I play a lot of Strategy games including Civilization 4, Warcraft 3, Galactic civilization 2 and Starcraft.
The longest I enjoy was Warcraft 3 either with the strategy or the widely mass custom-made maps. I know Frozen throne has a huge player database while Reign of Chaos is like dead.
Is Age of empires 3 anything different from Warcraft 3? Is the online option like Warcraft 3 where there are a lot of players you won't have any trouble finding a game?
Yea i still play warcraft for like 4 years, it never gets old! First of all you have the great normal strategy games, lots of units, different heroes, tactics etc. Especially the hero part makes it interesting, you dont have to just sit in your base but you have to level and get items. Then you have custom games, loads of different ones, the map editor is the best. I'd say it's easily the best strategy game ever.
As of AoE 3, i dont know, it didnt look so appealing to me anyway. AoE 2 was really fun but 3 just didnt appeal to me.