When comparing Warcraft III vs Age of Empires II HD, the Slant community recommends Age of Empires II HD for most people. In the question“What are the best RTS games for PC?” Age of Empires II HD is ranked 4th while Warcraft III is ranked 6th. The most important reason people chose Age of Empires II HD is:
While the graphics are slightly outdated, they were very well done for their time. And when combined with the history behind the game and its wonderful soundtrack, the game comes across as extremely polished.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Four varied races give more play styles
In multiplayer and skirmish matches, you get to choose which race you would like to control: Humans, Orcs, Elves, and the Undead. Each faction have their own advantages and down-sides, as well as wholly unique play styles. For example, the Orcs have units that are tougher and can deal more damage, while Night Elves units are completely invisible while standing still during the game's night cycle. This makes for gameplay that can change dramatically depending on which race is chosen.
Pro Story-filled campaign gives players knowledge of the game world
Warcraft III has an excellent story that's told through the eyes of four separate races. As you progress through each race's story, you are presented with background knowledge of previous events in the world of Azeroth, while taking on new and challenging missions. Due to this, you are given a breadth of information about the races of the world, as well as key characters that make appearances in later missions and other Warcraft titles.
Pro Heroes that rank up and carry inventory adds a well done RPG icing
Pro Single Player campaign serves as a learning tool
The campaign acts as a tutorial for each of the game's four races. New units become available every mission, which feature their own unique abilities and skills. By giving you access to different units over time, the game allows you to acclimate yourself with each individual unit type as the campaign progresses. This gives you an understanding of how each race plays, thus helping you develop a desirable playstyle.
Pro Multiple build orders make each Multi-Player match feel different
Warcraft III gives players the freedom to build their bases in any order they choose, to fit any strategic purpose they need. This allows players to start each match with a certain strategy in mind, build toward it, then alter it if it's no longer viable. For instance, players can build toward a rush of low-cost units at the start of the match and abruptly switch their strategy, constructing buildings that will enable them to train flying units instead. This keeps matches interesting, requiring players to adapt their build order at a moment's notice if their strategies change.
Pro Wonderful design
Pro Awesome ambiance with a great finish
While the graphics are slightly outdated, they were very well done for their time. And when combined with the history behind the game and its wonderful soundtrack, the game comes across as extremely polished.
Pro Runs on very old computers
As this game is quite old, requiring only a 1.2GHZ processor and 1 Gigabyte of RAM, this title will run on older PC's and laptops alike without issue.
Pro Facilitates the user's preferred pace
This game neither gives the impression of being thrown to the wolves nor that of being left stranded on an island. Whether you want to move slowly and steadily through the game or take things at a more heightened pace, Age of Empires 2 will allow for both (given a little planning).
Cons
Con Heavy focus on micromanagement makes Warcraft III too strenuous for casual play
The combat in Warcraft III relies heavily on the micromanagement of units in each encounter. The crux of each engagement is unit placement: Each individual unit has to be positioned properly, with their abilities activated the moment they are off cooldown. Due to this, every battle requires constant focus and the maneuvering of individual units, which can be quite difficult for casual players to maintain.
Con Macromanagement supplies casual players with a difficult learning curve
Warcraft III provides players with a difficult balancing act of maintaining armies, upgrades, and economy. Each unit takes a large amount of resources to complete, so it is imperative to keep as many of your units alive as possible with each fight. In order to do so, you must research technologies that increase their effectiveness and resilience in combat, making it imperative that you queue these upgrades once you have the money to do so. However, as your army grows in size, you will gain less resources due to an Upkeep Tax that is levied against you once you reach a certain population. This will make it harder to replace fallen units and purchase additional unit upgrades. Because of this intensive macromanagement of army, upgrades, and resources, casual players will find it difficult to master the balancing act required in order to win each match.
Con A lack of proper User Interface scaling makes a clunky UI worse
While this is a remastered edition of a classic Real-Time Strategy title, the UI was left largely unchanged. Selecting workers still prompts you to click buttons to bring up both economic and military buildings, then choosing whichever building you wish to construct. This is uninteresting design and makes the UI difficult to navigate.
On top of this, the game does not feature UI scaling. Since the game is bound to your current desktop display settings, the UI will adjust itself to match that resolution. This means if you play at 4K resolution the User Interface will be absurdly small, making it near impossible to see what buildings you wish to construct or what units you want to train. This is counter-intuitive design, for this era of modern gaming, and makes properly playing the game more of a hassle than it should ever be.
Con Age of Empires II HD is an unsuccessful remaster due to its outdated graphics
With the only notable upgrade being high resolution options, Age of Empires II HD fails at being a proper remaster. While higher resolutions give the game a slight face lift, the rest of the engine is left largely unchanged. This means the graphics we see in this remaster are nearly the same in its original 1999 release. Due to this, the game is grating to the eye and does not deliver on its high definition promise.