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Asked: 2025-04-16T00:14:18+05:30

Why do two prefabs with the same hexagonal tile render differently in Unity, despite using identical materials and lighting?

I’m having a bit of a conundrum with two prefabs in Unity, and I’m hoping someone here might have some insights. I’m using Unity 6, and I have these two buildings that look quite similar. Both of them include a prefab of a hexagonal tile which is the same for both. The hexagonal tiles are utilizing a Color Map, Roughness Map, and a Normal Map from Blender, and I’m using identical materials and lighting for both prefabs.

The issue I’m encountering is that the rendering of the hexagonal tiles appears distinctly different between the two buildings. They are rendered under the same lighting conditions and positioned very closely to each other, so I really can’t understand what’s causing this discrepancy. I’ve already tried a few things, such as saving them again, reimporting the models, and even tweaking some normal values, but none of that seems to have an impact on the difference in appearance.

I checked to ensure that the settings in the material inspector in Unity are indeed identical for both building prefabs. However, it’s quite baffling to see that despite all this, one hexagonal tile looks way more vibrant and detailed, while the other seems flat and lacks that visual pop.

Another thing I noticed is the rotation and scale of the prefabs. While neither should affect the rendering fundamentally, it seemed worth checking, and indeed, they’re both set to the same values. Could it be a problem with the way the shaders are interacting with the light in Unity? Or maybe there’s something happening with the prefab hierarchy that’s impacting the way the materials are applied? This has been driving me nuts, and I’d really appreciate any advice or pointers you might have on how to troubleshoot this issue. Thanks!

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    2 Answers

    1. The discrepancy in appearance between your two prefabs, despite identical materials, textures, lighting, rotation, and scale, could indeed stem from shader interactions or prefab hierarchy issues. Double-check that both hexagonal tile prefabs have identical shader properties enabled, such as emission, smoothness strength, metallic settings, or any custom properties within your shaders. Confirm that the rendering paths, HDR settings, reflection probes, static batching, and lighting mode (baked vs. real-time) are uniform for both buildings. Also ensure that no prefab has accidentally been set differently in layers, culling masks, or even light probes contributing to subtle but perceptible visual variations.

      If those checks yield no differences, inspecting the prefab hierarchy thoroughly might offer clues. Differences such as object nesting within parent prefabs, transform inheritance, or renderer/material component overrides can lead to varying visual results. You might also try swapping the hexagonal tile instances between building prefabs to test if the rendering issue follows the tile object or the prefab it is placed within. Using Unity’s frame debugger and inspecting material instances at runtime can further pinpoint subtle discrepancies in rendering states. Finally, consider regenerating UV maps or recalculating normals in Blender to ensure consistency before importing again.

    2. It sounds super frustrating to deal with such a weird rendering issue! Since you mentioned that everything seems to be set up the same, here are a few rookie thoughts that might help you troubleshoot:

      • Shader Issues: Sometimes, shaders can behave oddly based on the geometry of the model or how the UVs are set up. Double-check if the hexagonal tiles have the same UV mapping in Blender before exporting.
      • Lighting Settings: You said the lighting is identical, but maybe the lighting settings on each prefab are applying differently? Check if there’s anything overriding settings for one building in the scene.
      • Material Instances: Even if the materials look the same in the inspector, they could be different instances. Make sure both prefabs are using the exact same material asset in Unity and not just copies of it.
      • Prefab Hierarchy: You mentioned the hierarchy might affect it. Maybe some child objects under one prefab are affecting how the material looks? Inspect the hierarchies to make sure they’re identical.
      • Camera Angle: Sometimes, the angle from which you view can trick your eyes into seeing things differently. Try moving the camera around to see if the differences still appear.

      If none of that helps, maybe you could try creating a new prefab with the hexagonal tile and seeing if that one behaves the same as the originals. It’s frustrating, but sometimes starting fresh can uncover strange issues.

      Good luck, and hopefully, you’ll figure it out soon!