Age of Empires II: HD Edition releases Open Beta featuring performance upgrades

If you've been playing Age of Empires II: HD Edition over the last three years, you probably know all about the game's performance issues in regards to online play. For many (including myself), it just seemed like the problem was going to be perpetually present in the game for all time until a recent developer post on the game's Steam forum detailed a new Open Beta that will bring a number of performance upgrades.

Here's what the developers had to say:

"We’ve being working on this Open Beta for a long time and we are all very excited to get these updates into the hands of the community! This build includes the long-awaited return of MP restore, performance improvements, desync fixes, bug fixes and balance tuning. Significant changes were made 'under the hood' to achieve these improvements so we need your participation to broaden our Multiplayer coverage."

Multiplayer match restoration is another biggie, as before if you lost your connection, your game was lost forever. That is no longer the case. Here are the details on the Multiplayer Restoration notes:

• MP games can now be saved correctly and restored.
• File Transfer now functions correctly in the MP lobby.
• A green loading bar now displays progress for all players.
• MP saves, custom scenarios and custom maps now transfer correctly.
• Please note that old MP restore games from 4.7 or earlier will no longer load or even be visible in your list of restore games when loading.

The Open Beta is live right now and if you are interested in participating, follow these steps in order to access it:

• In Steam, right click on Age of Empires II: HD (while the game is not running).
• Select Properties.
• Select the BETAS tab.
• From the drop down, select Open Beta – Patch 4.8.
• Exit and restart Steam to ensure the update installs correctly.
• To go back to the Live Build, select None in the BETAS tab dropdown.

As a fan of Age of Empires II, I am thrilled to see these performance upgrades, even if they are three years late. But hey, better late than never.

Source: [Age of Empires]