I’d argue most of the “AO” seen in the base colors is mostly emulating where grime builds up on building surfaces overtime. If you look at photo references of half power washed city buildings, grime accumulates where AO would darken anyway. The treatment of the base color textures also suggests grime more so than overlayed AO. Although in some places it looks like a lazy AO mask controlling the darkening than hand crafted dirt and grime. Although it’s a valid perspective to think the reason the base textures were treated this way was to add more of an AO look and detail to those areas.
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