Best AOE 1 players in Vietnam and China still stick on Rise of rome with UPatch . If they have tournaments, they still play on 1999 version not DE version. Especially it Lunar New Year, I can see hundreds or maybe thousands players play AOE1 on GTVPlus (A Vietnamese platform for LAN). And I bet more than 10 times or 100 times on China. And I just look on AOE DE matchmaking is just 1 match :( .
I have some ideals for make AOE 1 DE more players.

1. Make AOE DE nearly-free on some internet cafe systems just like Overwatch do that before. Not free at all like rent to players per hours. In Vietnam and China they only play in internet cafe although they have personal PC for more comfortable so if your do that players in Vietnam and China maybe Korean will have attention on AOE DE.

2. Make more contents. Civs from South East Asian, Indian, Central Asian, African and American are interesting. And amphibious terrain where structures can be built on and that both land and naval units can traverse from AOE 2 Rise of Raja is great. Make more content different than 1999 edition will make them choice, and make sure you make it better

Hope u/CysionBE will read this post :)