Petroglyph Games is still patching Star Wars: Empire at War all these years later. The game originally launched in 2006. The newest patch was released on November 20, 2023.
The latest patch is for maintenance, but it makes a rather significant change: it shifts the game from a 32-bit executable to a 64-bit one to try and solve out-of-memory bugs. Beyond that, it addresses out-of-sync multiplayer issues and “numerous gameplay fixes addressing balance and incorrect unit behavior.”
It’s impressive. Some of my favorite games of that era aren’t even available for purchase anymore, let alone getting continued support. Petroglyph states that they worked with the community to locate and address some of the bugs fixed in this release.
I’m somewhat surprised that they’re still able to patch the game. Not that I think Petroglyph wouldn’t want to since it was the studio’s first game and one that still gets played today. It’s just that, since the license belongs to another company, oftentimes there’s little incentive to offer continued support and other times they’re contractually not allowed to make changes after a certain period. Nevertheless, such a major update so long after Star Wars: Empire at War’s initial release is an impressive showing of passion from the developer. In a world without official Battlefield 1942 servers, it’s nice to be reminded that some people still care.
While I was in high school playing StarCraft, I dreamed of a Star Wars RTS. I don’t know why I didn’t play Star Wars: Galactic Battleground, but by 2006, the prequel trilogy had left me badly disillusioned with the franchise. I have never recovered, and at this point, probably never will.
However, I may install Star Wars: Empire at War to check the game out now.
Star Wars: Empire at War is available for PC. The newest update is available now.
