This guide is going to teach you a huge amount about Age of Empires 2 strategy and includes hundreds of tips throughout. It’s much more complicated, however, to figure out the right move at the right time and be able to remember the really fine details when the pressure is on. Like chess, it’s easy to learn what the pieces do. The beautiful thing about Age of Empires 2 - other than the fact that it was first released in 1999 and is still going strong - is that the basics of the game are extremely simple.