@ Cyrus
I guess the discussion belongs here.
I like 1502 but am sad that Sunflowers continues to ignore that production islands should have houses and that there should be a need for basic staples. Especially in 1603, too buggy for my liking, there are large areas on many island where you can't farm any crops, so why not use those to place a settlement for the workers. That's one thing that gives P III the edge.
Re AOR III: from what I have read the full game has maps which are only marginally larger than those of the demo. Apparently, if you play with 4 opponents one sits right next to the next. In AOE II I could play against 7 opponents without feeling cramped, the maps were large enough for everyone to have their own part. I particularly liked the huge islands where each player had his own island. The AI would start attacking each other and you could either join him or take over his island while he was fighting somewhere else. The population limit of 200 restrices your ability to fight wars on more than one front since you need lots of workers to feed your machine.