About

"Wololo" is the battle cry of the Priest unit featured in the 1997 historical real-time strategy game Age of Empires. Due to its association with the Priest's mystical ability to assume control of an opponent's unit through conversion, the sound effect has gained notoriety among the fans as one of the most dreaded stock lines from the game. Online, the phonetic transcription of the chant is used as a taunt and an interrupter, which in turn prompts visual responses that indicate a switch of color between red and blue.

Origin

In Age of Empires, the first installment in the strategy game series produced by Ensemble Studios and released in 1997 by Microsoft, the Priest is a civilian unit with special abilities to heal friendly units and convert enemy units. While casting the spell of "conversion," the Priest utters a distinct battle cry ("wololo"), which soon became associated with bad omen among the fans of the game. Upon completion, the color of the targeted unit's attire changes from red to blue (or blue to red).

Spread

On June 7th, 2005, YTMND user oftoronto created a page titled "You are being converted" (shown below, left) which gained over 8.600 views and a 3.73 out of 5 star rating in ten years.^[2] On September 16th, 2006, YTMND user Jokerkaaos created a page titled "Wololo!" (shown below, right) which gained over 35.000 views and a 3.85 out of 5 stars in eight years.^[3]

On February 23rd, 2009, Youtuber Nov1706 uploaded a 10 minute loop video of the Wololo audio (shown below, left) which gained over 1.320.000 views in 6 years. On November 27th, 2010, YouTuber ccmazza uploaded a video titled "Wololo Blues [NOW WITH LYRICS!!!]" (shown below, right) which gained over 461,200 views in 4 years.

On February 21st, 2010, Deviantart user pokketmowse submitted an image titled "WOLOLO" (shown below, left) which gained over 25,700 views and 492,000 downloads in five years.^[4] On March 4th, 2012, FunnyJunk user nissanshitbox submitted an image titled "Age of Empires" (shown below, right) which gained over 35,400 views and 1,796 upvotes in three years.^[5]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References