest. It's a mode exclusive to Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition and can be played on all maps, although starting conditions vary depending on the map you're playing.

Read the rest of the story...

Red Bull Wololo IV: Sign up now

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THE EVENT

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The epic 1v1 Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition competition returns! Red Bull Wololo IV pits the best of the best against each other in a custom version of Empire Wars that offers a thrilling spectacle and incredible competitive strategy! With each game skipping the first stages of a traditional match to begin in the Feudal Age, Red Bull Wololo IV sees players plunged straight into the action.

Played across two parts, the global tournament will see challengers compete in open qualifiers to win a place at the Main Event, where they’ll face the top players from the previous event: Gan “Mr_Yo” Yangfan, Ørjan “TheViper” Larsen, Hamzah “Hera” El-Baher, Kai “Liereyy” Kallinger, Darko “DauT” Dautovic, Hoang “ACCM” Huy, Dmitriy “Vinchester” Smirnov and Ville “Villese” Jämsä.

Red Bull Wololo IV is the latest iteration in the competition series, with each event introducing a different story arc for players to compete in. Players fight to win control of a castle that has a library containing knowledge required for world domination. Red Bull Wololo I and II had players fight for control of a castle and library in a Western civilization, while Red Bull Wololo III represented Asian Civilizations. Now, Red Bull Wololo IV sees players take on the role of Viking warriors in a Nordic-themed event!

Sign-Up Now!

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The open qualifiers of Red Bull Wololo IV will be played over two weekends: 29-30 May and 6-7 June. The tournament will reach its epic conclusion in a 16-player Main Event that will be played across two weekends and five days, the first on 19-20 June, with the second and final stage on 25-27 June.

You can watch every minute of the Red Bull Wololo IV Main Event live on the official Red Bull Twitch and YouTube channels, with the event streamed globally and hosted by ace Age of Empires II casters, including Nili_AoE, MembTV, T90Official, Dave_AoE for the English stream, with Mario Ovalle and Nacho_AoE for the Spanish stream. If you think you have what it takes to compete at Red Bull Wololo IV, you can sign up to register for the open qualifiers here!

[h3]👉 SIGN UP FOR RED BULL WOLOLO IV[/h3]

[h3]👉 Join the Event Discord[/h3]

Ranked Map Rotation – May 04

Here is the latest Ranked Map Rotation as determined by the developer picks and community vote. For the next two weeks, you’ll be able to pick from the new set of maps listed below!

Map pools as of: 6p Pacific (9p ET / 20:00 UTC / 22:00 CEST) on Tuesday, May 04 to Tuesday, May 18

👤 1v1 MAP POOL

This week's 1v1 Community Map Picks are in BOLD.

ARABIA

ARCHIPELAGO

ARENA

FOUR LAKES

GOLDEN PIT

MEGARANDOM

SOCOTRA

👥 TEAM GAME MAP POOL

This week's TG Community Map Picks are in BOLD.

ARABIA

ARENA

BLACK FOREST

COASTAL FOREST

GOLD RUSH

MIGRATION

NOMAD

OASIS

VALLEY

👤 1v1 DEATHMATCH POOL

ACROPOLIS

ARABIA

FOUR LAKES

GHOST LAKE

GOLDEN PIT

GOLDEN SWAMP

KILIMANJARO

SERENGETI

VALLEY

👥 TEAM DEATHMATCH POOL

ARABIA

CENOTES

GHOST LAKE

GOLDEN PIT

GOLDEN SWAMP

KILIMANJARO

LOMBARDIA

OASIS

VALLEY

Join the Celebrating the Ages Event!

With all the announcements from Age Fan Preview Event, there couldn't be a better time to celebrate the Age of Empires series!

In 1997 the original Age of Empires was released, the beginning of us all coming together to create the fantastic and passionate community we are today. This month, we're bringing community favorites to Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition! Plus, for this months event we're adding some additional bonus rewards from the last year of Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition events!

Join us as we celebrate the incredible community, moments and experiences the Age of Empires series created in the CELEBRATING-THE-AGES event!

Unlock another brand new Cheat code!
Unlock the classic "Photon Man" cheat code!
Unlock the Musketeer visual replacement for the Hand Cannon!

New Rewards!

Starting TODAY through MAY 24, complete in-game tasks within the time limit to unlock exclusive goodies!

Bonus!
🔒 Unlock the "21st Century" achievement in Age of Empires: Definitive Edition. Xbox Live Sign in required to verify achievement.
🧱 [Mod] Unlocks the "Photon Man" cheat code, which spawns the Photon Man cheat unit.

🔒 Unlock the "Imperial Age" achievement in Age of Empires 3: Definitive Edition. Xbox Live Sign in required to verify achievement.
🧱 [Mod] Unlocks the Musketeer visual replacement for the Hand Cannon.

Each of the following challenges must be unlocked in order and on separate days:

🔒 Sign into Xbox Live.
🏆 Unlocks the George Crushington Profile Icon.
💾 *Required* if you want to save any rewards unlocked during the event!

Each of the following challenges must be unlocked in order and on separate days:

🔒 Gather 1997 Gold in any one game.
🧱 [Mod] Unlocks the Military unit creation sound replaced with Age of Empires: Definitive Edition version.

🔒 Use the "catzor" cheat code in a skirmish game to summon the Sharkatzor cheat unit.
🏆 Unlocks the Sharkatzorprofile icon.

🔒 Train 10 Camel Riders in any one game.  
🧱 [Mod] Unlocks the "cameleon" cheat code, which transforms all Camel units into Flaming Camels.

🔒 Kill 5 enemy villagers in any one game.
🏆 Unlocks the John the Fearless profile icon.

🔒 Reach the Imperial Age in any one game.
🧱 [Mod] Unlocks the Age Advancement sound replaced with the "Shipment available" sound from Age of Empires III: Definitive Edition.

Keep It All!

Remember: if you sign in to Xbox Live during the event, you’ll get to keep all of the mods and profile icons you’ve achieved! Sign in, earn your rewards, and enjoy!

We hope you enjoy this month's Celebrating the Ages event!

—The Age of Empires Team

Event Wallpapers

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