Gaming artstyles

johnny_ultimate

Playing through Eternal Sonata at the moment, and can't help but be won over by its vibrant and stunning artstyle. Makes a change from the usual gritty and military styles developers seem to have gotten so fond of.

Do you think gaming has for the most part been very unoriginal in terms of art design compared to other media? Of course, there are some recent enough exceptions:

Okami: just amazing to look at.
Katamari: surreal, odd and instantly likable. See also Gregory Horror Show.
No More Heroes: not great technically, but the retro design and HUD in particular is fantastic.
Half-Life 2: stepping foot outside the station? Amazing.
Patapon / Loco Roco / Echochrome: Just mad.
MGS4: great art direction, the final battle in particular just looks exceptional. And pleasantly its realistic too.

But I kind of get the feeling these are exceptions. Anyone else have any favourite gaming artstyles, and do you feel a lot of developers just go for technical excellence rather than imagination and atmosphere?

K.O.Kiki

Gaming needs more cel-shading.

Also more purple, blues, reds, yellows... basically, the world IS NOT BLACK & BROWN. Sometimes I wish developers took more trips outside...

madrab

darwinia - awesome retro look

Mr E

I love the style of Zelda Windwaker and Phantom Hourglass. The upcoming Prince of Persia game looks stunning too.

And if Johnny hadn't metioned Okami, then I would have. Stunning, stunning game. The effect with the flowers and trees coming back to life when you clear a section is absolutely amazing.

Sephiroth_dude

Was it just me or did anybody else find the boss fights in Eternal Sonata hard enough?I guess thats partly due to the amount of potions you carry during battle,I love its graphics though,and I also love the old 2d rpgs,grandia etc.

thelordofcheese

Mr E wrote: »

I love the style of Zelda Windwaker and Phantom Hourglass.

QFT.

Windwaker is still a gorgeous game even by todays standards.
Basically, every time i see yet another brown and bloom saturated game getting comments like "OMG, AWESOME GRAFFIX" i go back and take a look at Windwaker.
Just to remind myself that games don't have to be so frighteningly dull looking.

Mark Hamill

I always liked the artstyle of Psychonauts:

but probably the best artstyle,imo, has to Shadow of the Colossus:

Both brilliant games too.

Retr0gamer

Yep I'm really fed up of the currrent games trying to get as close to reality as possible and doing some really boring art design in the process. American developers are the biggest sinners in this regard. I would pick Wind Waker or Okami as far better looking games than something like Crysis.

Developers are given some amazing tools to let their minds run riot and create worlds that are just not possible in any other medium and they go and make generic sci-fi, modern day or tolkien-esque worlds. There's nothing wrong with doing these if they are done right, Blizzard injecting humour into the worlds of Starcraft and Warcraft is an excellent example, it's just how astonishingly lazy some developers can be that gets to me.

Some of my favourite games for art design that haven't been mentioned would be:

Metroid Prime series: Really beautifully and uniquely designed worlds with a lot of attention to detail. They really feel alive.
Prince of Persia Sands of Time: Fantastic use of bloom effects create a very surreal dreamlike experience and not a drop of blood is spilled during the game.
Pikmin: Excellent use of a real world enviroment to make something truly unique. Who thought gardening could be so much fun.

I also think the lack of 2D games is really a massive loss. I think Odin Sphere is the most beautiful game I've played in years and love the puppet animation.

steviec

Retr0gamer

I thought the art style in Heavenly Sword was a lesson in fantasy design generica.

As for Uncharted it wasn't original more a case of 'it works so well why that hell haven't more developers used it!'

He rest are good calls apart from the FPS one which sums up everything wrong with art design in videogames.

Edit: what game is the one with the gorgeous stencil cel shading?

steviec

Retr0gamer wrote: »

I thought the art style in Heavenly Sword was a lesson in fantasy design generica.

As for Uncharted it wasn't original more a case of 'it works so well why that hell haven't more developers used it!'

He rest are good calls apart from the FPS one which sums up everything wrong with art design in videogames.

Edit: what game is the one with the gorgeous stencil cel shading?

The one with the stencil shading is Valkyrie of the Battlefield, I think the European version is going to be called Valkyrian Chronicles.

And if by the "FPS" one one you mean Mirror's Edge (which is first person but doesn't involve any shooting as far as I know), I think it's the exact opposite of every FPS out there, with extremely bright and clean lines and great use of primary colours to really make things stand out.

Sarky

Meteos on the DS has a really charming visual theme, I love all those happy dancing little life forms.

I must admit a soft spot for TF2's visuals, they really stand out from most other shooters. Of course, the daddy of cel-shading shooters (on PC, anyway) is XIII, that game was beautiful, the little touches like the sounds of footsteps appearing as "tap tap tap" in text was interesting and really cemented the you're-in-a-comic feel.

Mr E

Good call, Sarky.... forgot about that one.

thelordofcheese

steviec wrote: »

And if by the "FPS" one one you mean Mirror's Edge (which is first person but doesn't involve any shooting as far as I know), I think it's the exact opposite of every FPS out there, with extremely bright and clean lines and great use of primary colours to really make things stand out.

To be fair, the pic you used isn't exactly the greatest demonstration of that aspect of Mirrors Edge.
That said, i'm distinctly unimpressed by mirrors edge as a whole, not just the art style.

As for the rest, drop uncharted and heavenly sword, and i'd agree with everything else.

Dont be at yourself

Despite having a lot more scope than other media, videogames tend to recycle artstyles rather than strive to be unique.

I do think that it is changing though. The medium is more mature, art departments are swelling, the market is saturated with run-of-the-mill gritty realistic titles, and developers seem to be using their visual style as a way of standing out.

Shryke

I'd like to add Jet Set Radio and its sequel to the list of honorable mentions. Every cel shaded game I've ever played has been excellent. Actually I didn't like Killer 7 at all but lets call that the exception. It still deserves a mention in this thread though I would think.

tman

I'm ashamed to admit it, but WoW deserves a mention here...
Some of the locales in Outland are stunning to look at, especially Zangermarsh. Shame that they seem to be going back to traditional style fantasy settings for the next expansion

Sarky

Much as I detest WoW as an infinitely more expensive alternative to seeing how many times you can click the mouse in an hour and then trying to break that record, I have to admit it's got great art direction.

Maximilian

When I saw this thread only one game came to mind - Grim Fandango. Great artwork.

Also, Zork II.

Weidii

I know it's not the best game in the Zelda series, but the Windwaker certainly has a lovely look.

Ooh, and spore. Has anyone used the creature creator yet? It's funtastic!

Sarky

I always loved Morrowind's visuals. The giant mushroom forests (ok, not quite forests, but y'know) and some of the cities were simply stunning (Remember Tel'Aruhn, made entirely out of the shells of gigantic sea creatures? Awesome). There was a great sense of otherworldliness about it all, as opposed to Oblivion's rather dull approach (Fair enough, it looked beautiful, but it was very, very samey)

I think STALKER should get an honourable mention. There was just something about the washed-out tumbledown buildings and wreckage and gusts of wind and clever use of lighting that was really enthralling. I spent ages just watching the shadows jump around during the thunderstorms while people huddled around campfires playing guitar. It wasn't particularly original, but it was incredibly well done.

pixelburp

I am a big fan of steampunk, so Bioshock for me was always going to score big in the visuals / art direction. The luscious graphics & beautiful marriage of 50s design with modern technology was great on the eye. Plus, although a very grim and dark tale, the neon lights & underwater lighting meant it wasn't just another dark brown "next gen" game.

Homeworld is another game that stuck in my memory for its visual style. The design of the various ships & the settings in each level were quite spectacular. The fish-like design of the Mothership itself is iconic in the gaming world.

Sarky

Yeah, Homeworld is the first game I remember that actually made space beautiful.

pixelburp

Sarky wrote: »

Yeah, Homeworld is the first game I remember that actually made space beautiful.

Oh and I forgot to mention it's cutscenes - where others were trying to use FMV and 3D renderings to convey an epic scale, Homeworld used simple B&W animted drawings to bring the universe to life. I loved watching them.