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Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

jeff-vogel.blogspot.com

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Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#281

Post by nimblegorilla »

billfruit wrote: post #165
scotty79 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me the actual message is that he doesn't have money to throw stuff at the wall and see what sticks, and he's not going to risk going into debt.

Yet some small developers have managed to build visually stunning games, like Brigadier. Enter The Gungeon, Stardew Valley, Dungeons Of The Endless, were all developed by very small teams.

> all developed by very small teams.

Key here is "teams". It's really hard for one person to bring all of those skills to the table.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#282

Post by castlecrasher2 »

meheleventyone wrote: post #9

Arrrgh, there are a lot of interesting and good points in the article but for the most part they miss the wood for the trees. The actual answer is that care isn't being taken to develop a style that looks good and meets his constraints. Jeff needs a good art director. The Ultima V and Baba is You examples are excellent counter-points because they show how great games with simple styles can look.

> Jeff needs a good art director.

The article can be summed into two points:

1) I'm not a good art director 2) Having better art is on my "won't do" list

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#283

Post by samlevine »

ChrisRR wrote: post #71

Unfortunately I think the graphics look like that typical windows 95 style game, where the lighting is inconsistent, the style is inconsistent, the colour choices are drab and the fonts are just the first default picks from MS word. There's a lot of work that needs to be done to pick a consistent style, because at the moment it's a mixture of everything and it all clashes.

That's my childhood you're making fun of! ;)

I wish more games look terrible in a 1995 kind of a way. Mostly for the sake of nostalgia, I loved playing crappy shareware games and terrible demos from floppy/CD magazines when I was a kid.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#284

Post by reidrac »

Goronmon wrote: post #214

I wonder what the sentiment would be if the situation was reversed. Here we have a developer effectively looking to pay below market rates for artists, and then unsurprisingly not finding many good artists willing to do that long term. Not a judgment on my part, just saying that he's looking to keep the art budget to an absolute minimum. Instead if it was an artist defending his choice to make relatively simple games…

I think you're right. I was thinking almost the same when I was reading the post.

Let me add that, in my opinion, there are more chances of a successful game if you're a competent artist with poor coding skills than the opposite. In fact, lots of solo projects succeed because the author is an artist that happens to be a half decent programmer.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#285

Post by Shorel »

magashna wrote: post #150
Aaargh20318 wrote: post #84

> People who grew up with Nintendo and Sega really like pixel art. As one of those people, I really don't like pixel art at all. Today's pixel art looks nothing like games did back in the day. The simple reason is that those Nintendo and Sega games weren't played on 27" 4k LCD monitors or 65" OLED TV's but on on the barely 14" CRT in my bedroom. We didn't have huge pixely sprites, they were small and blurry. It had a…

That era also had fantastic art in arcade games, so don't deny that things like Kim Kaphwan's pants exist https://www.resetera.com/threads/animation-excellence-a-eulo... I'd say today's pixel art generally doesn't hit the heights that it did in SF3 or some of the mid KoF games

That link has a fun and informative video.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#286

Post by PeterStuer »

freetime2 wrote: post #132
PeterStuer wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So we can't have opinions on public statements of people if they are 'successful'? The choices are his, but people can still have opinions and voice them. e.g. Jeff believes marginal revenue increases would not be enough to offset marginal expenses. Others have different opinions, and voice them as a response to a public blogpost. I see nothing wrong with that.

I updated my comment above to remove the negative reaction to the general HN sentiment. Of course anyone is free (and encouraged) to voice their opinions.

My comment above now no longer makes sense in he context of your edits, but I can't change it anymore.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#287

Post by ajuc »

systemtest wrote: post #207
Aaargh20318 wrote: post #84

> People who grew up with Nintendo and Sega really like pixel art. As one of those people, I really don't like pixel art at all. Today's pixel art looks nothing like games did back in the day. The simple reason is that those Nintendo and Sega games weren't played on 27" 4k LCD monitors or 65" OLED TV's but on on the barely 14" CRT in my bedroom. We didn't have huge pixely sprites, they were small and blurry. It had a…

For me, pixel art is a technical limitation. I don't see the point of romanticising a technical limitation. What limitation are we going to do next? Retro low-poly 3D models? A soundtrack consisting of six songs only? Distributing the game on 13 floppy disks? Games that never get updates? Low quality collision objects? Null-model cable multiplayer? game_demo.exe file download from CNET.com? Anti-piracy methods by hav…

Some limitations are very useful for creating innovative art styles.

If Muslim artists weren't restricted from painting people and animals they wouldn't create the decorative motives they created. If early sound chips in personal computers weren't restricted chiptune genre wouldn't be created. And you can certainly make art using restrictions that aren't enforced on you - restrictions often inspire people and make it easier to create.

That being said while I love chip tunes and I like some old games made with pixel art I don't particulary like it in the new games, but that's just my opinion, lots of people have different preferences.

Also from gamedev POV pixel art allowed many modern indie games to be created which wouldn't be created otherwise. That's a plus in my book.

> Low quality collision objects?

Funny that you mentioned this - some collision detection bugs in starcraft 2 were introduced on purpose to mimic bugs in starcraft 1 because these bugs increased the skill cap (people learnt to abuse them to get ahead of their opponents and community liked that because it was another thing you had to learn to master the game). See "mineral walk" :)

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#288

Post by meheleventyone »

scott_s wrote: post #185
meheleventyone wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jeff needs an art director doesn't imply anything more than that. It could be him, it could be another full time employee or it could be something he has a freelancer develop at the start of the project.

Jeff has an art director. And he likes what that art director produces. You don't, but he does.

I don't disagree with that at all and of course Jeff will do what he wants and is welcome to that. I just think the art direction is the encompassing unaddressed point that follows through the article despite the enumerated constraints. Also where he does touch on art direction the things he chooses to highlight are not why his games look bad. Particularly when he highlights games he grew up with like Ultima V which IMO still looks great despite being made with the constraints that existed in 1988. I'm also well aware that it hasn't prevented him running a successful business.

I don't think his liking his games art is a reason not to comment with my take on his blog post about it though.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#289

Post by mighty_bander »

Goronmon wrote: post #214

I wonder what the sentiment would be if the situation was reversed. Here we have a developer effectively looking to pay below market rates for artists, and then unsurprisingly not finding many good artists willing to do that long term. Not a judgment on my part, just saying that he's looking to keep the art budget to an absolute minimum. Instead if it was an artist defending his choice to make relatively simple games…

I hadn't noticed that angle, being fully invested in getting kids of my 256-color lawn. However, I feel a little more sympathetic towards Vogel; consistently making money in the games industry is borderline impossible. If, as he suggests early on, he is supporting a family with his small business, investing more than the absolute minimum in art, particularly when he has proven his business model, must look like a serious risk. Cheap art, and he knows he can recover from a failure; blow a lot of money on art, and the game sucks anyway, and he's finished, and has to go and get a day job, and post cantankerous comments on Hacker News during his lunch break. I wouldn't wish that on anybody.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#290

Post by pharke »

haversine02 wrote: post #41
glenvdb wrote: post #12

I think the problem is that the game is in Uncanny Valley. It's trying to achieve a certain level of detail/realism, but it's falling short of expectations. This might be completely intentional, to evoke a feel for games from an era that did the same thing, but comparing to Baba is You highlights the developer doesn't understand that. Baba is You has gone completely in the opposite direction in terms of graphical det…

The art doesn't even need more detail or realism, it just needs consistent detail. Even just a simple palettization/pixelation preprocessing for every sprite could be enough - https://i.imgur.com/oPH7paD.jpg

That is a surprisingly good result. It literally changed my perception of those screenshots from "that is some gross and sloppy artwork, I'm keeping my money" to "hey not bad, I might buy that"
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