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Game engines as an art form

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Re: Game engines as an art form

#11

Post by boppo1 »

whateveracct wrote: post #9
dragontamer wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Team Shanghai Alice / Zun (aka: that one crazy developer) does all his own artwork, music, and programming for the Touhou series. A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. --------- I don't know if gaming is the "ultimate" form of art. And no one is going to say that Zun's art or…

Full stack ownership of a game is what can make it truly good art imo. AAA games have art in them (the assets made by individuals), but the entire pieces are less art than product after being ground to completion by an org chart.

I think Arkane, Looking Glass, and iOi have come pretty close. This is coming from an experienced oil painter and novice programmer.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#12

Post by kello »

et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

This hits hard for me. The part about being in control especially.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#13

Post by bullen »

dragontamer wrote: post #5
bullen wrote: post #4

3D A&V multiplayer is the final medium/media. Game engines are the final craft. Programming is a higher art than painting or music.

Team Shanghai Alice / Zun (aka: that one crazy developer) does all his own artwork, music, and programming for the Touhou series. A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. --------- I don't know if gaming is the "ultimate" form of art. And no one is going to say that Zun's art or…

The definition of art is somewhat hard to find, but to me an artist excels in his/her field. The trick here is to see value, a painting or song has only consumption value, it produces nothing except feelings that in turn can materialize.

Programming is the weave of everything digital, like the matrix glyphs it can describe all, be all, modify all. It rules all crafts by an infinite amount. As a single programmer in a 3D multiplayer system, you become god.

The truly amazing game makers like Pixel f.ex (Cave Story) are not incredible because they can make graphics, music and code. But because they actually manage to release code that works while being good at graphics and music. The rare skill is programming, not drawing or music.

99% of programmers don't take resposibility for their creations long term, including John Carmack and Tim Sweeney!

So it's a trifecta: Be creative (discover things nobody did before), manage to release live products that work, take responsibility = work on your own.

The most underrated skill in human history is this kind of programming, eventually it will become the only skill worth having until all energy has depleted. Then we're back to sticks, stones and cave drawings! :D

Re: Game engines as an art form

#14

Post by zackmorris »

I miss working on my C++ game engine with my old business partner. We got so far with it, all the way to cross-compiling stuff like Ogg Theora/Vorbis video and audio playback around the time the iPhone arrived. Maybe a dozen rather large frameworks, before stuff like CocoaPods. Which provided us with a bare-metal environment, kind of a Unity for 2D gaming with blitters and basic OpenGL quad rendering.

Unfortunately, a game engine can only get as big as planned obsolescence dictates. Apple especially, deprecates stuff on what feels like a 2-3 year cycle. So just when we'd think we were done, another module in our engine would require refactoring because the system framework it depended on got axed. Not to mention that Xcode has reached such a level of burden on developers, compared to anything in web development, that I could no longer endorse it. I got tired of rewriting code for the eleventeenth time and called it quits around 2010.

The prime directive of game engines IMHO is to not make a single direct system call. Go through a layer like SDL, or you'll never get free of maintenance.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#15

Post by munificent »

et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

Are you me?

I spent much of my childhood working on a tabletop RPG with my brother. Then decades later working on and off on various gamedev projects.

I used to beat myself up for never finishing anything. Only with therapy over the past couple of years did it finally click for me that many times these projects were escapes. The point was not to finish them so that the were a safe place I could retreat to when my life felt uncontrolled and chaotic.

I was absolutely using it unknowingly to self-medicate. I still do so—I literally just took a break from hacking on my fantasy console project to check HN—but I'm a lot more mindful of my motivations now. It's OK to want some escapism now and then. Certainly with the pandemic, it's entirely reasonably to want a space where one feels they have some control because we sure as shit don't have control over COVID.

But I try to make sure I'm not using it as an unhealthy way to avoid chaos that I should be tackling.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#16

Post by munificent »

dragontamer wrote: post #5
bullen wrote: post #4

3D A&V multiplayer is the final medium/media. Game engines are the final craft. Programming is a higher art than painting or music.

Team Shanghai Alice / Zun (aka: that one crazy developer) does all his own artwork, music, and programming for the Touhou series. A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. --------- I don't know if gaming is the "ultimate" form of art. And no one is going to say that Zun's art or…

> A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing.

I'm reminded of a Tim Minchin quote where he said he isn't funny enough to be a comedian or gifted enough to be a musician, but he can be the funniest musician and the most musical comedian out there.

There's something to be said for having an interesting combination of skills even if you don't maximize any one of them.

I recently finished writing a giant book. I wrote it all, hand drew the illustrations, and typeset the whole thing. I'm not a particularly talented artist or designer, but I have the unique property of deeply understanding the source material. So even if the illustrations and layout aren't the best, they are informed by the source material in ways an outsourced designer wouldn't be able to do. When I draw a little diagram, I know which boxes to make biggest because the concepts they represent are the most complex. When I choose to split a snippet of source code across pages, I know where to split the code to be least disruptive.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#17

Post by moritonal »

et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

Reading this whilst waiting for Unity to finish importing.. yeah. It's my holiday, and a piece of me can comfortably think that I'm improving my skills, making something that might one-day sell for a bit of money, but realistically just cheers me up to make something pretty.

I guess you gotta ask yourself if it matters whether anyone else ever sees it.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#18

Post by dragontamer »

munificent wrote: post #16
dragontamer wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Team Shanghai Alice / Zun (aka: that one crazy developer) does all his own artwork, music, and programming for the Touhou series. A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. --------- I don't know if gaming is the "ultimate" form of art. And no one is going to say that Zun's art or…

> A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. I'm reminded of a Tim Minchin quote where he said he isn't funny enough to be a comedian or gifted enough to be a musician, but he can be the funniest musician and the most musical comedian out there. There's something to be said for hav…

Zun is a particularly cool example.

There are plenty of excellent artists out there. If your video games inspire them, you can have a large fan-base who can contribute fanworks... from (amateur) manga/comics and other online works, to fan art, and maybe even some professionals remixing your works (most noticeably in the music world for Zun, where professionals / dedicated musicians take his speedy tunes and add a more subtle flair to it)

The "Bad Apple" fanwork is a great example of how the fan community interacted with Zun (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkgK8eUdpAo). The shadow art was its own thing (though clearly based on Zun's characters / Touhou characters), but the song itself was a remix based from an earlier game (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNKyPkQ-_ug)... and professional level remixes to Bad Apple have entered the world.

---------

So Zun was "good enough" at art, music, and programming... but also did a great job at inspiring and leading the Touhou community / fanbase.

In many ways, the "game designer as commmunity leader" model is apparent. Braid, Touhou, Minecraft, and even Factorio all had community leaders and fan-growth that was superbly done.

The music / art of the Touhou community though really elevates that particular community into true artistry. Both of the classic kind (just straight up good drawings / music being made), as well as of the programming / interactive kind.

Re: Game engines as an art form

#19

Post by amelius »

et1337 wrote: post #2

> If you had asked me why I’d been so dedicated to developing the same game engine for so long, I probably wouldn’t have had a very good answer for you until somewhat recently. Perhaps I would have cracked a joke about game engine development being a basic human need for me, right up there with food, water, and oxygen, but obviously we all know that’s not a real answer. I was exactly this person for a long time. I to…

> I've realized that game development is a great coping mechanism to help you feel safe and in control.

Would this also work for, say, programming language and compiler design (which is also in a way about creating new, abstract worlds)?

Re: Game engines as an art form

#20

Post by HansHamster »

dragontamer wrote: post #18
munificent wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A lot of people joke that his artwork is sub-par and the music is repetitive, but frankly... the integration of all three into a single product / series of games is pretty amazing. I'm reminded of a Tim Minchin quote where he said he isn't funny enough to be a comedian or gifted enough to be a musician, but he can be the funniest musician and the most musical comedian out there. There's something to be said for hav…

Zun is a particularly cool example. There are plenty of excellent artists out there. If your video games inspire them, you can have a large fan-base who can contribute fanworks... from (amateur) manga/comics and other online works, to fan art, and maybe even some professionals remixing your works (most noticeably in the music world for Zun, where professionals / dedicated musicians take his speedy tunes and add a mor…

And the Touhou fanbase is really big both in Japan and outside. For music alone there are probably hundreds of artists and groups and there are lots of fan comics, videos, games, memes... the rabbit hole (no pun intended) goes really deep.
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