Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap • Hacker News Board

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#451

Post by eropple » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:11 PM UTC

zimpenfish wrote: post #416

eropple wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know JV's numbers, but I know mine and a high-quality visual artist who speaks fluent/first-language English and has the sort of willingness to play nice with others' art can be $50/hour. And for a game like these, you're talking quite a few hours, you know? You can go offshore for cheaper, but then you introduce risk, and if nothing else, JV's model is to minimize risk as much as is possible.

> I don't know JV's numbers http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2009/03/so-heres-how-many-gam... covers "Geneforge 4: Rebellion" (tl;dr: average performer, $120k budget, almost in the black after 3 years.)

I recall that post (I've been a fan of JV's work, and his blog, for a long time!) but that's ten years old now and the market has gotten more competitive. I think that post is actually pre-Steam, though might push it the other way--I recall that he did really well for himself early on after going to Steam.

He has a really good GDC talk that goes into more detail and might shed light on why he operates the way he does: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stxVBJem3Rs

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#452

Post by usrusr » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:13 PM UTC

mcv wrote: post #147

Sometimes 'better-but-not-good-enough' is a trap. That's basically what Jeff Vogel is saying about moving up from his poor inconsistent art to slightly better art, but it's also how I feel about moving up from ascii characters to his style of "crappy" art. AdoM is a fantastic roguelike created by Thomas Biskup, which originally had you as an '@' battling other ascii characters. Later he wanted a nicer interface and w…

"Better could be worse" resonates well with what I was thinking reading the article:

Ever since punk, and possibly longer, recorded music has a growing number of niches where lack of polish is a feature, not a bug. Liking stuff that others find unlikable makes the consumer feel special. All kinds of guitar noise, the absolute undanceability of IDM, cheesy pop music from an country far away. They all have their qualities, but if you infer from some people enthusiastically defying the superficial shortcomings of those styles that their redeeming qualities must be exceptionally high, you are missing the entire niche identity appeal mechanism: they are liked, in a large part, for being disliked by most others, nothing more. Try to move closer to mainstream (here: add better graphics) and you might alienate your acquired taste connoisseurs long before you start appealing to others.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#453

Post by eropple » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:15 PM UTC

ac29 wrote: post #427

eropple wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know JV's numbers, but I know mine and a high-quality visual artist who speaks fluent/first-language English and has the sort of willingness to play nice with others' art can be $50/hour. And for a game like these, you're talking quite a few hours, you know? You can go offshore for cheaper, but then you introduce risk, and if nothing else, JV's model is to minimize risk as much as is possible.

Their current game raised just shy of $100k on Kickstarter [0]. Presumably there have been additional presales via other platforms such as Steam as well. Given that, $10-20k as an art budget doesn't seem unreasonable to me, though I have no idea how to estimate how long it would take to do the art for one of his games and if that would be enough budget (probably not at $50/hour, but maybe at $25-30/hour). [0] https:/…

$100K is more like $93K after Kickstarter's cut. Further, I can't speak to the tax implications though I would assume they're nontrivial. And he has to pay himself enough to live for a year or more to get the game done and out the door.

This stuff is really raw and really hard at the margins and tolerances we are talking about here.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#454

Post by pawelmurias » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:19 PM UTC

johnnyanmac wrote: post #296

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 don't really see the problem. The game may be a nightmare for developers in this theoretical scenario but if the major bugs get kinked out then the audience doesn't care. I guess it's the same case here. The art isn't as if the entire art pipeline was MS Paint so most people who don't mind graphics may at worst just put up with it for the gameplay they expect from Vogels games.

It's worse than MS Paint.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#455

Post by GhostVII » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:22 PM UTC

I largely agree with the post, but using "Baba is you" as an example I think actually goes against the authors point. The art in "Baba is you" is very simple, and would likely not take much money to create, yet the game still looks very nice (in my eyes, at least). It uses simple graphics very effectively, while the author seems to use more complex graphics, and as a result the game as a whole actually looks worse and less consistent.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#456

Post by felipemnoa » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:24 PM UTC

Richard_East wrote: post #332

LoSboccacc wrote: post #319

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's more of a taste problem than a budget problem, plenty games go low fi and are amusing both to play and look at, i.e. Celeste

Specifically its more of an art direction problem. If you have an artist with decent technical skills, enough time, and an excellent art director, you can still achieve great results. Eventually that Artist will learn and become better in what they independently produce. Plus, the art is visible through a camera, and with post-processing and FX - which are easily controlled or influenced by that same art director. Ju…

It looks awesome! Best of luck.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#457

Post by crooked-v » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:24 PM UTC

nothis wrote: post #336

I'm super happy that games that look and feel like those from Spiderweb Software exist. I think it's charming. But the fact that he feels compelled to write an article in defense of the art style is telling to me. I think it's not unreasonable to answer the headline question with "because they're stubborn". Their games look crap, not because of a lack of resources but because of a disrespect for visual design (it's n…

I seem to recall stubbornness being the key reason behind the creator refusing to use Steam or other storefronts for so long, too, even though doing so made sales go up substantially.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#458

Post by crooked-v » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:31 PM UTC

ebg13 wrote: post #141

Oh man. This thread is really something else. Like...for miles in every direction, all I can see are pitchforks, and here I am standing alone on a small hill thinking to myself "Holy shit. That's the Spiderweb software guy. I've played every single one of his games, EVERY SINGLE ONE, and loved all of them." The graphics in the games are exactly as good as they need to be to make wonderful story-driven RPGs.

> The graphics in the games are exactly as good as they need to be

I feel like "exactly as good as they need to be" would actually be quite a bit simpler and, through lack of clutter, easier to use. See, for example, the Caves of Qud art style - https://i.imgur.com/Tul3mn3.png - which is substantially less visually complex than any of the Spiderweb Software games but, IMO, much easier to interpret.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#459

Post by eridius » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:32 PM UTC

eropple wrote: post #447

eridius wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the Exile III version of the Realmz graphics What do you mean by this? I miss Realmz¹, and until today didn't realize that the developer of Realmz was also the publisher of the Exile series. But I still can't figure out what "the Exile III version of the Realmz" graphics is referring to. ¹My ringtone is actually the Realmz outdoor theme.

Spiderweb Software and the Realmz folks collaborated to buy an art set, which became the Exile III graphics (and fans kinda just call them "the Realmz graphics"). They were then (somewhat) modified and backported to Exile I and II in ways that didn't always work great, which became the Exile I/II versions of those graphics.

Ah, interesting. I loved the heck out of the Exile games but I was unaware of details like this. I didn't even realize Exile I/II got graphics updates.

Re: Why All of Our Games Look Like Crap

#460

Post by haolez » Thu, Aug 22, 2019, 9:32 PM UTC

zapzupnz wrote: post #428

ebg13 wrote: post #141

Oh man. This thread is really something else. Like...for miles in every direction, all I can see are pitchforks, and here I am standing alone on a small hill thinking to myself "Holy shit. That's the Spiderweb software guy. I've played every single one of his games, EVERY SINGLE ONE, and loved all of them." The graphics in the games are exactly as good as they need to be to make wonderful story-driven RPGs.

It's not my understanding that having a fond nostalgia for somebody's works excuses the article's salty tone that basically tells people they're wrong for thinking the games are ugly, coming up with all manner of excuses but never once embracing that the problem is entirely the developer's own and nobody else's; yes, that point is laid out there but it's given as an excuse, not as a justification. There's a fine line…

He is not saying that everyone is wrong. He is saying that some people like it, most people don't, and the ones that do like it are enough to keep his business afloat.