As you can see in the graphic below the player numbers of HD are still quite high. I don’t know the player numbers of Voobly, but I am sure that there are still many players active as well. There are many reasons why people still play these old versions of the game but I assume that the main reason is that most players simply don’t have the specs to run the game at a reasonable framerate.
To get these players to play DE as well there should be a “ultra low graphic mode” i.e. no post-processing, even lower resolution sprites than the x1 sprites, reduced animations (no destruction animations) etc.
There is a folder in the game files called “graphics-low” (AoE2DE\resources_common\drs\graphics-low) which is currently empty. I guess that this means that at least some thought has been given to implementing such an option.
Optimally, the player base should be united in one place and I think that such a feature would definitely have a positive impact in this regard.
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Lowering the resolution usually works, I have a pretty weak system and on native resolution I only get a score of around 940 in the Ranked Benchmark test running at 1920x1080 but when I bump it down to 1440x810 I get 1000 which let’s me play Ranked. And people with weak spcs should play against the AI more often.
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There’s multiple reasons people still play HD. I have both, and although DE is objectively superior, there’s a lot of older custom content I like that I still haven’t played that doesn’t translate well into DE, since they really changed how the .json files work and such.
Options are always great; but I wouldn’t expect that single change to make everyone still on HD start playing DE.
It could be wonderfull to have a way to have the graphic of AOE2HD. A game of a few gB is quicker to launch, to run, to download. I still have the HD version to play with friends.
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I got pretty low specs for my laptop
Surface pro 4 laptop with
intel core i5 6300U
8Gb ram
intel hd graphics 520
(might be missing some things because I don’t know what to say for system specification)
but I can play with solid 60 fps maybe some fluctuations (45-60fps) if the temperature of the room is hot because I lower my display resolution from 2736x1824 (native resolution) to 1280x720 which is also the resolution I play on. Also did the ingame benchmark and passed with a score of around 210 or something.
TLDR: Lower your resolution from your native resolution to the resolution you use ingame.
I agree, but I also think the issue is losing relevance, simply because old computers are constantly being replaced by new computers. You can see that in the Steam Hardware & Software Survey. In November 2019 (when AOE2DE was launched), only 38% had 16GB RAM, in December 2020 that has increased to 50% (and many people have more than that). Windows 10 went from 74% to 95% usage. The most common VRAM went from 4GB to 6GB. And so on.
I still think it would be worth the effort to implement, because I know many players stick with HD because DE is too demanding. Same issue for AOE1 and AOE3, by the way. That’s a lot of $20 sales missing.
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Can confirm. This is the reason why many of my friends didn’t move to DE yet, and the reason I only play in my brother’s PC (we must arrange turns).
It would be great if this low specs mode looked similar to the original AoE 2, for the nostalgic feeling.
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The will to reunite was lost for Microsoft when they didn’t make a ladder and lobby system like on Voobly.
The playerbase will never ever unite, because Microsoft doesn’t care they just care about the money
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I like to play on my laptop, and so can play when I travel someplace else. The steam hardware stats don’t factor this in as much. Definitely a good idea to get the game to perform super smooth on everyone’s hardware. I like the original post’s suggestion!
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Do the devs ever read these or acknowledge these posts?
Is there just too much spam in the forums that turns the devs off maybe?
So many obvious fixes to the game like this I don’t see being acknowledged 
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