In my opinion, the development teams considered borrowing elements while researching the histories of the new civs they wanted to represent:
This includes both the original Macedonian dynasty and the Byzantine dynasty.
The Puru civ and the Delhi Sultanate, separated in time by 1,500 years of difference.
Romphaia, its Thracian origins and its subsequent use by the Varangians on the Byzantine side.
Japanese unit designs of Shogun shared for AoM Retold and AoEIV Sengoku Variant Daimyo.
That being the case, I imagine that other DLCs from the entire company could take the same approach in the future, or perhaps this is an exceptional case.
Similarities between different games in the same series made by the same developers, who would have thought?
I think they should do a few more official “crossovers” between the games.
Add the early AoE3 units to the AoE2 editor.
Add the Imperial Age AoE2 units to the AoE3 editor.
Add all AoE1 units to the Chonicles editor.
Add Chronicles units to the RoR editor.
Add AoM units to AoE2/Chronicles/RoR (depending on how modern they are) editor.
Add AoE1 units to AoM.
Add AoE2 units to the AoE4 editor.
Add AoE4 units to the AoE2 editor.
What units?
Mostly the generic ones or very iconic unique/regional units. In the case of AoE1 units all of them since there aren’t that many.
Unfortunately AoE3 is dead but it would be relatively easy to add all the generic Imperial Age AoE2 units to AoE3 as mercenaries. This way you could actually see them in a normal match and it would fit perfectly into the game.
All Chronicles units are already available in AoE2 and vice versa, despite the big difference in setting.
AoE1 units are thematically a lot closer to Chronicles but they are only available in RoR. Adding them to Chronicles would require 0 new assets.
AoM units in other games would probably make the least sense but it could be cool. Myth units could be added as cheats in AoE2/3/4 for example.
AoE2 and AoE4 have the same setting and already have some overlapping units but all AoE4 units have civ specific visuals so that makes it kinda incompatible with AoE2.
When RoR was released, I was disappointed that only the Gazelles made it into the base game. Don’t need the RoR civs there, just wanted the units in the Editor. There are about 50 unit models (excluding Villager tasks and cheats) unique to RoR.
But now there are more ancient units in the AoE2DE Editor than AoE1 ever had, and my demand for the RoR units is lower than it used to be. If they should ever add them to base game, I’d like them to fix the image quality of the RoR assets first, and preferably continue improving their animations, too, including those of the horses (should happen whether the units get exported to AoE2 or not). And do something about that Camel Rider.
Age of Empires 3 already has a few Easter eggs relating to other Age of Empires games. Especially Age of Mythology, with which it shares the game engine.
There is a treasure called ‘Arkantos’ Armour’, a Swedish explorer skin that is litteraly Thor, and the cheat codes for the laser bear and flying tapir are references to the cheat codes in AoM. And there are certain lines of dialogue from very specific mercenaries or european natives in AoE3 that come from AoE2.
Regarding Age of Empires 2, there is a card of the Maltese home city in AoE3 where the knight from the AoE2 game case appears. And there is an official mod for AoE2 that changes the skin of the handgunners to musketeers from AoE3
I really like the idea of adding AoE3 units to the AoE2 editor. In particular, the primitive units from AoE3 to extend the AoE2 timeline a little further towards the end of the Renaissance and the Wars of Religion. The pikemen with their morions, in particular.
I also saw someone in the mod workshop who made a reskin of the AoE2 bombard with the skin of the Ottoman grand bombard from AoE3. It’s “[Reskin]Great Bombard Cannons(UHD supported)”. And that’s really cool.
Having selected AoE3 units in the Scenario Editor would be a nice gift for scenario designers for sure. The event mod Musketeer could just be added, recently they added terrains from a spring event, I’m hoping for the incorporation of more event mod assets.
However, due the current circumstances of AoE3DE, its playerbase might not be amused…
One of the main reasons I want them is nostalgia. AoE1 was my first video game. But AoE1 units are still generally good looking in my opinion. Also they look more generic then most Chronicles units that have more specific designs.
Since they are already in the AoE2 format they can very easily add them to the main game.
Oh I know.
But I’d love to see AoE2 units in a 3D game. Like as close as possible to the original.
African technologies reuse AoE1 icons and their buildings make AoE1 sounds like their Towers, which I think is really cool.
I always play with that enabled!
Yeah people would probably get irrationally mad. Not like AoE2 content existing hurts AoE3 in any way.
