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for that one exist the reason why aoe 2 purists and pro players’s opinion dont matter as much as only they saw the changes until aoe 2 (or other e sport rts otherwise which most of them are stale ideas for a new tittle) meanwhile others beyond aoe 2 already saw better improvements years ago.
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I hope you understand that we are talking about the metal parts of these weapons, yes?
People are using the description of plastic to refer to the lack of metallic shine. In fact, most lack any real colour, making it look plastic. This is because there are plenty of weapons in game that are too bright, making it appear that they have no textures.
Do I have to pull out the editor for this?
First, we have all MAA in the game. MAA in general seems to have a very light texture on their weapons, too bright (likely for visibility). If you zoom in really close, you’ll notice it is actually emissive. Emissive means these textures a source of light themselves and will not darken with the environment. In fact, there is a specific setting in the Engine that allows you to turn up and down the emissive light on them. The exception to these is obviously Delhi, whose texture seems almost entirely too bright, making it appear very much like plastic.
This issue becomes more obvious with Spearmen and some other units, like the string of Crossbows and Bows or the tip of Horsemen’s weaponry or Zweihanders in this game.
When you compare them to metallic looking weapons, they simply look out of place.
Here is how a dark scene looks with these weapons by the way. Is this solution really necessary considering there is next to no changes to lighting in this game? I very much prefer the metallic appearance instead. Anyhow, there are no shaders labled “plastic” so you’re technically correct–but I would go out of my way to insist that the bright white colour of most weaponry looks far more like plastic than it does metal.
And that should be the point.
If you’re wondering, neither the Ghazi Raider or the Musofadi Warrior’s weapons light up in the dark. Why should they? They ain’t plastic! 
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Or too clean.
Especially when compared to the armors and some later weapon models which do have slightly better metallic textures.
In a technical term, they are using emissive shaders, meaning, they are lights. This comes with the bad of not being a normal PBR texture, as in, no reflectivity, no shadows, no normals. In other words, it becomes a flat texture that functions as a torch. The intention here is for them to stand out regardless of the lighting in the actual game (the flat lighting that never changes). I just think it is the wrong decision, because it simply looks so much worse than having an PBR shader for metallic textures.
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Game doesn’t have to be so lifeless. Small effects could go a long way to making it feel more alive.
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I think they could afford to make the white weapons look a bit more metallic without hurting readability.
I would make sure to still keep them relatively white though and not slip too close to gray.
The only thing I think looks truly terrible is the water in the Floating Gate landmark and the Cisterns.
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The Cistern “water” has been (rightfully) criticised a lot. I’m really hoping that can be improved at some point as someone who loves the Byzantines in this game.
It’s funny you include Minecraft, the game were people use voxel blocks as programming data to reproduce entire programming principles in what seems to be a Turing-complete way.
Oh, you don’t even own the game. That tracks.
Yet you like more than a few of the posts that consist of nothing but dumping on others 
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I appreciate you taking the time to pull out a side by side comparison of the weapon models which do have metallic textures and those that do not. I agree with the principle of metal appearing to be metal. In my original picture example the handcannon model shows a metal texture while the swords on the MAA had the bright emissive texture.
Absolutely! This is what I was trying to get across. The weapons are not plastic, I think we can all agree that the swords are MEANT to depict metal, but they fail in doing it convincingly because of their matte appearance and emissive behavior. The brightness that they have in combination with their size, or even animations being off, leads to a more ‘plastic’ appearance.
Seeing as they have models that are textured in a way that fits the preferred metal texture it wouldn’t be a stretch to polish that on the models that don’t have that.
My main thing was that you can tell what they are meant to be based off of context. If anyone here has experience working with 3d modeling and texturing, then it shouldn’t be too hard to understand that it is an issue with how they handled their rendering.
Again, I really appreciate that you took the time to bring a visual example to your post. That really helped clear up the discussion over metal vs plastic.
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basically, failure of lighting, which happens to negatively affect everything
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3 years later and we are still complaining about the poor graphics, animations and physics this game has, graphics has been the hot topic on these forums since I remember, they even deleted or hidden the older one, in reddit before game release there was a huge topic about trash graphics , this game lost 90% of player base after release, there is a huge fan base of AOE that simple doesn’t like the graphics, to this day, the siege units destruction still have the same destruction animation for all units…
Yet you will see the same 2-3 guys defending this, will not mention their name as you already know them.
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Please don’t compare AOM to age of Disney IV, it doesn’t deserve to be compare to it, age of Disney IV should be compares to mobile RTS
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Not blindly agreeing on everything doesn’t mean people are necessarily defending the game as not needing improvements.
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Usual reminder that companies like Touchstone that produced Die Hard 3 or Starship Troopers also belong to Disney and weren’t purchased by them. 
Even if you keep that Age of Disney narrative, it won’t make sense.
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It doesn’t help that there’s only like 15 people who post here regularly.
What I mean is...
I’m trying hard not to be a scold, or even condescending… but I feel frustrated with the tone or level of conversation most of the time. Most of my posts on this forum are just focused on “how can we say this better”. There’s just not a lot to talk about when the conversation enters the realm of ‘age of Disney IV’, or ‘90% of players quit’.
I’m more worried about the playerbase self destructing through negativity than I am with the developers not responding to feedback. If people are concerned with developers not responding to feedback, there’s a dual purpose to presenting a convincing argument (with data, examples, or references) as many of the regulars do!
We can both understand each other AND not need to agree, all while still speaking with each other! It’s a win/win, and it happens without forcing our conversation partners to retreat via insult!
I also feel like it makes these threads easier to read… maybe even making the whole forum more approachable. We can have more diverse conversations as more people decide to join the discussion. They have to want that though.
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I feel like lots of units in this game are 1 texture setting too low. I’ll again ask that if there are higher textures available, make it an option on as a texture pack steam or something. I know many players do not care about this, but there are plenty that do.
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Totally agree with you. Look at the AOMRE screenshots uploaded by me before and you’ll see the big difference in term of quality textures. Relic could make the same textures of a Company of Heroes 3. And yes, a Graphic DLC it’s what i asked for since the game’a launch
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A closeup in-game shot from aoe3. You can clearly recognize the metallic parts of the musket bayonet, you do no have to guess that it is there based on the context that it is a gun.
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and remenber that aoe 4 has a more demanding spec than aoe 3 so there no excuse for the current result.
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There are always excuses (or as people without an axe to grind say, “reasons”). Performance is always a trade-off. Implementation takes developer resources.
I think we can all agree that we want AoE IV to have more resource, and make more improvements. I think that’s the same for fans of III: DE as well. Nobody wants a game they enjoy to stop getting support.
But the specifications are actually pretty comparable. AoE IV’s is slightly more demanding, but the minimum GPU is from 2015 (AoE III: DE’s HD 4400 is from 2014).
So why shouldn’t AoE III: DE take some improvements from IV? There’s no excuse, right?
Subjective opinions on art style aside, I mean actual technical improvements. Just copy and paste it over. Easy peasy. Right? If it’s all about “demanding specs”.
Obvious disclaimer: I also think they should improve the weapon textures in particular. I also think they should focus on a bunch of animation bugs that are obvious with certain weapons.
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