I find limbo to be similar, of course with more colors (or grayscales ;) ), smoother animations and physics.
Oh thanks! I was wondering what he was talking about.
I'd argue that it is easier to "get it right" with simpler graphics. As someone above said, consitency is important. I would even go as far as to say, consistency is THE most important factor. The more eye candy you add the harder it gets to balance everything to achieve this level of consistency.
I would disagree as far as calling consistency THE most important factor as you said, though I do see your point. Still, I think it's perfectly reasonable to have a more high-res art style without giving up a factor of consistency. Would it be more work? Sure, but that goes to the main point of the thread in that use of a retro style could be used more for purpose of implementing less work into your art.
I would disagree as far as calling consistency THE most important factor as you said, though I do see your point. Still, I think it's perfectly reasonable to have a more high-res art style without giving up a factor of consistency. Would it be more work? Sure, but that goes to the main point of the thread in that use of a retro style could be used more for purpose of implementing less work into your art.
No, the thread's title contains the word laziness. Doing less work does not equal laziness in this context. It's more about risk management and cost effectiveness.
I always found pixel art *much* harder than 3d modelling. Back in the Amiga days I struggled and struggled in DPaint to create decent art for my projects. Although I loved the Amiga scene, in creative terms it was a relief to move to the pc and start using 3ds max.
To me, pre-rendering sprites is the laziest method in graphics. You can be pretty sloppy with your modelling and still get good results. Once I made a top-down space game with pre-rendered graphics for an old WindowsCE based smartphone. We didn't bother modelling the bottom of many of the ships since you'd never see them!
Making good-looking low-res pixel art or low-poly models is just as difficult as their high-fidelity counterparts, and requires different, but equal, skills. Imagine, for example, trying to create a unique appearance and character to 20 different sprites whose heads are a mere 12 pixels across. It's really hard! In fact, this is why old console games always had around half of the character dedicated to the head of the character. Proportional sprites, unless they occupy many more pixels, are devoid of personality.
The reason small developers and indies often choose the retro aesthetic is that it allows them to get by with *less* art, not *worse* art. If your character is only 16 or 32 pixels across, then a 4-frame walk-cycle looks perfectly fine, whereas for bigger sprites it would look stilted and jerky--not fluid at all.
Other good reasons are that it simplifies the art-pipeline on the back end, and makes fewer technical requirements of the game engine.
Simpler aesthetics and gameplay are really just an acknowledgement of the small team sizes involved, but it doesn't mean that the art or experience of playing is any less worthy, valuable, or enjoyable.
Personally for me, the retro style is the only thing I can somewhat achieve so being a sole indie developer right now it is all I have to work with. That being said I think there are probably a lot of indie's that are in the same boat. I have spent countless hours doing tutorials, reading, playing with my tablet but in the end the best I can do after 5 years is very small pixel sprites such as in this because I can hide the imperfections in the scale.
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