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A PIXEL ARTIST RENOUNCES PIXEL ART
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Sailerius
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Closehttp://www.dinofarmgames.com/a-pixel-artist-renounces-pixel-art/
A very insightful article by a professional pixel artist about the relevance of pixel art in games in the modern day.
Though I never intended for Auro to be a “retro-style” game, what I intended doesn’t matter at all, and it’s 100% my fault for failing to communicate in a language people understand.
As a game developer, time is the most valuable resource a human can give you. Nobody owes us their time or attention. As such, when someone gives us their time, an implicit agreement is made and we are now in debt to that person. We owe it to them to deliver value for their time, and to deliver it efficiently.
A very insightful article by a professional pixel artist about the relevance of pixel art in games in the modern day.
This is an interesting article and great read, despite not knowing much about art or pixel art in particular.
Though some of the assertions made in the article seem incongruous, or misapplied. Like, by using a deliberate retro-aesthetic he didn't expect his game to be labeled "retro"? And then goes on to describe pixel art as a result of limitations of 25 years ago. I am not sure what he was expecting here.
He is a good pixel artist as evidenced by his samples, but even so I think he is overestimating his own abilities.
While this might be a pixel-art purist's wet dream, to me it looks drab - mostly in his palette selection and the overuse of dithering in the HUD. The font is barely legible. The character sprites, and what I assume are animations, are top-notch and I love them.
But I understand how that overuse of dithering could be described derogatorily as "pixelated". The HUD is not very clean, especially compared to the character sprites. The point I am making is that perhaps the reception to Auro's art isn't "a failure of the audience" or a "failure of the medium", but just a personal shortcoming of that particular artist.
Lastly, educating the audience that pixel art is a deliberate style is a collective effort, and the more indie games that adopt it, the more educated the gaming audience gets.
He makes some great insights, and does highlight some trends and perceptions, but he also seems to be shifting blame a bit.
Though some of the assertions made in the article seem incongruous, or misapplied. Like, by using a deliberate retro-aesthetic he didn't expect his game to be labeled "retro"? And then goes on to describe pixel art as a result of limitations of 25 years ago. I am not sure what he was expecting here.
He is a good pixel artist as evidenced by his samples, but even so I think he is overestimating his own abilities.
While this might be a pixel-art purist's wet dream, to me it looks drab - mostly in his palette selection and the overuse of dithering in the HUD. The font is barely legible. The character sprites, and what I assume are animations, are top-notch and I love them.
But I understand how that overuse of dithering could be described derogatorily as "pixelated". The HUD is not very clean, especially compared to the character sprites. The point I am making is that perhaps the reception to Auro's art isn't "a failure of the audience" or a "failure of the medium", but just a personal shortcoming of that particular artist.
Lastly, educating the audience that pixel art is a deliberate style is a collective effort, and the more indie games that adopt it, the more educated the gaming audience gets.
He makes some great insights, and does highlight some trends and perceptions, but he also seems to be shifting blame a bit.
Lastly, educating the audience that pixel art is a deliberate style is a collective effort, and the more indie games that adopt it, the more educated the gaming audience gets.
I agree with this but fear it's either a losing or lost battle. Due to the huge swell of indie games, and the fact that most of them rely upon bad pixel art to compensate for not being able to afford an artist, pixel art has become equivalent with cheap, bad games in the public's consciousness.
author=SaileriusLastly, educating the audience that pixel art is a deliberate style is a collective effort, and the more indie games that adopt it, the more educated the gaming audience gets.I agree with this but fear it's either a losing or lost battle. Due to the huge swell of indie games, and the fact that most of them rely upon bad pixel art to compensate for not being able to afford an artist, pixel art has become equivalent with cheap, bad games in the public's consciousness.
Eventually the public will be able to ascertain good vs bad pixel art (again, like it did in the 80s and 90s), or maybe art doesn't matter as much as we think. :/
author=kentonaauthor=SaileriusEventually the public will be able to ascertain good vs bad pixel art (again, like it did in the 80s and 90s), or maybe art doesn't matter as much as we think. :/Lastly, educating the audience that pixel art is a deliberate style is a collective effort, and the more indie games that adopt it, the more educated the gaming audience gets.I agree with this but fear it's either a losing or lost battle. Due to the huge swell of indie games, and the fact that most of them rely upon bad pixel art to compensate for not being able to afford an artist, pixel art has become equivalent with cheap, bad games in the public's consciousness.
This is sort of what I'm thinking as well. Audiences aren't as dumb as we think (but ironically, very easily influenced), and with time and exposure people will learn to appreciate pixel art and be discerning with the good and the bad.
author=Sal
pixel art has become equivalent with cheap, bad games in the public's consciousness.
I haven't noticed this.
Pixel art will always be a retro thing, and there's no real 'reclaiming' it from that status. We can, however; aim to reclaim it from the stereotypes that have emerged along with the indie games revolution. The biggest problem is there is just a market over-saturation of pixel games because yes, they are often cheap, and some of them (many of them?) are bad.
A lot of indie developers latch onto pixels because they are perceived as "easy". This hurts everybody's bottom line, because it's a sad misconception and reduces pixel art to an amateur aesthetic that anybody can use. Let's not fool ourselves here either, the Minecraft titan is both responsible for much of the public's awareness of pixel art as well as being a contributor (along with Spaghetti Pixel Jones) in devaluing credibility in using it as a style.
god save our immortal games
A lot of indie developers latch onto pixels because they are perceived as "easy". This hurts everybody's bottom line, because it's a sad misconception and reduces pixel art to an amateur aesthetic that anybody can use. Let's not fool ourselves here either, the Minecraft titan is both responsible for much of the public's awareness of pixel art as well as being a contributor (along with Spaghetti Pixel Jones) in devaluing credibility in using it as a style.
god save our immortal games
turkeyDawg
195
author=kentona
Honestly this guy uses so much super-subtle dithering that it just ends up looking like JPEG compression at places. It also reminds me of some old license games where they just took pictures from the movie and reduced the colors. The characters themselves look great, but I think still have too many colors for people to immediately register it as "pixel art". (I think the same goes for KoF 13 sprites)
While pixel art remains a legitimate style, I can understand him wanting to really take advantage of everything modern technology has to offer. I'm just wondering how well he'll really be able to do HD graphics and animation.
I'll be blunt about this: as a guy who can't get enough of awesome sprite art like Metal Slug or Yoshi's Island, I will fully admit that higher resolution drawings can look better hands down... but usually don't. Trying to match 2D pixel art animation with drawings basically requires you to be an animator and colorist/painter on par with the people who made Fantasia or those 40s Superman cartoons, if not even better (A low-res, low-color count image is much easier to edit and animate). I haven't looked hard for it, but I don't think anyone's actually managed that yet. Games like Skullgirls or Cuphead with actual good animation (from what I've seen via YT an such) are exceedingly rare, and these games typically aren't attempting realistic shading like a Vanillaware game, which generally rely on somewhat goofy-looking tweening tricks to actually animate.
The technology regarding poly counts and shaders is to the point now that 3D can look better still, but Guilty Gear Xrd is the only game I've seen so far that I think really proves this. It seems they went out of their way to animate the 3D models in frame-by-frame fashion with radical mesh deformations and changes, comparable to claymation almost, avoiding 3D animation's usual "stiffness", and also heavily customized how the lighting engine shaded things so that it would actually look like how a regular 2D animator would shade things (and just look good in general).
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