#AGE OF EMPIRE HD EDITION NO CD#
#AGE OF EMPIRE HD EDITION MODS#

So we didnвЂ™t have to go around and redesign all the assets. One of the things we really wanted to stick to was people have been recognizing this specific unit as being a camel.We wanted to make sure you still recognized that unit as a camel, 20 years later. One thing is that we had the original art. So we literally had no choice but to make everything from scratch. We didnвЂ™t have any of the original assets. This is not just one game weвЂ™re making, this is six games worth of assets. When we started this we made a list of all the assets we had to remake. With that said, it was still a crazy amount of work. The art direction was something we did in-house, that was all done in in collaboration with Microsoft, but a lot of the asset work was luckily done by studio that helped us out. What was the process of remaking an entire gamesвЂ™ worth of assets? In the HD editions, all the graphics were the original graphics. With that said, literally every asset in the game had to be remade. All the little details make it look prettier. If you look at the graphics, if you put them side by side you would see like the building style beautifully collapses, it comes crumbling down, or we have the smoke that comes out of the barrel of the cannon. ThatвЂ™s kind of the biggest difference and manifests itself in many ways as well. It was a very very different approach- 'letвЂ™s make sure everything we have up to this point is the best possible thing that we can make.' We need to make the best Age IIВ possible. But then when the definitive editions were made it was more than 'OK, let's bring back Age II.' ThatвЂ™s actually the whole project goal from within Microsoft and from us as well. We brought more content because there was clearly a demand from the community.

#AGE OF EMPIRE HD EDITION NO CD#

What did you see as the tentpoles for a definitive edition? What were sort of the project goals of that that separated it from previous HD editions youвЂ™ve done?Д«ack in the HD edition, the main goal was 'letвЂ™s bring Age of Empires back to the players.' There were a lot of players who hadnвЂ™t played the original, there were no CD players on laptops, for example.В That was kind of the goal for the HD edition, to bring it back to the players.ДЄnd it kind of grew on that.

#AGE OF EMPIRE HD EDITION MODS#

After the launch of Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition, lead developer Bert Beeckman dropped by the GDC Twitch channel to discuss the process of revamping thisВ series, and what considerations were needed to add new civilizations to the game.Д«eeckman and his colleagues at Forgotten Empires are a team of former modders who organized as a studio after their mods to the Age of EmpiresВ games took off and caught the attention of Microsoft.В If you've ever wondered about how a team of modders could take up the mantle of developing Age of Empires, here's some insight from Beeckman on the process.

Age of empire hd edition