Two years and a half after the release Age of Empires II HD, and two years after the release after the last Expansion pack, The Forgotten, Age of Empires II HD now sees another expansion announced named the African Kingdoms.
Taking place on the continent of Africa, a variety of new units are added ranging from Organ Guns to Shotel Warriors. New building designs will will come with the expansion as well, and are said to be affected by the type of terrain they are built on. But there will also be new fauna such as Lions, Ostriches, Crocodiles, Zebras and Elephants.
Unlike expansions in the past, this expansion will only come with four civilizations, being the Malians, Berbers, Ethiopians and Portuguese. Each of these Civilisations will have their own campaigns that are named "Tariq Ibn Ziyad," "Sundjata," "Fracisco de Almeida" and "Yodit," which will be fully voice acted.
The expansion will also rebalance parts of the game, such as Water Battle and some of the already existing civilizations. This ranges from nerfs to overpowered units, to bringing the new Fire Galley and Demolition Raft ships that would allow for an effective rock-paper-scissor system on water that land units already abide to. The linked article also shows that LAN is still an option within the game, but was dug in deep as the Host is first required to set up the game online to then have a friend join locally, which immediately turns the connection local as well.
And finally the expansion will also introduce a new sudden death mode. Not much information has been given out yet regarding this mode, but if Age of Mythology is an example of it, the mode will function around keeping your Town Center intact and giving you a limited time to rebuild it if it's broken down.
