As i said in the previous post, World’s Edge Is looking for a Better graphic Engine or a totally update of Essence Engine or Bang Engine.
This Is the latest Poll
Many questions about graphic: effects, wheater, physics, stylized or realistica graphic, High detailed on units, weapons and more.
I think many games including AOE4 itself has proved “you don’t have to make enlarged weapons and overly clean textures to promote competitiveness”. Oh and people have been manipulating the sliding bar of how competitive AOE4 is for their convenience all the time.
I personally am strongly against the kind of argument of “well it’s not ideal but it is maybe the only way to achieve A and B and C at the same time” (B and C usually being optimization and competitiveness).
No it’s not. Developers of AOE4 like the developers of many other games have the talent and skill to strike a good balance. There are games that already did. Some units in AOE4 have massively better details and textures, more variations and greater deviations from the shared units, than the others added earlier, and few people really had problems with it.
Remember when 2 years ago some people were saying “no if you add more units it might break balance/make the game too unique difficult to learn/fail like AOE3” and they added one round of adding a bunch of unique units and an expansion that added even more (and still more to come)? Anyone had problems learning or remembering them?
Same applies to graphics, textures, siege crews, etc etc.
Yeah, well, we are each entitled to our opinions. AoE3DE in the meantime, as a fully featured game, has half the player numbers of AoE4, with many AoE3 players bouncing to AoE4. This tells you something.
Regarding the point that AoE has always catered to casuals, I don’t think if AoE4 sacrificed multiplayer for casuals it would still be played today. Casuals consume the game and move on. Multiplayer people always have a much higher retention rate. So catering to MP makes sense, since the game doesn’t have enough content to support SP, and won’t for a long time.
Wrt AoMRE, it’s gonna launch in a few days. We’ll see if people share you opinion that it looks much better.
I just think you are biased. As someone who hasn’t played AoE3, 2 or Myth at launch, I have a clearer perspective. And the reason I think you’re biased is that to me there is no way AoE3DE looks better than AoE4. And I asked my wife who is not a gamer, and she said she likes the details on the right in the comparisons as well. So I must be drunk or something if AoE3DE looks better.
Oh and there is no way the AoE franchise has the same following as the Civ franchise. The AoE franchise almost died at a point, until MS decided to revive it. There is no way Microsoft poured into AoE more than Firaxis poured into Civ. There are cost cuts everywhere, even in AoM Retold.
And UE is not made for RTS. Frost Giant had to create another engine on top for it to work.
This is not a microtransaction game that relies on selling seasonal passes and skins. Those who consume the game and move on do not generate less profit than those who grind the ladder every day.
The only way how that “MP retention rate” could make more profits is to consistently hold huge tournaments with massive audience and sponsorship. That is the idea mode for “competitive esports games”. And what we see now is the prize pool keeps going down.
It’s not about AOE4, but there is little space for RTS esports at present. Even sc2 can no longer survive on that. You cannot rely on big tournaments.
And as I’ve already said in the previous reply there is no conflict between graphical details and competitiveness even if you want to go down that path.
So AOE3 has fewer players because it has better or worse graphics? Or because it is casual or competitive?
I remember more details means more casual and less competitive and fewer players no? But according to you it also has poorer details at the same time?
Worse graphics, older engine, worse unit control, worse everything except water physics and content (types of animals and stuff like that). Just a worse game straight up, to today’s standards, without nostalgia goggles.
The discussion was about the choices they made for the sake of unit visibility, not conflict between graphical details and competitiveness. There is enough graphical detail in AoE4, that was the point. It’s a beautiful game, and if you don’t like it, you are free to play AoE3 and show Microsoft via raw player numbers that a game like that is what people want.
Dead games don’t sell DLC.
Edit: You started replying seconds after I posted this. Makes me wonder if you’re reading the posts you’re replying to. Not that it matters but might explain why you’re misreading my points.
No conflict either.
Several units in AOE4 itself have more metallic weapons, better details and textures than big clean white boards and nobody ever had problems seeing them.
It might surprise you but there are games that see player number surges whenever there is a DLC.
Not all players forget about the game entirely if they don’t grind the ladder every day.
In the meantime there are some “pros” and self-proclaimed “pros” who resist DLC contents because they’ll have to learn new strategies and matchups.
If anything I see the RTS genre haunted by the esports focus more than benefiting from it. RTS can be sp-rich and casual games like every genre has been. FPS or FTG can be extremely competitive but there are also very casual games that survive well. Most strategy games are extremely casual. Only in RTS I see the majority of developers and players with the “competitive pvp or die” mindset.
Wow you already started arguing before seeing my reply. Makes me wonder if you’re coming here to dIsCuS or to simply claim victory.
If the latter you can just skip this entire writing.
I don’t understand what you are trying to say here? Are you saying the tip of the spears and the bows emanating light wasn’t a stylistic choice? The devs were just beginners and turned on the weapons light by mistake for only these small bits?
Do you have examples of this phenomenon?
In my view there is a high chance that if everyone ditched AoE4 after playing the campaign, the doom-posting from previous titles fans who want the game to fail, like yourself, would have been even bigger. On the other hand, Sultan’s Ascent DLC was the best selling DLC of all time for any AoE game. Interest in the game helps sales. High retention also allows them to fix common complaints as they go, and improve the experience.
That sounded very childish. “dIsCuS” what is that? I think we can check each other’s post history and conclude who’s here to talk about AoE4 and who’s here to argue.
The fact you immediately started replying to my previous post and the reason why I pointed it out is because I think the way you read posts is a single paragraph at a time. Then you quote it and make up a reply, even if you have nothing to say. This is like a sport to you.
All it tells me as someone who bounces is that perhaps some players like the AoE franchise and play every game. More power to the people who stick to one game but to me variety is good and so is appreciating each game for what it is both for its positives and negatives.
Every Age is good.
No I say it’s an oversight, or the result of budget cuts, their own specific update plan, or any other reason that prevent them from making better weapon textures at release or fixing them later. It is something that should and could be improved not an intentional, brilliant design choice.
It’s like all units being European in AOE2. It’s because they didn’t have manpower/time/budget/space to make unique skins in 1999. Not because they have the opportunity to do it, but intentionally chose not to.
Weapons emanating light is separate from textures and details too.
Look at your AOE4. There are quite a few units, most of which added later, that do much better at textures and details, while their weapons still emit lights.
Most sp games I guess?
From the one who tried to go ad hominem with speed of responding
XD
See this is the kind of treatment you’ll face when you want to “unite” the players of all age games and become part of that “union”.
Edit: or this:
Back to a few years ago I tried to be very careful in my wordings in the AOE3 subforum when suggesting anything new, adding a lot of disclaimers and alternatives, to avoid making “competitive people” angry. I tried doing the same when expressing some parts of AOE4 could be improved, such as things as trivial as color selection, back in 2021, with a million disclaimers and praises to not look like a hater. Worked?
The more you try to reconcile different groups, the more you want to find a trench to stay in.
I play AOE2 and 4 a lot and I never want to admit myself as part of the “community”.
Would you mind expanding on these points?
The first paragraph confuses me. First, they were not able to diversify the unit models because of several constraints, but also that means they chose to not do that intentionally? What is the implication for the issues you are underlining with AoE IV?
The second paragraph is also confusing… weapons having emissive property causing them to not interact with lighting is a texture/details issue. More importantly, they’ve had this consistently (as you point out), which suggests this is a stylistic design as Ardeigras is pointing out.
That would be the best approach, but the world unfortunately is not perfect, so the reality is you get fans of previous titles coming to AoE4 forums to trash talk it.
A good example is ArrivedLeader22 who keeps arguing with me in this thread, but if you check his post history, he’s only interested in AoE3. So what brings him here if he already found his favorite game? He’s here on a crusade against AoE4.
To clarify, what I mean is “they chose not to diversify because they couldn’t (at the time of the game’s release)”
Not that they chose not to diversify because they brainstormed all possible choices, and decided not to diversify because they thought it might affect readability, harm esports, etc etc.
“Intentionally” is not accurate. I mean “based on some well-established design principle” in contrast to being limites by other factors.
I’m talking about some weapons that lack metallic textures and are too big. If you want I could also include all spears being big white European billhooks.
My point has always been “it’s not the ONLY way to keep the game competitive or ensure unit visibility”. They can be trivially improved without harming the latter.
Find a single sentence in this thread where I called AOE4 bad or trash talked it, and I’ll disappear from this subforum forever. Or you disappear. Deal?
“Something needs to be and can be improved” does not count. Maybe to you it does, and that explains why the world is not perfect.
Just to clarify, we’re talking about the tip of the spears and the bow string. So for all other elements in the game where metal was used, they had time to do the textures, but only for these highly repetitive elements they were out of time, so they said “fuck it, we’ll make them glow”. Just making sure that was your point.
Now you’re saying this in a negative way.
Switch the entire wording to a positive, constructive tone, and that will be my point.
They could, if they have the time, and have the permission from the management, make better weapon textures and details than we have now, while not harming competitiveness or readability. But the reality is they have long term plans for newer contents that prevents them from attending to these details right away.
This specifically applies to already released contents because you cannot re-sell what is already released, in contrast to DLC contents which usually and naturally come with higher quality than the older ones. So free universal updates to existing stuff are slow and gradual, and I can do with that. But this is not to say they don’t need improvement or will do more harm than good when they get improved.
I am against sugarcoating oversights and (understandable) compromises with grand design principles because usually they are not.
Example in AOE4 itself: I can’t remember how many times back in 2021 I was taught “the civs are already unique enough” and “more uniqueness are harmful to the game”. I thought it was because they had not figured out how to add more uniqueness, instead of intentionally controlling the level of uniqueness. Then what happened? A free update that gives almost every civ a new unique units. Then an expansion that adds even more wildly unique designs. And we are expecting more.
Fun fact: when they added some new basic features exclusively to new DLCs civs in AOE3, I criticized it as well, before they made a universal update (which took several months). Because I was on a crusade against it XD.
Here’s a screenshot I made a few years ago to report a bug with the longbows.
You can tell how easy it is to recognize the units at a glance thanks to the way the weapons are stylized. That’s why some very specific parts of units have this effect.
You can see the spear immediately, instead of it blending into the background.
The same reasoning applies to certain weapons being slightly bigger than they would in reality. Readability is a factor when we’re talking about a game where you mostly look at units from afar and you need to instantly tell them apart.
Where the metal part wasn’t small, or pivotal in recognizing the unit, regular metal texture was applied. There are plenty of examples.
I’m not disagreeing with “the current design helps readability”.
What I mean is “there should be better-looking alternatives to keep the readability and make a few other people happy”, and they can be achieved with slight adjustments. The devs just need to spend some creative efforts on them. They know this better than us.
They are constantly improving the game, from redesigning old units to adding features. It’s uninformed to say they are favoring new content to improvements. If anything, it’s the opposite.
Now who’s not reading XD
Right in the next paragraph I said “free updates to existing contents are usually gradual and slow”.
DLCs usually come in as a batch of higher quality contents on average than existing ones, while the latter gradually catch up.
This not only applies to graphical quality, but also design creativity, uniqueness and many other things. You can compare Byzantines and Japanese against the 8 civs on release and see the difference in sheer amount of contents.
This is not a criticism. It is natural. And I have learned to accept that. I know this because I happen to play AOE3 too.
