CaliGirl: Can you first tell us a little about yourself?

Vidguy: My name is Steve Cherrier, nick name is Vidguy. I work for Arbuthnot Communications, which is an online PR firm for Microsoft's games division.

CaliGirl: What are Ensemble's current major projects?

Vidguy: The project they are working on now is Age of Empires II: Age of Kings. Their focusing entirely on that right now. Age of Empires II is a real time strategy game set in between 450 and 1450A.D. covering all of the middle ages/medieval times/castle ages, that kind of thing.

CaliGirl: Can you tell us about the new features we can expect to see in Age of Kings?

Vidguy: Some of the key features that would set Age of Kings apart would be the multiplayer saves which was a feature requested by many hard core gamers. So if a person drops in the middle of the game, you can re-start the game and pick back up right where you left off. Or people who like to play 6-8 hour marathons, they can save it and re-start it at another time. Another feature is the addition of formations. The AI was completely re-written from the ground up. Another feature they have is where you can build AI scripts that allows power users to build the AI scripts so you indirectly sort of play AI against AI. Say I build my AI and you build your AI and we play a game... We can watch them fight against each other. It as complex and in-depth that you want it to be. But these are a just a few of the many new features.

CaliGirl: Where did the idea Age of Kings come from?

Vidguy: I don't know exactly. My speculation would be simply that medieval time/middle aged time was filled with battles with Kings. In one aspect of the game there is a style of play called Regicide where you have to protect your King.

CaliGirl: What do you have planned in terms of multi-player support on Age of Kings?

Vidguy: It will be available on the Zone, modem, TCP/IP or LAN. Currently the LAN and IP is 8 Players much like Age of Empires and Rise of Rome.

CaliGirl: What do you feel sets Age of King series apart from other Strategy Games?

Vidguy: For me personally, it's the art. I think the art is amazing and I think Ensemble has the most talented artists in the business. You couple that with this unique sort of scripting language for the AI and the ability for gamers out there to utilize it, as well as the multiplayer saves you have some very unique features. I am not aware of any other strategy games out there that has the feature where if somebody drops off, you can pick it back up. So there are a few things like that which can really set it apart. The scope and the scale of this one compared to Age of Empires is amazing too. I think the biggest gigantic map is probably about five times of the size compared to the biggest map in Age of Empires: Rise of Rome. So it is huge. The buildings are larger and much more of scale.

CaliGirl: So the buildings aren't as tiny as the original Age of Empires?

Vidguy: Right. It is something Ensemble wrestled with, was the fact that, how do we make it so it is somewhat realistic but you still have to be able to find your units, you got to be able to play and it has to use agility. It is a game where you have historical roots but they aren't going to sacrifice the gameplay and fun to be historically accurate.

CaliGirl: Do you feel the development of games may change from Colorado High School shooting?

Vidguy: I don't know. I mean, Microsoft has always been really cautious of the violence of games. We have never had a game that has received a mature rating or higher from the ESRB. It is something we aren't planning on in the future.

CaliGirl: Have you seen many cool games around the E3? Do you have any favorites yet?

Vidguy: You know, I came here with blinders and headed right to the Microsoft Booth and haven't left anywhere.

CaliGirl: Is there any other information you would like to add to this interview?

Vidguy: Personally, I love the game. I am an Age fanatic. I started off doing fan sites for Age of Empires before I got my job. To see what they have done to this game, compared to the original Age of Empires and Rise of Rome (which I still think are amazing games, by the way) is just phenomenal. People who are Age fans and hardcore fans, are just going to blown away by Age II!

Interview by CaliGirl