Pretty mush nothing in aoe4 was done for Esport :
SC2 was done for Esport and it’s still the bigest rts right now (but SC2 is also the biggest rts for casual)
Some people believe that making an RTS with the mentality of the 90s model would be a success when we are in 2023 and, today, the big companies must focus on both the casual and competitive scenes (each separately).
esports or no esports, this game has UI worse than any of the aoe series
pathing is stupid and they can’t even be bothered fixing it still
matchmaking system is just horrendous
but despite peoples complaints, they are doing balance nonsense every season. after balance + new season, i see much fewer players despite waht steamcharts says
why not?
as andy said if this worked for de versrion of 3 i can work without problem on similar new rts like aoeo and aom which makes it better because its easier to develop and was like this in any brand new game in the series. also they got ppl that have experience with the engine.
You’re asking questions nobody can answer. Even Andy is guessing at the viability of the Bang engine. I’m guessing as well.
However, a fact is that engine development is hard (and AoE III: DE has had its own share of technical issues). Developers that specialise in a game engine are very rare. Maybe there wasn’t enough resource to commit to III: DE and Age IV at the same time.
Who knows?
Agreed. The problem is when you base most of your decisions on one or the other. In this case AoE4 came out better suited for competitive gameplay but at the expense of the campaign, AI, world building, etc. which caters to the single/casual players.
I would guess that the bang engine is a nonstarter, but I also know almost nothing about game engines and don’t pretend to be helpful in that department.
In my very undereducated view, it seems like whatever engine aoe4 uses is bad and that the bang engine is good. I don’t have a coherent opinion worth sharing about whether the bang engine could or should or would be used for a future AoE game.
But regardless of how they build a future game, I sure as heck hope it is a lot more like AoM, AoE3, and AoEO than it is like AoE4. Though honestly, AoEO is so darn good I have no particular need to ever leave it.
This is my attitude regarding AoE3DE as well. Even when 3DE support stops the odds of a future AoE supplanting it are very low. I have my eyes on AoMRE but anything beyond that is not something I’m gonna spend time on. I’m hoping AoMRE is good not only because I adore AoM but because I want to see what World’s Edge does and if future iterations of these games are worth getting excited about.
Just because AoEIV isn’t my cup of tea doesn’t mean I feel cheated out of a new AoE experience or whatever. The support the DEs and AoEO have received has been a dream come true and helped mitigate any lingering disappointment. Heck, AoE3 and AoEO players know more than anybody what it is like to have their game be treated like an unwanted stepchild.
The AoE family has been playing these games for over 2 decades now, and a lot of that without official support. We will live on regardless of whatever road World’s Edge goes down.
On another note one feature in AoEIV I think is praiseworthy is masteries. They act like a 2nd batch of achievements within the game and entice players to learn the civs. I wish 3DE had something like that.
It’s nonstarter because Relic has their own engine. Bang engine is basically dead software and switching to dead software is something you would never do. It would be worse idea then either writing new engine or taking something like UE5 and rewriting portion of engine to be more suitable for your project.
Switching between engines is very rare for large studios as it consumes lot of time.(whole team has to learn how to use new tools…). The current trend of switching to UE5 is only due to UE5 being years ahead of most inhouse c++ engines in terms of features, stability etc…Plus using UE5 allows them to change their recruitment requirements to X years of UE experience…
It’s not really an engine fault. Even if their engine is more suitable for COH3 then AOE4. Main problem is that they are just not studio with experience and time to develop AOE4 and at the same time COH3 without sacrificing one or another. Also lack of experience with AOE franchise is definitely an issue when they were updating their engine to handle it…
Both engines have there good and bad points i think.
Aoe3 has nice clear graphics
Relics has better smoother game play. Thats why i prefer aoe4 over aoe2 and aoe3.
If anything you would want a updated version of the starcraft engine
The Broodwar Engine is SUPER old and the Starcraft II engine is held together by hopes and well wishes. Bang! and whatever Relic is using are much more reliable.
AoE3 having less smoother gameplay is just an AoE3 thing. AoE Online used the same engine and it was much more polished gameplaywise, so it’s not the engine’s fault, it can definitely perform better if you build for that.
also noteworthy, both genie and bang! are much more responsive to inputs than essence in aoe4 is, you don’t notice the delay with those 2 while with essence you’re gonna notice, this isn’t necessarily a gamebreaker, but its smt my eye noticed right away and should be addressed, not asking for 1 to 1 parity with input lag on genie and bang!, but surely there are ways to reduce it from current abnoxious 50+ ms per command
When you have been playing with Bang!, SAGE or Havok and then you come back to AoE4 the lag is very noticeable. As you said, you get used to it and it’s not a showstopper, but it’s not as satisfying.
To get a bit back on topic, every time I watch casted games I can’t stop but shake my head in disappointment that nobody cared to animate siege units being destroyed. They just puff out of existence no matter if it’s a ram or a trebuchet.
It’s another one of those baffling things since death animations are in general very detailed and well done. Or the fact that the Ottoman bombard is the only siege unit that follows terrain inclines.
beautiful little animations in aoeo make me fall in love all over again.
You’re not wrong. Siege puffing into a bunch of particles is just a way for them to cut time in making that asset instead of making an interesting death animation.
Lack of effort. Maybe intentionally so, but it is sad to see. I look at COH3 and how beautiful some of the details for their larger units are, their tracks moving individually, the earth beneath them shifting accordingly, the trembling dust it creates as it moves. In comparison, AOE4 siege units like a Culverin “drop” a bunch of sand on the floor when it unpacks, then it picks it all up when it moves. Such lack of detail.
I can only summarize that it was far far far from a passion project for the developers involved, or development has cost Microsoft less than what they’ve spent on marketing and tournaments so far.
Tbh, COH3 also has units that have poorer or bugged animations than others. That has been a common practice of releasing a “half-finished” game (not in terms of functionality, but details and uniformity of quality). I have been accustomed to that (or what other choices do I have?)
Like you’ve mentioned, most siege units except the later-added ones do not respect the terrain.
The problem is whether they will EVER fix these one day, or “well we’ve got enough sales and not a whole lot of people are complaining, so let’s leave them aside”, or they just keep focusing on a continuous stream of other higher-priority tasks forever and never get their hands on these.
Who knew a death animation could be so endearing? I love it. The gravestone is such a wonderful touch.
Personality & Charm & Humor from just single animation. This is what makes AoE…AoE.
Most (big budget) games spend more on advertising than development. Or at least, far more on advertising than you’d think they’d spend.
It’s not cheap, and all his towards the overall cost of a game.
My general position on any game is that constraints are imposed on the developers as a rule. The games development industry lives off of the passion its developers have (which is also a big reason why it pays less on average compared to software).
Yea, don’t get me wrong Gorb, I’ve been part of it myself and I well understand these grounds.
Well aware of how constraints are the ultimate ender of these things, and it is why I do bring it up as I cannot but compare the passion between COH3 and AO4. Both have strengths and weaknesses but visually, COH3 has a lot more detail in almost everything despite it still having similar issues like AOE4.
Out of the two games, I always thought AOE was bigger so it does come at a surprise to me personally. I think @ArrivedLeader22 's statement about “they just keep focusing on a continuous stream of other higher-priority tasks forever and never get their hands on these.” is especially horrowing as it isn’t a tactic I am a perticular fan of and neither wish to be the case for this game, but the more time passes, the more I believe it is the case.
Yes, precisely! That anim is close to my heart because we borrowed the gag from a scene from Back 2 the Future Part 2 where Marty punches Biff and he spins around and falls face first into a handcart of cow manure. The Clinicus drunkenly pulls a cart of medicine around to heal the Roman army but close enough. The point stands that details are everything.