How important is Art Direction in Videogames?

Between two similiar games (as in they are of the same genre of gameplay and equally good in terms of mechanics) the one with better art direction attracts a bigger audience. Even singular franchises can lose or gain players depending on how much the art direction changes regardless of gameplay.

user you've been making this same post for the last 3 days, give it a rest

Very.

As far as graphics go, it's the most important thing. It's also something that modern video games are seriously lacking.

It makes or breaks game. I'm pretty sure some of the new JRPGS have good gameplay, however the anime art style and story probably littered with same tired cliches in anime shows keep me from ever pick up any game.

Art style ain't as good as reach. They are puppeteering halos dead corpse.

How so? Some games look fantastic these days.

Art-direction/aesthetics/Visual-themes are incredibly important to video games, moreso by virtue of the word "video." Video games are a graphic media, one that necessitates visuals in order to interact with them.

Specifically however, art direction is crucial in establishing the emotional tones, themes, atmosphere, and even gameplay of the video game. Two exact same games, identical in challange, mechanics, gameplay, audio, etc, will be VASTLY different if the art direction is altered.

To expand on this topic further, one needs to properly define "art direction."

For the sake of brevity and shitposting however, art direction is very important to a video games.

Yes

Please tell me you know the one on the top is objectively better right?

>le every tiem lol
No but really, the first game had an art style that better fit the game. The new art style would maybe fit, if the game were not billed as Nidhogg 2.

depends on the genre, but overall seperating the art from the game is a bad idea no matter what. If its something relatively slow paced with little or no movement/animation like a turn-based game or something like Civ then you should give the player something interesting to look at with what little they can interact with, while for a much more fast paced game like say, Nidhogg everything should be relatively simple to keep it immediately recognizable in terms of gameplay. If you want a goo example of this just read Valve's commentary on the design for the classes in TF2. On a side note I don't even know why their needs to be another Nidhogg and why it has to look like fucking shit regardless.

>Lazy atari graphics done purely because they didn't have an artist is better than fun claymation style art to a silly game about fighting to get eaten by a giant worm

>that saturated as fuck blue
jesus christ
500000000000 seconds in photoshop

> how important is a visual direction to a visualy presented game

Besides the game rules them self, I'd guess pretty important.

>implying that the original's is worse than the wacky random youtube artstyle

True, the graphics are top notch. No argument there. But an art style is something different than graphics. Compare screenshots from any number of modern military shooters, and it can be very difficult to tell them apart because they lack any sort of visual style to set them apart from each other.

The visuals are what you fucking look at, and if I look at your game and hate the art direction, that could be the mark against it that turns me away from it.

I can't believe I let Cred Forums convince kid-me that gameplay is the only thing that matters.

It's not claymation, but the artist has done a lot of claymated before.

Kay

Most games these days have little to no art style other than "realistic". So you end up with tons of games that look the same.

Can you go work for them to make it better? Thanks.

top : Halo
bottom : Power Rangers

It's the part you see

>plastic, fragile looking armor glued on a black suit looks good

art like music can make a game more enjoyable than it was if it was barebones. that said music is a lot more important than art. Music can make boring grindy games worth playing just to hear the soundtrack.

>wacky grafics done purely for the sake of wacky grafics is better than atari like graphics because there's more effort put into them
ever heard of less is more fag?
The simple style of the first game complimented the gameplay extremely well
literally all they had to do was scale up the faceless color people and it would have been fine.
I don't want to play as some failed Homer Simpson clone in my jousting vidya

It's meant to be an easily identified team color.

...

that alone made it considerably less eye searing to look at

thanks user

Are all of the armor colors in Halo 5 that plastic looking?

Well I don't know about you friend, but that sure as fucking shit doesn't look red to me

>How important is Art Direction in Videogames?
Almost as important as Marketing.

What MMORPG is this sprite from?

>the first game had an art style that better fit the game

If the first game had this art style then you would hate the sequel for going simpler in art style

Art direction is one of the most important things in video games. I could not give a suck at all about graphics, graphics are usually shit and wear out as the times go on, but a good art design lasts forever.

Yes, they actually had to change it because people hated it that much

low quality bait

Models, textures and animations were meh, but it's style makes it so visually impressive and striking that I didn't give a shit. Art Direction > Raw Graphics everyday.

Hi.
I just pirated & finished Nidhogg for the first time.
I prefer the style of the first one.

which is funny being the armor in the bottom is just halo 1 armor in halo 5

The general art direction still looks like ass.

RIP Halo

that's what I was trying to point out, I really dislike
Halo 5's Style

I wouldn't have played it as much or enjoyed it as much if it had this art style at first.
this art style doesn't really even feel genuine anyways so I can't imagine it coming first for what the first game was.

Good job the original hurts my eyes.

Forgot pic related

No shit. That's why the other team uses a color on the other side of the color spectrum.

PazerSHREK all day everyday.

The minimalist art style for Nidhogg worked great because it contrasted very well with your environment, and you could clearly see your opponent's arm language and use that to your advantage.

I don't know what the fuck he was thinking with the new game. It's almost hilarious just how much he ruined it.

Too bad the gameplay was repetitive and the story too boring for it to be enjoyable.

art direction, gameplay, and sound is the holy trinity of vidya
get these 3 right and you have guaranteed success
even the story can be wacky

gundam? more like the guyver.

This shit is really goofy. Like why is there so much exposed, unarmored suit parts? Also the head does look crazy anime.

I don't really see the big issue with a lot of the Halo 5 armor stuff. Reach definitely had better armor design but it wasn't that far off from 5 in a lot of cases.

I honestly think the Halo 1 armor looks like hot shit. Everything just looks so simple, the helmet looks goofy and too similar to a motorbike helmet, the back piece is just a big flat square. It's just so weird.

I unironically like the new art. Maybe because i love Skull Monkeys.

More important that technical graphics, sure. What's important is to be able to properly present whatever's happening on screen.

FGC(Fighting Game Community) member here, art direction doesn't mean SHIT. All that matters is the GAMEPLAY. Git Gud.

This isn't a trade retard, it's a question.

And I fucking answered it, scrub. Art direction and graphics don't mean shit, gameplay is KING.

>I post fedoras on the internet

>Reach definitely had better armor design but it wasn't that far off from 5 in a lot of cases.

There's no fucking way you can compare 5's armor with Reach rationally. Reach's armor fits the description of "futuristic, but militarized" and never went too ridiculous with the armor designs itself, meanwhile 5's fits the description of "just fuck my shit up senpai."

You need to get your eyes checked, mate.

You can't even guarantee that in that hypothetical situation. In this argument you mean to imply that my taste in art is something you're familiar with, or even worse, you're basing your argument on the belief that I'm being contrarian simply because the creators changed something in the sequel. It wouldn't matter if it was the first or the second game, this art style is not as appealing. The first game's art style played into the gameplay mechanics by being fairly easy to read (save for the Clouds level). It was simplistic enough to track the character's movements, while being just realistic enough to give a sense of place to the environment. In response, let me make a bold claim by assuming you're one of those fat shits who thinks going to Golden Corral is objectively better than any other restaurant because you can just have more and more food, regardless of quality.

Reach still has a fuckton of exposed black suit material, specifically on the female Spartan. I think it's the shift in graphical styles that annoy people the most.

It's important in a lot of things. Designs all stem from what role the character plays and what the tone of the overall project is.

For example, in pic related these are supposed to be the protagonists but children claimed they were evil counterparts, so they had to be redesigned. Even though the designs are atrocious regardless, it's shit like that that makes art direction so important.

>Art direction and graphics don't mean shit
Alright, lets make identical fighting games but you give yours a vomit of colors and particle effects because "art direction... don't mean shit" while i keep mine clean and effective.

Reach's design was great because of the undersuits and the way the armor laid on top of it. The undersuits were still clearly a very thick layer of protection and not just a thin little sheet of nothing. And the armor pieces hug the undersuit tightly, as if they're molded to fit it. Which they are. Halo 5's armor pieces look like scraps you gorilla glued onto the undersuit with no concern for how they would provide protection.

>You can't even guarantee that in that hypothetical situation.

Look at any game that changed art styles and no one has liked them, people hate change its as simple as that

>Reach still has a fuckton of exposed black suit material

All of which are thick and bulky that blend with the armor itself, whereas 5's underarmor looks like a paper thin wet-suit and expose at least 40% of the spartan's body.

It is very important to stand out with your aesthetics

>he actually believes this

All that matters is how good the shit is. UMvC3 has tons of effects, don't matter cuz the game is fucking GOOD.

Suck it, bitch

>people cant realize the guy talking about pure fighting gameplay is baiting out his ass

come on guys.

You're forgetting something very, very important.

Halo supports more than two teams.

So while it's easily distinguished from red, is it easily distinguished from green, yellow, grey, etc...? Even at a distance? By desaturating it, you make it harder to tell the difference at a distance, especially when there's a large amount of light reflecting off the armor. What about dark lighting conditions? Some people have trouble distinguishing between blue and green when it's dark, for example.

This is why you don't work in the video game industry.

HOT TAKE: Nidhoggartfags are the Meleefags of Nidhogg.

You can also tell who is who by the big red nametag above the enemy's head along with the bullets flying towards you. Not to mention all of your teammates being highlighted on the map and whenever you see them.

You're a fucking retard.

...

Meleefags complain based on gameplay, though.
I don't think I've ever met a meleefag who thought smash 4 looked bad from an artistic perspective.

Not very. A character can have a very good design but be drawn as if the artist were hitting the bottle hard and it can still turn out okay. What Nidhogg 2 has going on is that the character designs are god awful and the direction in which those designs are brought to life make it even worse.

>demanding that the player rely on UI elements for enemy identification
I bet you like Overwatch.

>SJWVerse reaction image
opinion discarded

If you can't tell between both than you shouldn't be playing those games in the first place.

That's why Dishonored is my GotD.

No one will argue it has amazing graphics but that art direction is fucking Elder God-tier.

>the designers have to add other elements in order to immediately recognize enemy/ally teams

you already fucked up.

How about red and orange then? Fuck it, throw yellow into the mix.
Desaturated red, orange and yellow enemies. At a distance. In a dark environment. You think that's a good idea, do you?

This is why you don't work in the video game industry.

Choose the ones you like

P and everything Z

Aesthetic is infinitely more important than graphical fidelity.

>Desaturated red, orange and yellow enemies. At a distance.

There are games that do this with no problem.

>In a dark environment

There are no games that do this and if they do they add ways to compensate for it.

Stop making up generalizations to support your claim, that doesn't work. In reality there are many variables that affect how enemy detection works, especially depending on the game itself.

>This is why you don't work in the video game industry.

Follow your own advice and never make a game.

>Dev thinks that everyone played Nidhogg for "lol randumb XD"
>Dev thinks people likes screaming
>Dev decides to focus on these aspects to sell out to the youtube crowd

>There are no games that do this
The entire Halo series does.
Dark environments with long sight lines aren't uncommon. Pic related, Waterworks from Halo 2.
Hence why it uses oversaturated team colors so you can tell the difference between them even at a distance.

This is why you don't work in the video game industry.

D, H, X, ZL, and ZM

g, p, z, zb, zc,ze & zk
mostly the first two

Don't fucking talk about my waifu like that

probably the third most important thing behind gameplay and music

with good art direction, anything can look good no matter how strong or weak the graphics are

e, g, n, v, zb, ze, zh. zj

What are all these different colors for? Will they always be changing as you progress through your game, or are you only gonna use one?

i seriously regret having already used my best disgust reaction faces in other threads

Friendly reminder:
"I don't like that art direction" =/= "That art direction is bad"

looks like some kind of douchy bmx fag from the 24th century

I don't think I like any game with bad art. It can be simple, but it can't be bad.

I would actually like touhou if it looked like this.

>dem mutant lovecraftian tentacle whales
>dem barnacle monsters
>dat whole outsider vibe tho
>dem tallboys

art style is a big deal, but its important that it strikes a cord with people, and no one is buying nid 2, the artstyle is being universally shit on, so retard contrarians can defend it all they want, I guess

The most important part of art direction is that it compliments the gameplay. Nidhoog 2's art style is the complete opposite of that, in that it is overly cluttered and bulky in a game that demands clean visuals.

It's a fucking trainwreck.

Lucas Pope is that you?

anyway, d, e, f, g, p, y, zg, zh, a

This, it really clashes with the core philosophy and tone of Nidhogg. The art style would have worked a lot better with something like Mount Your Friend or some other relaxed YouTube bait game.

I will never touch a God Eater or Gears of War game because think they look ugly.

Overwatch wouldn't be on the radar without its art direction.

...

That game looks decent and certainly better than 90% of pixel-art games that are popular on Cred Forums. I don't get all the commotion.

Pretty important. A game with great art direction can still look pretty good years later even if it's not the most technically impressive in terms of graphics.

...

>That game that everyone tells you is amazing but you never played because the artstyle seriously turns you off
What's her name, Cred Forums?

That looks pretty fucking rad actually.

Will halo 5 ever come to pc?

Jesus Christ, what a fuck up. How could they have so completely misunderstood why the visuals in the original worked well? It's a game where you need to be able to see minute changes instantly, and yet they gave it the most obnoxious & cluttered art ever. What the actual fuck?

Because they made the player characters goofy and not xXXCloydSephiroth99. The art is fine on a technical level, it's just some people expected a different style that panders to their Korean tier vanity.

T. Sensitive Christian Fuck Boi

>That game that everyone tells you is amazing
Everyone apparently has shit taste.

Are you specifically referring to the orignal BoI? Rebirth's art style is far better in my opinion.

Much more so than the graphics themselves.
Gameplay>Art direction>Music>Story>Graphics

The game just looks gross.

uncanny

I think that he's trying to say that the art is garbage, not that the art is offensive.

Thanks for the reply, but next time, could you try actually reading my post?
If it still has that ugly fuckstick for a main character, I'm not interested.

I'M ANIME ALL OVER SHITBAG

>you are a weeb if you don't want your characters to have dick noses

Incredibly. It's the thing that defines if a game will look good in 10 years.

Where are the JUST edits?

what art direction?

g, j, p, zb, zg, and zh.

But dick noses are CHARMING and QUIRKY

You do realize that him calling you a weeb is no different than you blindly dismissing all games that feature tumblr noses, right?

Very important. Team Fortress 2 is specifically so good for me because all the characters fit the universe and look cool and act cool and visually fit their roles. Of course that has changed a little over the years, but the nohats mod makes much of it better

More than gameplay

windwalker is a mix of clean, solid textures and low polygons that translate really well into higher resolutions. not discounting its godteir aesthetic ,however
Its the same reason pre-drawn sprites look like shite in higher res compared to vector pixel, which end up being really small instead of blurry as fuck

I don't know what this says about any of us but I found it interesting

>People actually disliked how this game looks

Yeah, they were pretty upset with it because it was such a visual departure from the previous game in the series.

Sound familiar?

Not necessary

I mean, it's a departure, but it's not unappealing to look at.

Link is still Link, not some fat green monster.

I thought Cred Forums was kidding.

How is this allowed?

i was more upset with the sailing which felt like, and was, huge fucking filler. more than that, the "wind" mechanic railroads you a huge chunk of the game since you can only go where the arrow points. they tried going for this openworld shit but it functioned the same as it would have without stupid fucking sailing making it so fucking boring. i also disliked the art style at first, but i was younger and just thought it looked stupid coming from majora's mask

Maybe they shouldn't have cockteased a Zelda game that looked mindblowing for it's time with something so radically different

It's all about how you do it and when you do it.

youtube.com/watch?v=SvE3yJv3fm0 Blame this for the backlash

this is the kind of retard edgelord that loves isaac.

Solid art direction helps solidify the kind of atmosphere that the developers are going for. Nidhogg 2 is a good example of this, because the new artstyle tries to solidify the game as goofy and silly, while the previous artstyle seemed to more easily convey the gameplay with its smooth animations and simplicity compared to the bouncing blobs of this new game.

Shut up retard

Second to gameplay in importance.

Shit's fucking gross, my nigga.

will you fuck off already? youre not even gonna finish your shit so quit shilling

n reminds me of a western and a reminds me of murasame castle

i would still prefer something NOT extremely lazy and cheap, such as actually texturing the ground and buildings so it looks like an actual place and not an artsy indie shit game

This is such a shitty fucking argument. Look at all the shooters on the market, "competitive" or otherwise. CSGO, Siege, Overwatch, Call of Duty, Battlefield -- not a single one goes to the lengths you describe to make team models more distinguishable.

>This is why you don't work in the video game industry.
Shut the fuck up.

Read the rest of the reply chain before replying, thanks.
Other games don't have environments like Halo does: Most importantly, every single game you just mentioned only has two teams. Halo can have up to eight teams, so providing a very simple way to tell the difference between them, even at a distance in dark environments, is very important.

That looks awesome
Is that halo or some actually gundam weeb shit?

People need to realize real life armors and uniforms are as much about look as its utility
It was the case of winged soldiers of medieval times as much as some modern black full mask with no features riot suppression suits

>b-but what about colourblind people!
Literal sjw mentality

So where did it all go wrong?

he washed the suit too much the color faded

All look good except 4's shoulder pads

Edmund MacMillian's style and humor really hasn't progressed from Dead Baby Dressup.

I like the black-green contrast, 4 looks too muddy.

>Other games don't have environments like Halo does
Simply having colored suits that clash with their backgrounds is enough for that.

When's the last time you played any pre-343 Halo and had any difficulty telling between a red, orange and yellow guy? It wasn't fucking hard, in any situation, unless you're legitimately blind.

Fuck, man, Overwatch and Siege have literally ZERO difference in models between teams, and people still manage. I guarantee you nobody was begging 343 to make it easier to tell between a blue guy and a red guy. On top of that, you're not going to see competitive play in eight-team matches. It's a party game mode, so factoring the number of teams into the equation is pointless.

he has hooves in halo 4 what the fuck

>How important is Art Direction in Videogames?
Depends how much focus the developer puts on it.
Like in this case it's very important considering it was worth making the game incoherent and unplayable.

I still haven't played WoW because I find the art direction hideous.

>Simply having colored suits that clash with their backgrounds is enough for that.
Exactly. That's my entire point. By having vibrant, brightly colored suits, it's easy to distinguish enemy player, both from each other, and from the environment. But doing something like just fucks all that up.

No, that's not your point. The point you've been trying to make is that the colors have to be abrasively over-saturated. Are you telling me you can't look at the top picture in that post and see where the blue guys are and where the red guys are?

overdesign is halo 4s biggest issue

>Game based around frenetic and silly violence has an artstyle based on cartoons featuring frenetic and silly violence

It got better?

Blows my mind anybody would think Power Ranger armors is the better looking one.

this
i like my graphics like i like my gameplay, straight out of 1995

no... wait...

Not a big fan of the armor design, but I would 100% play a Nidhogg game with this level of graphical detail.

Definitely, and it's very present when comparing the armor sets here

>the suit in 4 is better than the suit 3
Fuck off 343 industries!

Can't argue with what works

Why so mad?

Anyways, there will be texture work in the game. It will only be shown in the front layer, though. That way, areas out of immediate reach (too far away to care about them during combat) won't take as much attention. And it also helps keep that 2D fog lagers style

0

all that matters is the gameplay
if a game can't stand on its own with its gameplay it's not truly a game.

art direction, story, music, wtv are just really irrelevant aspects that should be as important as the cover of the game.

Never even played Halo, so I can say without that bias I like Halo 2's appearance the most.

"Video" is one half of "video game" for a reason.

>game with minimalist graphics is able to convey the frenetic and silly feeling through gameplay alone
>sequel changes its visuals to abandon all subtlety and hammer the point home, just in case you didn't get it the first time

Of course, it's the best one.

TF2 has stayed extremely popular for about a decade because of it's unique art style. Many games such as Limbo and Journey are only popular/known because of unique art style. People say that graphics don't matter, now matter how much they really do.

I don't get why anyone calls the first game "silly"
Since when are duels "silly"
Who the fuck is perpetuating this meme, that game was a hard core grounded fighting game.
Street fighter is silly bullshit compared to nidhogg, with it's thrown fireballs and retarded poses and animations, and I've never heard anyone describe street fighter as "silly"

Seconding that, also don't care about Halo. 1 looks like a Mc Donalds toy, 3 is too rounded, 4 is too low contrast.

the first one had the best gameplay though

Street fighter is silly

>Exaggerated animations with no smooth transitions
>Ludicrous amounts of blood
>Getting eaten by a flying worm when you win
Did you even play the game?

It's literally the only reason of why shitty franchises like Senran Kagura and Nepshit are still alive.
Nobody plays them because they genuinely think those are good games.

If those games had characters with realistic western-like designs nobody would even know they exist.

zi
za
x
w
n
h
f
Objectively the best because they don't sacrifice visibility.

Cars 90 years ago wored, wanna drive in one today?
I bet the 120 decibel engine, smell of gasoline and no suspension to break your ass apart will feel fucking awesome

New halo games shit on the old ones in art design, parobem is lack of solid direction due to overexpandure of the projects with weird inconsistent armor designs going way too far in form over function, idiotic gameplay decision that never to even be fully realized, rushed production values and campangs that never even come close to their potential (recent idea of Chef being the bad guy for once, that gets fucking dropped like a bag of dick and only exists in the marketing it seems) and bad writing

Nostalgia fags are the worst. Bungie Halo games were far from perfect, and werent as warmly received outside of first game mostly in press as people would like to pretend. Same As Bioshock 1 was fucking panned by users here and yet today is an beloved classic.

So blood is silly?

The only thing I'll give to you is the worm, which is a tiny part of the game considering fights last 20 minutes long and the worm scene lasts 3 seconds.

Honestly, I don't understand why they felt the need to change the art style. It was actually pretty serious and composed. Why go goofy and grotesque? Who saw pic related and thought "this looks like muppets?"

Honestly I'd probably be fine with this new style without the context of Nidhogg 1, but Nidhogg 1 happened and looked good. Why throw that all away?

>So blood is silly?
You didn't see the world ludicrous? Or do you think Mortal Kombat is a super serious series as well?

It's the protagonist in a first person shooter, you literally don't see him outside of cutscenes

High contrast is only excusable if visibility is an issue

>Or do you think Mortal Kombat is a super serious series as well?
Mortal kombat is over the top, sure, but calling is silly is fucking retarded.

I'LL FUCK YOUR MOM IN THE ASS WITH A RAZOR DILDO

f, n, x, zc, zk, zl

"Sometimes"
More like all the time.

The new colors do look a lot better.

Still not good, but better.

Game?

fghjmlknopqrst zb zc zd zh
Hope you're that guy who said he's making his own niddhogg to capitalize on this stupidity, make sure to get the gameplay perfect and add a custom map maker

Tell this to Max Payne 3 or Uncharted 4 Was U4 animations good? I only saw some cutscenes, not the actual game

>Was U4 animations good?

This might be one of the dumbest questions iv seem all day, and I have been on Cred Forums for like 2 hours now

its Sony's flagship "graphics" game, what the fuck do you think?

The only thing naughty dog is good at is animations, their games are mostly cutscenes interspersed with shit stealth and cover-based shooting.

Sorry user, I'm not. I'm making a game with Dark Souls exploration and level design, more interesting combat and movement, and cool unrealistic graphics. Think Medievil, Psychonauts, Jak 2...

Oh no that sounds terrible, bad luck user.

Crucial to the success of the game but only moderately important for gameplay centric gamers(aka real gamers), they want the game to look nice but they don't give a fuck if it doesn't and would play in ASCII if the gameplay were still good.

>Why go goofy and grotesque?
Youtube and streamers love wacky shit
Youtube and streamers playing means more people know your game
More people knowing your game means more sales

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Well good luck user, I'll probably never play your game until 10 years from now but I'll probably enjoy it.

What the FUCK is this

Where's his dick?

ez money when Pewdiepie sinks his teeth into this shit

...

I suck with letters, can someone compose a well-written letter we can send to advise PDP NOT to play the game?

I don't think they should be getting free sales off of him purely for making the artstyle pander to his audience.

can not unsee

the "copy team fortress 2 muddy textures and add cuhrazy characters with no relation to each other" art direction? smart monkey! xD

Overwatch's art direction was pretty carefully made and everything in it was made to appeal to the lowest common denominator, even at the expense of a congruent character cast.

thats

thats not nighogg 2, is it

Sounds neat, got a blog or a name for it?

>even at the expense of not having a congruent character cast.
What I meant to say.

This games entirely leans on it's style and executed so perfectly.
I was looking to forgive the flaws purely just on how fucking good it looks.

peep this
youtube.com/watch?v=hxuNF4WMK5s

Darksiders, every blizzard game except for maybe starcraft, ray-man, world ends with you, a lot of final-fantasy games, Jak & daxter, Ratchet and clank are the ones that come to mind now.
There's a ton more for me though, i can get annoyed at visual stuff very quickly.

4 MB image limit is fucking cancer, Moot was a fucking idiot to let this slant eyed gook run the place.

What are some games with art styles you prefer?

I cant be the only one who see this, can i?

He barely plays games anymore, I doubt he's gonna be interested in it.

why

WHY

WHY WOULD YOU RUIN THE PERFECTLY SIMPLE YET DETAILED ART DESIGN OF THE FIRST GAME THAT PERFECTLY COMPLIMENTS THE STYLISH BUT QUICK AND BRUTAL GAMEPLAY

WHY WOULD YOU MAKE EVERYTHING GOOFY FOR NO FUCKING REASON WHEN NOBODY FOUND HUMOR IN THE ACTUAL CONTENT OF THE GAME BUT THE SITUATIONS THAT COULD OCCUR FROM IT

ARE THESE IMBECILES TRYING TO INTENTIONALLY PRODUCE SOMETHING THAT LOOKS LIKE SHIT FOR MEME POINTS

IM FUCKING MAD

Quite.

Kill yourself, gogem.
You're a retard.

Weren't the artists from Darksiders ex-artists of Blizzard or something like that?

yeah but he was saying it had good art direction. all the characters feel like the respective token black guy's of every group. strong womyn (but lol! shes a racist!), gaymer gyrl, smart gorilla, fat asian, all the outliers they could think of just to make anyone who plays any of them feel special or some shit. the game mixes cowboys with space cyborg ninjas and in no way has good art direction, in fact it is directionless

Neither yet. It's a project that I work on alone in my free time (when I'm not working on other game projects, kek)
I don't have any reason to rush it, so it will probably take me 2? more years to finish it.
Cred Forums is good at telling when things are shit, so I sometimes post it here, to test the waters. If I ever make a blog, you'll learn about it here, so don't worry

I am still confused over the lighting

>valkyrie
>not shield maiden
For what reason

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Not as important as gameplay but more important than everything else save sound design. Art direction managed to get me through some games like Remember Me and Fragile Dreams even though the gameplay wasn't quite up to snuff.

c, l, x, za, and zm

>green
>green
>green
>brown
I think we all know where it got fucked up.

I wouldn't be surprised.

I always liked the way resident evil and silent hill games looked, especially the later games had pretty great stylized characters that still had elements that gave them a grounded feel (mostly by giving them tasteful imprefections such as slightly pale skin, visible pores, slightly bloodshot eyes. Architecture and interior felt very tactile or something.

Darksouls was great because it looks kinda generic fantasy if you give it a quick glance, but it starts to fuck with your expectations the longer you stick with it. The more fantastic, grand and horror inspired enemies and environments really felt extra special this way. Like a dream were some elements are familiar daily leftovers mixed in with more surreal elements.
Jet set radio and JSRF were wonderful.
Dead space1 and 2 could be considered generic alienesque stuff, but the brass looking armours of Isaac were crazy cool looking and different to me. I was kinda dissapointed in the more standard combat suits of 2, but i warmed up to them.
N64 era mario and zelda games(this is partly major nostalgia-induced, but whatever)
While a shit game with a more generic "realistic" artstyle, Kane and lynch 2 kinda stood out. I haven't played a game yet with an artstyle that made me feel that kind of levels of cultureshock and general misery. The handicam filter looked very genuine(even though it didn't really help the gameplay)
Madworld.
F-zero series. (mostly the characters from X)
A lot of campy 90's shit, including quake 1,2 and 3 and doom are a guilty pleasure of mine (pic related).
While i never actually played any fightan, Darkstalkers or vampire and a few other series had amazing designs.

I'm forgetting a ton right now.

>everyone complains about gamedevs being lazy and using "meme pixels" instead of actual pixelart
>meme pixel game upgraded to actual stellar pixelart
>RRRRREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Bretty good taste and reasoning my mango.

>actual stellar pixelart
If it didn't look like shit nobody would complain.
All it's going to do is muddle up very sensitive combat, and everybody knows this.
Stop being an apologist, you don't own messhof any favors.

It's pretty good but the character and snake sprites look too goofy.

nidhogg 1 already had good pixel art though due to its fluid animation and intentional design. anyone who disagrees is more often than not a memeing chucklefuck

2 just looks like ass because it runs in contrast to the first game's clean, simple, and effective aesthetics for the sake of forced humor to appeal to the youtube crowd that ate the game up in the first place

Shut your dumb mouth, you blind shit.

Look at this picture.

Now compare

N looks like it would be best for actual gameplay.

>gradients

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa its worse

Both of these look terrible to me.

Beautiful, you can smell the wafting breeze of sakura blossoms amongst the tinges of hot steel clashes.
>HURR DURR HOMER SIMPSON SMAAASH
>'member neverhood? 'member clay fighters? member the simpsons? I 'member!
I honestly can't even tell what the fuck is going on in that image, why is he standing on lava?

>vignetting
what is this, no man's sky?

Fucking autists, all of you.

Hello?

When 343 took over

>those portraits on the wall
>the bottom portrait implying they were nipple simpson humans the whole time

What are you doing to get those different looks, is it all in the shaders?

>1278116722086.jpg
Hello newfag, that's "laughing elf man.jpg"

You should probably ensure things are named properly to avoid being spotted and called out for your newfaggotry in the future.

Extremely.

kek

That's Roy from Don't Hug Me I'm Scared

>kek
The only corruption of "lol" accepted here is "lulz" since "kek" is a WoW meme, and WoW used to be permabanned here.

That's twice in the same thread you've fucked up

I actually like the graphics and art for N2, but I feel like it's going to change the tone too much, and it's a change for the worse. The first one didn't need over-the-top goofy graphics to be hilarious, I feel like this will just distract from what the game is really about.

lel

Filtered

Yup. Here I made a post asking for help, and then explaining what I did
forum.unity3d.com/threads/cartoony-fog-depth-sobel-based.433042/

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When halo got less about the fate of the universe and more about the Master Chief.

Man this is a really great example of how tone and dissonance in tone can be used to great effect; the contrast between the understated graphics of Nidhogg 1 compared to the silliness of the situations that arise while playing it and the endgoal of feeding yourself to a giant worm.

It's also a great example of how much of Cred Forums is retarded and thinks that one silly element means the entire tone is 'silly' and that internal consistency and anything else like that has no place. If you have magic in your game and you can shoot fireballs clearly it's fine to arm the main character with a dildo and have them speak in jokes from the 80s.

very nice, user, seems useful for more stylized effects, will definitely steal

and his sidekick turned lover, Cortana

Please do not misuse the Lazuli.

That's pillow shading, indie devs love putting this in their game for some reason.

g > p > zh
I dont care to rate the rest

I thought lets playing is a (thankfully) dying trend, hence why PewDiePie opted out of it and followed suit by doing the snarky youtube drama bullshit.
Why do devs favor L'EPIC RANDOMÉ VISAGE?

Good! Here's the node graph, in case it helps (the skybox has its own material)

is it dying? maybe they didn't get the memo

gmae?

What's different about the gameplay? It looks exactly the same from the webm I've seen.

on his face

Different weapons and hopefully proper online functionality

I think consistency is almost more important than quality (once you reach a certain base level)

Actually I fucked up. The values should look more like this, sorry

its actually improved with the head removed, thats fucking sad

I hate to be that guy, but can you fuck off to /agdq/ or something? This thread isn't even close to being an appropriate place to shill your game.

Is it just me, or do the hitboxes look kind of wonky? In the original it was really easy to tell if you were stabbing someone, but this seems too muddled for the speed.

Art direction is immensely important. Even if your game is technically impressive for the time, if it looks ugly, it will start out looking ugly and only get worse.

Look at Wind Waker, a game that clearly put a lot of thought into its art direction. It's utterly timeless.

>The only corruption of "lol" accepted here is "lulz"
No.

lulz is eternally associated with chanology, the biggest pile of cancer this site has known.

Sorry I'm not exactly putting this together as we talk, this is of the inspector what is this supposed to be changing in the actual shader

I'm not sure I understand. The second picture are the shader "public variables". You modify them in real time, and they change how the object looks

>Thread about art direction
>Show art direction
>user says he likes it
>Show him how it is done
>waahh booh, stop talking about game art guys!
If you don't like it, just ignore it. I still contributed more to this thread with those "shill" posts than you with your whining

I beg to differ.

Right, worded it odd in my post but that's what I was getting at, cheers mate.

not him but I am pretty sure it's Flywrench

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Nigger why the fuck would you chose the shittiest comparison?

>Stupid helmet particle effects
>ugly as fuck forge world map

There are so many better pics to highlight Reaches grittier military sci-fi aesthetic, did you show off the ugly as cosmetics to make a point?

There's also Halo games that did art direction better than Reach.

>and I've never heard anyone describe street fighter as "silly"

It's fucking vital and I'll tell you why using the Nidhogg example.

The problem with the new artstyle is that it looks much worse, matter of fact the backgrounds do look nicer, but the characters themselves look stupid. When the player sees them, the illusion that you are controlling a super skilled warrior that can kill in one hit is instead replaced with the image of naked idiots stabbing at each other. It goes from an exciting and dramatic setting to wacky hijinks between retards and it zaps all tension out of the gameplay.

When you have no tension you drain a lot of energy out of skillful plays AND from humorous accidents too. You turn them from the remarkable into the uninteresting because it feels like the character you are playing is far too dumb for any deliberate show of skill; too stupid not to fuck up their combat.

>everyone on the team agreed on this design
This is why fuckers focus group test shit.

Am I the only one who thinks that the new art style looks like it took less effort than the original?

The original actually had nuances and is based on actual fighting stances and choreography, the new one makes the fighters look like retards.

Salt and Sanctuary

That art makes me cringe so hard. Its like a guy made a bunch of fanfiction raymen OC and put it all in to a dark souls rip off.

if your video game isn't fun to look at then you've done something wrong

a shit game with amazing art direction is still worth playing (see: alice madness returns)

b,c,d,e,g,j,k,m,p,x,ze,zh,a

r8 my taste

Federation Force looked more shitty for how slow paced and clunky the gameplay footage appeared, family.

Whoever drew this forgot to censor the Nobashi.

A good artstyle won't make a shitty game any better.

A bad artstyle can make a good game shittier though.

The naginata might be a girl's weapon but the Nobashi is also wearing a delicious taco as a hat.
I think letting her in was the right decision.

>that smooth, elegant neckbreak animation now a stupid clunky repeated headstomp
Even if the art didn't piss me off, this would.

Not bad.
My favorites are a,c,g,h,i,n,p,q,s,t,x,z,zb,zj,zm
These are the results so far

Focus group testing could easily be to blame, if they asked a bunch of youtube tots.

Note that "everyone in the team" means, the developer, his girlfriend (who got the artist) and the artist who made it

very

Now that I know what Nidhogg 2 is going to look like, this render makes me upset and sad.

>Beautiful, you can smell the wafting breeze of sakura blossoms amongst the tinges of hot steel clashes.

f,j,n,y,z-zm

What monster you going for user?

I want a Peco.

I want all of them

But barroth, nerscylla, and zamtrios are high on the list

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Oh yea, I want a Barroth too.

>that backwards hand on the right pic

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Im gonna skip all the explaining and just say that nidhogg 2 looks fuckin awful. Cant believe someone was saw the first nidhogg and thought "man this should look more like Cool Spot for the Amiga". Is there a carbon monoxide leak at their studio?

Probably one of the most important things in regards to any visual media.
However, a lot of it affects people on a subconscious level so the average consumer usually doesn't even realize how important it is to their taste.

B, g, n and p.

>thousand year war between knights, vikings, and samurai
>WAH WAH GIRLS AREN'T REALISTIC
People have weird standards.

They can make a huge difference, especially in competitive games where color and lighting are crucial for assessing enemies and having the information needed to make good decisions.

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Wheres the part about the pink colored cosmetics and the pony hats?

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>Sometimes art direction is more important than actual graphical quality
>Sometimes
>Some
>times

no. Always and forever. Why even entertain that notion in the first place? Of course it's more important.

just look at the countless EarlyAccess shit that has dynamic-everything and the latest and greatest 4K textures and autisticaly-crafted assets with more detail than you could ever ask for, yet they all look like shit.

>Look at Wind Waker
>It's utterly timeless.
Stop it with this meme, it looks like ass.

b, c, e, f, g, j, n, o, q, w,x, y, za, zb, zg, zh, zi, zj, zk, zm, a

>pussy and nepotism
Winning combo every time.Alright, he can still salvage this. It's not a big deal.

If he was smart, he would ship the game with several model skins. Use the traditional game as the base, then do stupid clay crap as an option. Then add some steam workshop faggotry and allow people to create and share their own skins for the game.

I'd be shocked if they didn't release it with multiple character models..

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