0 A.D.: Empires Ascendant

Wildfire Games, an international group of volunteer game developers, proudly announces the release of 0 A.D. Alpha 27: “Agni”, the twenty-seventh and last alpha version of 0 A.D., a free, open-source real-time strategy game of ancient warfare. The release is named after the Hindu god of fire Agni (pronounced: /ˈɐgnɪ/).

Trailers

YouTube:

PeerTube:

Easy download and install

Download and installation instructions are available for Windows, Linux, and macOS. 0 A.D. is free software. This means you can download, redistribute, modify and contribute to the application under the same licenses: GNU Public Licence version 2 (GPL v2) for code and Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 (CC-BY-SA 3.0) for artwork. Although you might find some people selling copies of 0 A.D., either over the internet or on physical media, you will always have the option to download 0 A.D. completely gratis, directly from the developers. No “freemium” model, no in-game advertising, no catch.

How to Download 0 A.D.

Don’t forget to deactivate every mod before updating the game to avoid any risk of conflict. If you’re a mod creator, please look at this page on how to port your mod to the new version. As always feel free to reach out to us for assistance.

Moving away from the Alpha label

Before presenting you with the new features of this new release, we would like to officially announce that this will be the latest version labeled Alpha. We have already updated the versioning scheme (this version being 0.27.0) and we will progressively stop using the Alpha label altogether up to the next release, which will be Release 28.

Two decades ago, at the beginning of the development of the game, and with the subsequent open-sourcing, a traditional software release life cycle was envisioned. 0 A.D. would go through Alpha releases while features would be implemented, then some Beta releases where all features would be present but needing some more polish, up to a final Gold release of 0 A.D. Empires Ascendant.

Years later, 0 A.D. is polished in many aspects, sometimes more so than some released professional strategy games, but not feature-complete. Moreover, it is unlikely that a final release will mean the end of the development: we wish to keep maintaining the game, bringing you technical improvements and adaptation to new hardware and operating systems. The initial Alpha-Beta-Release plan does not seem relevant anymore.

In parallel, it looks like the gaming industry has also followed this path. Games now usually start in Early Access and may stay in this state for a few years while gathering a large community. The most successful early accesses are quite polished, without incapacitant bugs, but do miss a few planned features. It seems that this trend matches with our latest releases, so we will go with the flow. We hope to be seen, with the Early Access label, on mainstream gaming platforms, in one of our next releases.

As usual, for the next ~~alpha~~ release, we welcome fan suggestions for words relating to the ancient world beginning with the letter B. This will serve as a compensation for the Beta label which will not be stapled to any future release as we would have thought! Keep it original and related to the time frame portrayed in 0 A.D. (c. 500 BC – 1 BC).

New maps

The release features new maps on which to build and fight.

The new skirmish map Isthmus of Corinth, displaying the famous location in Greece, features a rich land and seas stocked with fish. Mercenary Camps can be found as well as large Metal Mine deposits… but also pirate ships and brigands, as war-torn Greece is not without its share of dangers.

Three new random maps will bring you challenges in ever-changing environments.
The Foothills map features rolling hills and no obstructions to the vision range of your armies. The Coast Range is a strip of land between the sea and the resource-rich mountains, balanced for team battles. Lastly, the Migration map will have you starting in a small island: you will have to take your share of the resources of the larger central island if you wish to dominate your enemies.

These maps were also added to the "Demo campaign – new maps".

Engine Improvements

The main feature of this release is the addition of a Vulkan backend to the Pyrogenesis engine. Vulkan is the next-generation open standard API for 3D graphics and computing, aiming, among numerous advantages, to offer higher performance and more efficient CPU and GPU usage compared to the older APIs by providing a considerably lower-level API for the application than theirs.
Vulkan should make the performance of the game more stable and predictable. In some cases even faster, but only in some cases as we currently use it in a single thread.

Upscaling/Downscaling support with FSR
The new Resolution scale option, also called AMD FSR (FidelityFX Super Resolution) allows one to render the game at a higher resolution (eg. if you have a Full HD screen it could render the game at 4K), allowing for sharper visuals an better graphics at the expense of performance. You can also render at a lower resolution and then upscale the result, to reduce the graphical load and increase performance.

GPU Skinning
The new GPU Skinning config option allows you to delegate model skinning to your GPU, using shaders, instead of using your CPU for this operation. This is considerably faster and can bring you a performance boost of 10 to 20 more FPS.
GPU Skinning also allows animated meshes such as elephants to make use of normal maps, improving the visual quality of models:

Multiplayer Savegame
As with single-player games, it's now possible to save and resume multiplayer games. When loading a savegame from the lobby or from the "Multiplayer" submenu you are led to the "Match Setup" page. There, you can assign yourself and other clients to player slots. Note that the AIs are fixed: it's not possible to take over a slot where an AI was, and it's not possible to let an AI take over a slot from a client.
With this feature it is possible to try out a different strategy in a specific situation, to resume a game days later if you live a busy life, or to replace kicked or absent players for a rebalance of the teams.

SpiderMonkey upgrades
Throughout the release cycle, we have upgraded the SpiderMonkey JavaScript engine from version 78 to version 115. The various upgrades bring bugfixes, new features, and build support for more recent Python and C++ versions. The new SpiderMonkey versions also bring us new performance tooling which will allow us to identify and address more performance bottlenecks in the engine/scripts interface.

Support for JS Promises
Modders can now use Promises and async/await features when writing GUI or simulation code. The support has been introduced to make it easier to handle results from GUI child pages, but the feature can be used for other purposes.

Fix lobby TLS connection on Windows
With earlier versions of 0 A.D., it wasn't possible to connect to the multiplayer lobby while having TLS enabled on Windows. As that's the default, players had to find and disable the "TLS encryption" option in the settings and disable it, before being able to connect to the multiplayer lobby. This has been fixed now, so all players can now enjoy the benefits of TLS-encrypted connections with the multiplayer lobby.

Other library upgrades and fixes
Many other libraries were updated to bring security and usability fixes to 0 A.D.

GUI

Tips & Tricks page
Our contributor Vantha has implemented a browsable Tips & Tricks page, accessible through the main menu. There, you will find all the tips that can be seen in the game loading screen. You will be able to learn new tricks at your leisure, while enjoying informative screenshots that can also be scrolled.

Change lobby password
Players are finally able to change their password for the multiplayer lobby. To do so, the player needs to log into the lobby and open the new "Account Settings" dialog, which can be accessed through a button in the lower left corner of the lobby screen.

Phase indicators
Our contributor abian has added visual indicators of the current phase you are at into the middle panel of selected units and buildings.

Horizontal scrolling
The GUI now supports horizontal scrollbars which allow displaying complex contents, such as the Structure Tree, at the lowest supported resolution. Work is under way to implement dynamic use of horizontal scrolling based on the window resolution, in the next release.

Art

Many improvements were made to models and textures, including new models for statues by our contributor nifa:

It can be hard to realize how many incremental visual improvements have been included into the game over the years, but here you can compare a screenshot of the game in 2010:

and the same scene recreated inside Alpha 27, fifteen years later:

What a journey! A big part of this visual improvement is brought by a fix for the orientation of the normal maps of terrains, included in Alpha 27. In prior releases and for several years, the lighting on the terrain normal maps was incorrect by 45 degrees. And while the game still looked nice, there was an underlying almost subconscious wrongness to the look of the terrain.

Release of a 2nd 0 A.D. Soundtrack Album

After the release of a first album of the 0 A.D. Soundtrack in 2018 (available on Bandcamp as well as major streaming platforms) under the Materia Collective label, our composers Omri and Sam have been preparing a second 19-track album, including new music from Alpha 26, as well as remastered versions of classic tracks which will be included in the next release of the game.

We will keep you updated very soon with links, so you can enjoy this music outside of your game sessions.

Gameplay

Civilization Differentiation
Spartans, Romans, Athenians, and Macedonians are now more unique. Spartans focus on champion hoplites available from the village phase, with unique techs. Romans get the “Marian Reforms” tech, reshaping their roster at some economic risk. Athenian spearmen can promote to champions, and they gain Hippocrates as a town-phase hero. Macedonians can construct the Arsenal in the town phase, allowing earlier access to bolt shooters.

Player-Controlled Building Arrows
Players can now direct building arrows like any other unit using the hotkey ‘f’. By default, buildings target the nearest enemy.

Naval Overhaul
Warships are categorized as Scout, Arrow, Ram, Fire, or Siege ships. Garrisons no longer boost firepower but remain available for transporting soldiers. And the new tech tree for warships will fuel the arms race for supremacy over the sea.

Capture Changes
Following player feedback, units now attack buildings by default when right-clicking them, with the "C" modifier enabling capture instead.
Capture defense now depends on the capture attack value of garrisoned units, making it harder to defend key buildings with weaker units. Cavalry units have been tweaked to be less effective at capturing or defending buildings.

Elephants
Elephants are reworked into multi-purpose shock units with a hack splash attack, excelling against infantry and cavalry while still somewhat effective against buildings.

New Champion Variants
Chariots: Expensive, less agile than ranged cavalry but more durable.
Spear cavalry ("Cataphracts"): Heavily armored but slower.
Longswords: More expansive than swordsmen but deal splash damage.

And more !

Balancing adjustments

Melee Rebalance
Melee units now deal 50% more damage but have reduced armor, while ranged units deal 25% less damage. This makes melee units more threatening and less of a damage sponge.
The promotion bonus for melee citizen soldiers have been reduced, while mercenaries now gain 10% more attack.

Territory Influence Changes
The territory gain with each phase is decreased, and the cost of a new Civic Center or Colony is decreased. This makes expansion a more strategic and impactful part of gameplay.

Wall Buff
Wall garrisons have been doubled, allowing two rows of units to be visible when fully garrisoned. This aims to make walls a more effective defensive tool, as they are currently limited mostly to blocking movement.

Siege Balancing
Ranged siege units have a faster prepare time to make them feel more responsive.
Catapults gain a splash attack with a small radius.
Pack and unpack times are significantly reduced, with bolt shooters having a slower movement speed to compensate.
Battering rams take more damage from ranged attacks, reducing their effectiveness when unprotected. Garrisoning infantry inside rams increases their speed and acceleration.

Miscellaneous

Observer flares and chat notifications for flares
Observers can now send flares to other observers. Flaring is now also shown as a chat notification, which is clickable to center the view on the signaled area.

Some fixes against cheating
We have included some protections against some mods which would allow cheaters to reveal the map or exploit bugs against opponents.

Increased maximum selection size
Thanks to regular performance improvements, we have decided to increase the maximum number of units in a selection to 300.

You can find a comprehensive list of all the changes on the page wiki:Alpha27.

A new development and contribution environment

This summer, we were able to perform a long-awaited migration to a git-based development environment. We had been using SVN as our version control system, which was adapted to our use and especially adapted to manipulating game assets. However, this limited the agility with which we could provide and accept code contributions. Our new environment also allows us to leverage powerful tools of Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery, improving the stability and the quality of the game during development.

You can read more about the migration announcement on this forum topic.

Team Changes

phosit, who joined the team during this long release cycle, is now a well-known programmer and almost an old team member (!), with contributions in many areas of the engine and the game. More recently, sera has joined the Programming team and has made numerous contributions to the build system in the context of the git migration. Last, but not least, real_tabasco_sauce has joined the team as Gameplay Developer after his invaluable help throughout the preparation of Alpha 27.

Now is the time to contribute!

With our new developer environment and our plunge beyond the Alpha label, now is the time to join us and place 0 A.D. in the spotlight. We need your help to make the game flourish and to bring new features to life.

We are in sore need of contributors in the following areas:

Video Editing
Social Media Management
Website Design

We are also always looking for, and providing an improved contribution environment, for:

Testers and Quality Assurance enthusiasts
Translators (get started right away on Transifex)
and of course, Developers and Artists – the team will gladly welcome contributions in all areas.

You can also support us by simply donating.

Next Events

We will be present at FOSDEM 2025, with a booth on the floor level of building K. Come and say hi!

Reporting issues

If you experience a technical problem with the game, please report it at gitea.wildfiregames.com. This is also the first address to visit when you wish to dedicate some of your time to help patch the code. Got any further questions or suggestions? Discuss them with other players and developers at the forum or talk with us directly in the IRC chat rooms: #0ad and #0ad-dev on QuakeNet.

See our LinkTree. For press/media inquiries, please DM @play0ad on Twitter or webmaster at wildfiregames dot com.