Imperialism II: Age of Exploration

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Imperialism II: The Age of Exploration

Developer(s)	Frog City Software
Publisher(s)	SSI
Release date(s)	1999
Genre(s)	Turn-Based Strategy
Mode(s)	Single player
Platform(s)	Mac OS, Windows
Media	CD-ROM
Input	Mouse & Keyboard

Imperialism II: Age of Exploration is a turn-based strategy game for Microsoft Windows and Apple Macintosh computers, developed by Frog City Software and published by Strategic Simulations, Inc. (SSI) in 1999. It is the successor to the 1997 game Imperialism. In Imperialism II, the player starts as ruler of a 16th century European country, and must build an empire.

The main novelty in Imperialism II, compared to its predecessor, is the component of exploration. Unlike in Imperialism, only part of the world is visible at the start; this is the Old World (either a semi-accurate map of 16th century Europe, or a randomly generated map). The other half of the world is the New World, which is always randomly generated and must be explored (by ships and prospectors) before it can be colonized.

The game is won when any of the "great powers" (France, Holland, Spain, England, Portugal or Sweden) controls more than one-half of the old world. Control over other countries can be achieved by conquest or by diplomatic means (influencing "minor nations" Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Scotland, Switzerland and even the "great powers", so they would finally join the player's empire), or most often a combination of the two.

The game is considered by some as abandonware. However, a budget-priced re-release of the game has been issued, which means that the game is not technically abandoned. Technical support and other aspects of the game do resemble one that has been abandoned, however.