The zoom level is indeed annoyingly low. Depending on the elevation it may not even cover the maximal range of a trebuchet.
6 Likes
I’d appreciate to be able to zoom out just 10-20% more only situationally in a match… but what truly bothers me is the fog at the highest level, heck it’s not even that high “in the clouds”? So annoying, please REMOVE the fog and make max zoom level 10% higher… So easy to do guys
4 Likes
100% more would be more like it, double the width of the map area shown on screen.
3 Likes
Well put. It is quite odd I must admit. Relic thinks it is impossible to play it that way and is used to ignoring requests to change it, meanwhile Ensemble Studios thought it gave too much of an advantage, and Forgotten Empires thinks it is fine and included it in AOE 1, 2 and 3 DE. Both Relic and Ensemble actively took steps to prevent zooming out further in their games, when the functionality was already there in both games: AOE 3 non-DE zoom out mod was allowed in single player by Ensemble but not multiplayer, Relic just disabled/blocked it throughout the game after they discovered the mod. Meanwhile we see pros selecting a medium zoom level in the DE games, and casters switching between max zoom and medium, indicating that the zoom might be about right. (Note that almost no one EVER zooms in closer than medium, even in DE games, indicating that the max zoom could be full map and someone would probably use it, in contrast to no one ever zooming in all the way except as a joke to view an expression or something, but that is allowed even though it almost certainly ‘could not be played that way’). The player base also seems to have opinions all over the place. So the most logical decision seems to be what Forgotten Empires did, which is to let the players decide for themselves. I really hope Forgotten Empires keeps making DE versions, the next hopefully being AOM. Maybe they can make a DE version of AOE IV after that and include all of the options everyone is begging for on these forums.
4 Likes
Zoom definitely needs improvement. Nothing like looking over a mountain and feeling like the peak is about to pick your nose.
4 Likes
Oh, no… really? I think you may be right come to think of it. At least somewhat, if not entirely
1 Like
I can vividly imagine the conversation that was had between the closed beta and the open beta
“theyre complaining about zoom, lets just change it by a small fraction, like one more scroll out, then we can say we fixed it and I bet they’ll stop complaining”
Sadly a lot of people did fall for this, but obviously theres still many of us here who still want the same feature we’ve been asking for since the closed beta.
4 Likes
No actually it’s because people in the beta felt they need to tell devs exactly how to do something.
As if they know themselves how the game works and it’s settings.
People were like “awww just 15% or 20% should be fine”, like they actually knew what it meant
So the devs did 20% based on the beta feedback.
Whenever you wrote a thread where you just said what you thought was wrong, without getting too technical about how to improve, they’d jump into your forum and be like “what a waste of beta code. Give “constructive feedback”.
But this is what happens when people pretend they know something when they don’t. The beta testers asked for 20% and they got 20% lol
2 Likes
not rlly sure what youre refering too
1 Like
I really don’t know what you are talking about or where exactly you are pulling this “20%” consensus figure from. On both Beta’s, the thread with the most votes/activity/comments were literally the ones related to zoom. If you were a part of the Beta’s and were in any way active in the discussion, literally a giant percentage of the people wanted significantly more zoom, to varying degrees, but referencing actual game play-points such as: “we should be able to see at least 8 town halls worth of space” or even as simple as “if there are trebuchets hitting you, you should be able to see it all within your field of view,” and literally 100s of other ideas with varying degrees of zoom, but predominantly all asking for significantly more.
So no, don’t defend the devs as if they actually did something about the feedback, they did not. They have the arrogance to say ‘oh they don’t know as much as we do, you can’t play an RTS zoomed out’ through two full on Beta tests where it was literally the main talking point and which they decided to ignore completely.
7 Likes
Indeed there were people who made maps to show how much a zoom should be. Using AOE maps or just doing edits. But there was a whole line of people saying “oh, just another 15-20% will do. Some were even saying 10% would be fine. At that time (because I didn’t know how much zoom is needed) I too was thinking that would be quite a bit. But I never specifically mentioned in the threads exactly how much, just liked the maps ones.
But yes, there were a lot of people saying 10-20%.
Let us zoom out further!!
4 Likes
Its weird isn’t it? The devs from AoE2:DE & AoE3:DE have implemented sooo many suggestions and balance changes from the community, and those games seem better from it, they are a lot more balanced and feel much better to play.
We, as gamers and as their targeted audience, we know what makes these games great, why they aren’t listening is waaay beyond me. Just look at how much Age2:DE improved from community feedback alone, not to mention their own devs making correct design decisions and not being scared to backdown on poorly made ones.
2 Likes
yeah I think community is what makes video games great tbh
a lot of great games come from community made mods
for example forgotten empires for aoe2
2 Likes
If you browse through the reviews on steam, there are a LOT of people who complain about the zoom level. If there are tons of people complaining about zoom level, how can you stubbornly hold your ground that the zoom level should not be improved in the face of such overwhelming disagreement from the people who actually buy your games? They must maintain the belief than enabling (and yes, it was already possible in the beta version of the game) zooming out more would cause more dissatisfaction from players than keeping it restricted, despite the fact that this did not happen in the DE versions of the game when they enabled a higher maximum zoom.
5 Likes
Here are the zoom options for all of the age games:
Age of Mythology EE has an option called ‘unlock camera’ you can select in the options. By selecting that, the zoom restriction is lifted and you can zoom out a lot farther. AOE 3 has the ‘enable ludicrous zoom’ button (it seems they even fixed the fog when you zoom way out, very recently). AOE 2 just allows you to zoom out as much as you want without needing any option button. AOE 1 has the most flexible options of all of the games, you can select the sprite sizes, which effectively enables you to have the farthest out zoom of all of the age games. AOE IV, as we all know, lets you zoom out the least and there are no options to change that. The maximum zoom out is similar among AOE 2, 3 and AOM. (Kind of funny that the first age game allows the farthest out zoom and the newest the least).
3 Likes
The game has been out a whole five days, and this is the sixth. Give them a chance. It’s far too early to say they’re stubbornly holding their ground, don’t you think? Code, testing, and releases don’t magically happen instantaneously
1 Like
The devs knew about the zoom issue in beta. It really is not about what the devs want but what the players want.
2 Likes
this has been an issue for months now… i’ve been playing since the closed beta
Same here, but it has been publicly available to purchase for less than a week. Let’s see how long it goes post-launch with current zoom level