Belaukiant meno video zaidimuose

A few ways to show that your video game art direction is on par with working in a stamp factory.

An exciting tool of modern day stamping. A must for all copying needs. In practice, a real stamp is firstly created by an artist, thereby harshly separating mass streamlined production and creativity. | Fiskar brands, inc.

1. When your publicity poster is mistaken for another game in an another genre. I`ve seen a “Far Cry 2″ poster, which I thought was from the game “Silent Hill: Homecoming”. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find the exact poster in the web, a good thing, but a different one will showcase several of the percieved evils described in here.

One of them is a prequel, the other - a sequel, starring the same antagonist. | Developed by Ubisoft Montreal and Foundation 9 Entertainment with Double Helix, respectively.

2. If your main character is mistaken for another protagonist in an another game in an another genre.
Now why should you care? Well, funny enough, because Hollywood is even better at it. You won’t mistake, say, “Street Kings” with “The Devil’s Advocate”, even though both have the same male lead actor! If two completely different companies in other countries are creating an FPS and a third-person horror flick, how much does their art leading must suck, if they both come up with quite similar characters in a similar get up?

The wonderfully distinctive and creative variations on the sci-fi theme. Notice the ubiquitous rounded corner glossy metal panels with big rivets, gratings, dominant blue or rust colours, blocky arcs and constant columns, and more pipes than in a plumber‘s dream. | iD Softwate, „Doom 3“ | Starbreeze Studios,“Chronicles of Riddick: Assault of Dark Athena“ | Raven Software, „Quake 4“ | EA Redwood Shores, „Dead Space“ | Human Head Studios, „Prey“

3. If your game still looks like Doom 3. Or the only visual difference between your World War project is that it’s taking place in a different city of rubble, where debris has been placed in more varied and strategic locations.
Seriously, what the hell? Since Doom 3 of 2004, we have had almost all indoor first-person shooters look the same through the impish deviousness of normal maps. Normal mapping is cool, but your art lead must be smarter than that incubus of rendering tricks, bearing such a visually familiar curse of pure blackness in lighting.
As for the World War games, well, if you would really try to look at the screenshots from games like Medal of Honor, Call of Duty, Battlefield with a clear sight, or better yet, act as if you haven’t played or seen any games at all, you would just barely notice slight differences in contrast and brightness. And the heads-up-display. Woo-hoo.

Are these different interpretations of war, or should these people just gather under the same wing to create the same projects reciprocally, interchanging their expertise? Currently they are creating games so alike each other, I wouldn‘t be able to tell the difference from the screenshots. | EA Los Angeles, „Medal of Honor: Airborne“, 11th installment in the series | Infinity Ward, „Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare“

While in contrast, it is a very facile task of telling each artist‘s interpretation apart. In addition, they exhibit care for distinct aspects of such horrible events | Otto Dix, „Meal time in the Trenches“, 1923-24 | Ludwig Meidner, „Apocalyptic Landscape“, 1913 | Dean Cornwall, „Serving the Nation“, 1943

4. Your team of artists is taking inspiration from various artists, which you are not aware of, or not controlling the bulk of the inspiration and reference sources.
I have heard that Half-Life 2 lighting has been based on the works of this artist, without the lead, Viktor Antonov, knowing about it:

Edward Hopper, “Office in a Small City”, 1953

5. When fashion rhymes with khaki pants painted in a “woodland and leaf” camouflage pattern. Or in another scenario, when your game characters are clothed by what’s “up” in the US.
The USA is like a black hole in the world of fashion and style. The only thing that came from that void is what’s concluded by the word “hip”. Next time your concept artists want to drape your most often viewed NPC with a plain t-shirt and jeans, buy them a fashion magazine. An italian or french one. And less anime inspired haircuts, while your at it? Bring in some hair magazines, too.

This guard’s unit’s get up is so a la mode, they are all wearing it uniformily.
| Konami, „Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater“

Lara Croft, one of the wealthiest people in her world, yet can‘t afford clothes and a publicity counsellor to take care of her image. But the Tomb Raider is trying to be fashionable, just like she is taxingly trying to grasp that lost artifact. She changed the colour of her upper garment! I couldn‘t handle the plainness of George Stobart, so you are safe. | Crystal Dynamics, „Tomb Raider“

6. When “amotsphere” is just a synonym for: fog, HDRI, and “in-your-face” monotone.

I quote: “[this game] reeks of atmosphere.” And the blogger is right, this screenshot reeks of mud and filthy water. Still, I haven’t played this game, yet what I’ve seen and heard were testimonies of a true golden sheen. | 2K Boston and Australia, „Bioshock“

7. When your game relies on two lighting and colour set ups. The golden hour and the blue colour setup. We get that enough from TV shows or films.

8. When your making an unoriginal game and you draw the same references, the same movies for inspiration as the game before you. As if another pastiche cinematography, reusing the exact same thing but in a slightly better copy of the original source will somehow make it clever or more likeable…

9. Architecture in your levels is limited to bare columns and indefinite arcs of supposedly belonging to the period the game takes place. And when it is underpinned by common level-design, which, let’s face it, likes to obliterate architecture to unimagined cacophonies and completely disparate rooms and spaces, it starts to lack a unifying aesthetical beauty in the relationship of spaces.
Quite a lot of games, to vary the setting, just replace the action into japan, some European city, usually Paris or London, Venice perhaps, New York, maybe a rural setting in the U.S., the jungle, some lost tomb in Egypt. This is alpha and omega of level settings for your typical video game. James Bond is a series that is kind of well worth to watch for the locations, as they are based on some current political events. How about a first person shooter in Jersey or Prague?

This currently is a feat of technology and computing power. And it is refreshing to see again something blocky and strong in forms. Pictorialy, though, it’s very bad and showcases bad, unimaginative architecture and obnoxious city planning. Yes, that is a part of it. | Ubisoft Montreal, „Assassin‘s Creed“

In quantity and percentage terms, mass media outshines all the gold that is buried within the various worlds of arts. It has always. I want to clarify, that the situation isn’t bad, and even though this business is extremely commercialised, the tirple-A projects - each of them bring in something new to this media. Some of it are to be avoided, like the direct influence from Hollywood and the japanese market, or at least trimmed down. There are still a lot of roads, even highways, that are untouched by this industry and I want to encourage people to go down und fahren auf die Autobahn.

Šis straipsnis nebuvo parašytas lietuvių kalba, nes jo naudingumas būtų buvęs nulinis.