IE they can take the Chinese assets and make them Japanese with minimal work as opposed to creating an entire new set.
I agree. I rater have 1 good one instead of 2 bad ones.
But I rater have 1 bad one that 0 good ones.
I’m happy that they are reworking the Chinese and I would be sad if they didn’t bring them back.
I hope they keep adding 2 Pantheons a year (so basically 6 civilisations) plus maybe a few god packs on top.
1 pantheon a year would be kinda slow.
AoE2 started with 12 civilisations. If we are at 6 civilisation at the end of next year (2nd DLC is promised for next year) then we would take until 2031 to match the number of civilisations AoE2 started with.
A pretty long time.
- Greeks
- Egyptians
- Norse
- Atlanteans
- Chinese
- Mesoamericans (Aztecs) (already announced DLC)
- Mesopotamians (Babylonians)
- Celts
- Japanese
- Slavs
- Hindu
- Yoruba
And then that would be all additional civilisation in 2031.
Not very much.
This list is just for illustration purposes but you already see that it’s not much.
No Persians, no North or South Americans, no Polynesians, no Phoenician, no Hittite, no Ethiopian, no Mayans, no Thai, no Romans and so on.
Unfortunately this will most likely happen.
Many people think they can increase the chance of getting their favourite civilisation by hating on the other candidates.
I don’t think they will reuse any assets for new civilisations, neither from existing AoMR civilisations nor AoE3DE civilisations.
I would personally not mind at all if they would use AoE3DE assets but they haven’t even reused any of the very generic things like animals and trees from AoE3DE from the looks of it.
AoMR models are not that much higher quality that using some AoE3DE assets would have been an issue but they decided not to.
Many gamers act very allergic to reuse of assets (but then the celebrate Elden Ring that does nothing else then copy everything 10 times) so they would riot if Chinese, Aztecs, Japanese, Inca, Lakota etc use any assets from AoE3DE.
Not sure how many Lakota assets could be reused because it’s questionable if anyone would even accept American civilisations with horses, but it’s certain that any gunpowder unit would have to go.
The only assets that could likely actually be reused are Aztecs and Incans since Chinese and Japanese are way to modern.
Chinese units all look like from the Qing Dynasty, because they are.
I personally would love to see some “crossover” between different AoE games by adding some AoE1/2/3/4 units to each of the other games as scenario editor only units, unique units, minor civilisation units, mercenaries, etc.
How many Musketeers do you need to take out one Titan?
Full upgraded British Musks? Gimme 50 and some micro and Cerberus is going back to Hades 
But I think though there is a balance to be struck, especially with AOM. Each pantheon in AOM plays differently, has different mechanics, units, flavour that share very few similarities bar the base level with the others. Intermingled amongst this is each pantheon having 3 major gods, each effectively mini civs in their own right, with potentially more coming once we know what these new “god packs” are going to be.
This is a huge amount of variety that will steadily become diluted the more pantheons are added. Having to make each stand out as so unique with a widely different playstyle is a momentous task, and further diversifying each major god within that pantheon so that THEY play differently to the others with cross-contimantion further makes it more daunting. AOE2 gets away with it because the variety only comes in the form of one (or two) units, cancelling some techs and some minor % bonuses. AOE3 is starting to struggle under the weight of its diversification as the devs struggle to keep the flavour and impact of each new civ unique. They’re doing a good job, but look how much dlc civ content has slowed lately.
There’s a balance with AOM to be struck I think with keeping the impact of each new pantheon so they stand on their own two feet without being derivatives, and doing the same for each of those major gods.
I’m all for content, but not for the sake of it. If AOMR is super successful with the addition of say 4 new pantheons, I’m all game for them moving on from future dlcs to work on an AOM2. But I acknowledge I might be in the minority on this one. At the end of the day, if I don’t want a pantheon, I won’t buy it. That’s the joy of the consumers choice
I see civilisations, units, buildings, maps, etc. as “tools”.
I can set up different matches with those civilisations or use them to make different scenarios.
The more civilisations the game has the more different scenarios I can make. So for me it wouldn’t even be bad if one civilisation would reuse the same mechanic to generate favour and other things from other civilisations as long as they give me a new “tool” that I can choose to use.
In AoMR more civilisations are even more useful then in AoE1/2/3/4 because you can have 12 players.
In AoE1/2/3 I often run into the issue that I want to represent another civilisation/faction on the map I’m currently making but I can’t since I run out of players.
In AoMR I will run out of civilisation before I run out of players. It will be a while until the game has 12 civilisations and then those civilisations are so far apart that they can’t be in the same scenarios unless its a world map.
For example in AoE2RoR I wanted to make an Alexander the Great Scenario but I need 9 players for it:
Macedonians, Greeks, Independent Greeks (Minoans), Carthage, Egyptians, Phoenicians, Lydians (Hittite), Babylonians and Persians.
I had to scrap the Phoenicians in that case.
In AoE2DE I made an Rise of Islam Scenario that needed following civilisations:
Arabs, Byzantines, Persians, Ethiopians, Avars (Huns), Berbers, Goths, Franks, Lombard and Armenians.
I had join the Goths, Franks and Lombards into one player which had the issue that the AI didn’t really fight on 2 fronts the way I wanted to.
Currently in AoMR I could even make a scenario that includes all Major gods at once!
So for me the biggest downside of AoM is clearly the limited number of civilisations and the fact that none of the existing civilisations even border each other.
Aye I hear what you’re saying. And the thing is, that’s what you want, fitting your preferences, style of play, what you want out of AOM and how you want to play the game. All perfectly justifiable reasons for wanting what you want.
Whereas for me, I want different. So we’ll like not see eye to eye on this matter but at the end of the day, who cares? As long as they put care, thought and hard work into each civ as much as they did into the OG’s, I’ll be happy. As I said, it’s my choice at the end of the day to buy a civ dlc or not. So if they go down your route and pump AOM full of civs, so be it, I have the luxury to pick and choose what I want in my AOM!
I loved scenarios of the OG, so fun to play, so looking forward to seeing what scenarios you produce! The trigger system in the OG was amazing for its time
I’m pretty optimistic in that regard.
They did a lot more for the old civilisations in AoMR then they did for AoE1/2/3DE when those came out.
AoE3DE might be comparable but only after years of updates and incremental improvements. The Ottomans reword is pretty big for example.
All of the original civilisations have been changed in a significant way for AoMR. The Greeks got the smallest amount of changes though.
My first thoughts were that the files were likely left over from AoE3. There are still a few AoE3 images (screenshots, editor buttons) in the game BAR files. Also, some early logos were in the first beta but removed for the second. So it is plausible the leak was just old files from AoE3 or AOM dev. However, after looking into it more I do think there is merit to this leak. AoE3 stores 3d models as GR2 files. The BAR screenshot shows the Japanese files stored as TMM, which is the new 3d model file type for AOMR. Either the devs are including/considering Japan in a campaign or as a civ, or are backporting game engines changes like TMM to AoE3 and somehow files got mixed up between the 2 games (unlikely IMO).
Ultimately nothing is confirmed until it is announced. In AOE3 DE, the Barbary Coast was developed far enough to have a theme song, but was ultimately not included as a civ.
I am honestly astonished that people entertained the idea of reusing assets for a civilization or pantheon when the developers can create them from scratch to better fit the style of the AoMR game.
Not directing this at anyone but it could be seen a bit “disrespectful” and/or “pseudo closet racism” to lump certain cultures together and then force them to reuse the same models / codes / assets simply because they either:
a.) Live in the same geography.
b.) Share “similar culture”.
c.) They are the same race.
d.) It’s okay to be lazy. The Devs will save a lot of time!
e.) All of the above.
Imagine if the assets for one of your favorite pantheons were primarily made up of models from a different game, resulting in a mismatched appearance.
I think the majority of us want a game where most things are created from scratch. The TotD made a mockery of the original games by reusing things and we do not want that to happen again.
2 Likes
Pseudo closet racism? Bro go take your woke fake outrage elsewhere.
Don’t be a negative Nancy and also go off topic on your own thread just because you thought you were onto something. Take it elsewhere.
I hope the Japanese pantheon will be in the game (in the future) with zero reused assets.
In AoE3 all Asians have unique architecture and almost completely unique units while Europeans share architectures and a lot of units.
But I don’t think AoMR will ever do that anyway.
I thought the Chinese and Japanese had the same architecture?
You fundamentally misunderstand what I’m saying. I’m not saying they’re going to straight up re-use assets, I’m saying they can use the existing Chinese assets they’ve made for Retold and just copy/paste what they want, then modify those assets to make them Japanese.
There’s no reason they’d use the same assets again.
The Divine Edition. The mod I’m working on. We use Lakota assets from 3DE and when Retold comes out, I’m going to be porting the Lakota design to try and see how much I can replicate in Retold.
None of the buildings have the same visuals but a few units do.
I think Chinese and Japanese villagers and fishing boats are the same.
I don’t think having Chinese models will make it much easier to make Japanese models.
Let’s hope so. Age of Mythology has the most diverse fundamentals among the Age games by far
Tale of the Dragon left a scar in many gamers’ minds, so it’s probably best to avoid reusing assets to cut costs or even attempting to modify them to look and function differently.
I think it’s okay to reuse modified assets for a mod game since essentially its that developer’s game and the consumers aren’t forced to pay for it.
On the flip side, I would much prefer if the AoMR developers made everything from scratch and not just copy, paste, and edit.
I suppose it could work for some natural terrains but architectures and units should be treated differently if given the chance.
It depends. For example, the TCs look the same for both civs in Age I but become unique in later ages. Some buildings are completely unique (Village vs Shrine). Here is a comparison for Age V.
China:
Japan:
If you think about it every pantheon is kinda like a regional architecture set.
So there kinda are 3 civilisations using the Greek architecture for example.
That was just a glorified mod.
AoMR didn’t even reuse animals, trees, rocks or any props from AoE3DE even thought they totally could have.
I noticed that the first Stage of the Castle looks the same too.
Maybe Exploration Age Market and Dock too?
All Europeans share the same Exploration Age buildings and only diversify later. I think even in AoE4 the Europeans share some Dark Age buildings.
Something that AoMR could do too in some cases.
Consulate is shared between all Asians, even the Indians, but that’s a special case.
Trade Post is shared between all civilisation because it’s map dependent.
There are not many buildings that could be shared in AoMR.
Maybe Archaic Age drop of buildings between Greeks and Romans?
I don’t think anything could be shared between Norse and Celts?
Nothing between Egyptians and Mesopotamians.
Chinese and Japanese Archaic Age buildings maybe.
If civs like Aztecs and Mayans are both added they could share a few early buildings.
Slavs could share some early buildings with the Norse or even Celts.
Persians could have some Mesopotamian buildings.
Not a lot of potential if we are looking at the popularly requested civilisations.
Sentry Tower and Wooden Wall is already shared between all.
I assume you have a program to peek in the codes?
If so, that is great news. I hope the developers continue to make things from scratch. It is the only way. /biased.
No I don’t.
Also that doesn’t exist. Or you don’t actually mean code.
If you mean the datasets, yeah I technically have since I downloaded the BAR tool for AoE3DE years ago but I don’t even have the up do date version that can read AoMR files.
I know that the animals look different by looking at them and seeing that they are different.
Maybe there are some stones or something copied from AoE3DE and maybe some AoE3DE assets are in the Scenario Editor but I can’t check those things yet.
tbh. I don’t fully agree.
I think they could have reused some things from AoE3DE and invested their time and money into making more things.
Like I’d rather have AoMR and AoE3DE share some terrain and animals but therefor have new European Terrains in AoE3DE instead of reusing American and Asian terrains.
Please port the European Terrains from AoMR to AoE3DE.
Also I think it would be cool to know that AoMR and AoE3DE are in the same “universe” giving us things like the Fountain of Youth in AoMR.
The assets are already there so it would be cool to have them in both games.
Having an Earthquake in AoE3DE would also be a cool way to add nice events to a scenario.
I personally love all AoE games and AoM so I would like to have more crossovers between them.
Make all AoE2RoR assets available in normal AoE2DE.
Give us 3D models of some AoE2DE units in the AoE3DE Editor and some Sprites of AoE3DE units in the AoE2DE editor. Make the Musketeer a Scenario Editor Units instead of just an official mod that replaces the Hand Cannon Sprite.
Give us some AoE3DE assets in AoMR and vice Versa. They already done the work so allow us to use those assets to make more interesting Scenarios in both games.