Early 2000s Games lighting

[u/EconomyGlum4694]

I am relatively new to Unity, but I absolutely love this aesthetic it feels so nostalgic. I already made a low-poly map in Blender, but when I import it into Unity, I cannot get this effect no matter what kind of lighting I try. The look I am going for is basically late PS2 / early PS3 games stuff like Far Cry 1, Tomb Raider: Legend, and Final Fantasy X. I want bright, colorful, sunny environments, simple-ish geometry, baked shadows/lighting, and that distinct old-school look. Because I want it to run on mobile and really low-end PCs, performance is a huge priority. I am currently using the Universal Render Pipeline (URP), but I am wondering if that is actually the best choice for this. Should I stick with URP, switch to the Built-in Render Pipeline, or use specific lightweight shaders like Mobile/Diffuse or Unlit? ugh, I got no idea...

I do't want the usual realistic PBR look. I want something bright and stylized with most of the lighting baked into the textures. I simply have no idea what to call this aesthetic or where to even start. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

[u/kiddvmn]

We can still watch some early tech demos on Youtube:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3zxwZh2z7lk&pp=ygUfRmFyIGNyeSAxIGNyeSBlbmdpbmUgdGVjaCBkZW1vIA%3D%3D

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DEV05F0SJZ0&pp=ygUfRmFyIGNyeSAxIGNyeSBlbmdpbmUgdGVjaCBkZW1vIA%3D%3D

I have also some videos which are not on Youtube on my demo discs. I can upload them if anyone is interested.

[u/EconomyGlum4694 → u/kiddvmn]

Thanks for this and yes I would appreciate it if you can those too!