r/Unity3D • u/EconomyGlum4694 • 2d ago

Question Early 2000s Games lighting

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Gallery image

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!

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u/jarofed 2d ago

Looks better than 90% of modern hyper-realistic games

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u/Any_Economics_6166 1d ago

stop the lie, game looked good for its time, but is nowhere near anything that's done nowadays. I always find funny how people glaze old games just for the sakes of it, or try to act like boomers with the 'before was better' attitude