Ready your troops! Age of Empires III, the stunning real-time strategy (RTS) landmark from Microsoft and Ensemble Studios, is complete and poised to invade retail on October 18. Available in two versions - standard and Collector's Edition - Age of Empires III will fire up gamers with groundbreaking new features like the persistent Home City and jaw-dropping graphics never before seen in an RTS. Gamers can now experience the game first-hand with a recently released playable demo that offers hours of exciting combat challenges, as well as the ability to upgrade the player's Home City.

The third game in the illustrious Age of Empires series that has sold more than 16 million copies and defined the historical RTS, Age of Empires III is being hailed by critics as a new benchmark for real-time strategy games. The minimum system requirements for Age of Empires III are: 1.4GHz processor, 256 MB RAM, 64 MB video card that supports hardware transform and lighting, Windows XP, 56k modem for online play, and 2GB hard drive space.