Hello everyone here on Gamedev! I was having an monolog with myself, about how to perceive this. We have "overly visual" games like Crysis, we have "very minimal" games like Dwarven Fortress, just to convey my mindset about these two concepts to everyone. Games like Crysis lean on conveying immersion through achieving a high standard of realism, games like Dwarven Fortress do this by explaining a lot of the world and history of it in text and haveing deep very complex gameplay to suck you in the world that is Dwarven Fortress. These for me are two very different things. My personal opinion is that I always lean more to Gameplay over Graphics, anyday, anytime in any situation, no matter what. Graphics can almost never break a game, as to where gameplay could easily break any game, even or espescially one with say the look of Crysis. So for me I would say it would be like this, Gameplay is 75% and Graphics 25% of any given game, as a total package. And this is being generous because the percentage Gameplay over Graphics really could be even higher in my opinion. But in the case of what I was wondering. Imagine Dwarven Fortress, it really has a high factor of wat is happening in the game, dwarves hopping on about, building, constructing, socializing, etc. Imagine if such a game got a tiny facelift, to make it equally charming visually as it is technically and gameplay wise. Dwarves would be nicely animated, they would wander about, going about their business. Sometimes they would hum a tune when working hard to lighten the load. For me this was the case with Settlers 2 the original one, I just intensely loved the Settlers going about their business, I could watch that all day back in the day, it added so much in my opinion. Made it more "alive" Well rant over, my question is: what is your opinion/vision about this. Could a game world be crafted in "simple" 2d, like the Fake Pixel Art Mock Up for Dwarven Fortress, and still be just as or more appealing and immersive like a fully realised 3D world? Does this graphic flavour add to the game on itself, and how much and how so? Which one is more important for you, and why? Could a game like this in this day and age still be a massive commercial hit and succes? [Edited by - onemanbandman on April 21, 2009 2:59:33 AM]

See...I think visual stylings and formating of stories should based on what the creator feels is best for that particular story. Not just everything should be this way or that because it is the most modern, realistic looking. To that end most of my ideas and stories even if they are in the same series are for different genres of games or even different mediums, because I feel that the best work in those mediums. It's like what Alan Moore? (co-creator of the Watchmen) says about his work, but he focuses on comics creating stories and using the comic format to do things that you can't do with other mediums.


As far as saying Graphics have a hard time breaking a game... that is utterly untrue. Two Worlds is a huge graphics glitch, I can't play either of the 2 most recent Elder scroll games because the graphic of the guy moving across the terrain bothers me so much that i can't ignore how badly it is out of sync, I absolutely hate when a graphic doesn't look like it should be in that game world, and many people hate the look of just certain graphics like cell shading in 3D fully rendered backgrounds so much so they won't play games that has it.

I think Durraken touched on an important point,its not so much lower tech graphics (2D, sprite art etc) which I think can actually be used to enhance the game, but graphic errors where the game aims for a ceartain bar, and then falls short of it. I read somewhere that you game will come across better if you have everything good than if you have everything good and one thing great, because it will make the rest look bad. Likewise with graphics, everything needs to be at about the same level of polish.

Graphics are all about immersion, if the game has been 2D all along, then that just becomes part of your suspension of disbelief, but if everything is 3D then suddenly one bit is 2D, that will throw you out of the world.

I wrote a blog post relating to this a while back, if you fancy a read.

Edit: fixed the link, got the href the wrong way round (herf :()

Durakken - Im glad you understand me a 100% that was my thought if it fits/supplements the game and its theme, and it works, its no biggie!

Yeah you are right about that, should have mentioned that as well. Graphics not working as they should hamper gameplay a lot of course, I was in this case talking about solid/polished titles though, but that is spot on.

And yeah pretty sortsighted of me again, certain styles, like over stylised and cell shaded are so hated that certain games wont even try them, true again. But I do think its a very short sighted thing to do as a gamer I mean, but that is another discussion ;)

So in your opinion it would be all good if it fits and compliments the game, and wouldnt bother you at all?! Good to hear ofcourse!

thk123 - Another solid one, sometimes games have uber impressive graphics to just try to cover up what the game does not have. Or in your case because of those graphics, the contrast between what is great and what is not becomes even more evident! But I do think that 2D can be just as impressive or even more so if done exactly right, and you can still make it very busy and make sure a lot is happening which improves the ambiance of the game even more?!

I would really digg to see that blog of your, I will look in you profile, if its not there I would love a link ;) Thanks!

I think ideas work better using different styles. I've been lucky enough to be exposed to all different styles of art and animation and story telling so it becomes a hard swallow when I see some things done in a style that don't match.

I can't think of anything off the top of my head in terms of graphics, but I have to point again to Star Ocean 4 which I've been doing a lot recently, there is a character named Lymle who says " 'kay?" at the end of much of her dialogue...which I'm used to character having something like that there, but the " 'kay?" is just so grating at times because it doesn't fit... and likewise I watch much of the game and it's very beautiful to watch but it they don't move their lips when they talk...it wouldn't be noticeable in many games due to shorter scenes but this game has 40 minute scenes of just talking so it's looks worse than it would. But the " 'kay?" thing is more akin to what I'm talking about if you were to apply that to graphics... it needs to fit with everything in the story and be the best it can be...but being the best does not always mean technologically looking real. I much prefer many 2D games over most 3D games and even some really bad looking 3D games (FF7 anyone) are preferable to games that have too much out of place.

I remember seeing a rant about MUDs vs MMORPGs that had some fairly interesting arguments. It said that in a game, in order to have immersion, what is important is not the graphical quality but the depth of your world model:

He took the example of the rainy weather. In WoW, sometimes, it rains. The light changes, rain is displayed, you see drops on the floor, etc... But, he argued, on his favorite MUD, the rain was actually more realistic : it could extinguish someone on fire, it weakened fire elementals, it could replenish water buckets, etc... In WoW, the rain isn't realistic because it is "only" graphical.

I believe that Dwarf Fortress is not popular because of its graphical look, neither is Nethack. Sure, they can be cute, but players enjoy a cute game for five minutes, not for hundreds of hours of play. Things are possible in Dwarf Fortress that you will never see in, say, Dungeon Keeper : managing a trapped entrance for goblins that is close to your forge so that you don't have to haul their copper items a long distance in order to melt them, managing animal and tree population so that you don't genocide a worthy specie.

This require a deep world simulation, something I believe graphical engine will never be able to make up for. Sure, you can have an immersive and deep game, it is not mutually exclusive. I am merely pointing out that popular "very minimal" games are usually not popular because of their looks.

IMO, as long as the graphics fit the overall design, and are clean and concise, then they are good. Games like Dwarf Fortress and ADOM work because you know, pretty much, what everything is at a glance. You know the 'D' is a dragon, and you know the @ is an adventurer, and you know the little smiley face is a dwarf.

Graphics generally won't break a game; there might be people who despise certain types or hate graphical glitches but that doesn't mean the game is less fun. A pure focus on graphics, however, will break a game. Most of the really good looking games I don't even bother with because I know they are little more than shallow, poorly made interactive CGI movies.

However, poor graphics can make a game harder to enjoy. The DOS version of Phantasie III is a good example. The game is just as good as it's C64 and Amiga counterparts. Better in some sense than the C64 version, as it's got a faster and more intuitive interface. But the 4 color CGA graphics (which are identical to the Amiga save in colors) SUCK. The acres of black, light green, and magenta interspersed with bright yellow are hard to look at for any length of time.

Now, in the marketing sense, sex sells. Good graphics sells. It's what has sold games since day one, when the C64 was touted over it's competition for it's superior graphics and sound. Long before demos and videos were feasible to showcase a game, it was pictures on a box and in magazine ads that sold the games. Now, it's mostly videos showcasing the good stuff while hiding the bad.

There are a few examples of less detailed graphic-equipped games selling well. Mega Man 9 was a hit, based on sheer nostalgia, and good design. It also meets my requirements for saying a game has good graphics; everything is clear; you know what it is at a glance.

And if anyone says 'kay' at the end of every sentence, then I want to beat them. In real life or in a game. Seriously.

A game like Dwarf Fortress might be considered more content-heavy as it has lots of little lower-quality content. And it wouldn't take much effort to add more content to this game. It's like adding more pokemon to a pokemon gameboy game (no offense ;P ). You just make a crappy (no offense) sprite and 8-bit sound effect (which may just reuse another sound that's used by like 50+ other pokemon) and fill in the number stats and abilities and you're done.

Whereas a game like Crysis has a few high-quality content and adding content is not as easy as there is more work involved. The models need to be put together based on real-life photographs (maybe), then skeletal animations have to be done with motion-tracking from real life actors (maybe), and detailed, high-quality, realistic textures have to be made by artists.

As a developer I like a game like Dwarf Fortress. I am a programmer and love all the intricate simulation and gameplay strategy and things to explore that is in the game. Dwarf Fortress is a programmer's dream game. I also love it (this type of a game in general, both to make and to play) because it would be so easy to add content and make huge, detailed worlds and because my creation would come alive and have lots of things for me to explore and perhaps unexpected things that I would enjoy discovering and playing around with. A game like Dwarf Fortress can pretty much encompass anything and everything in your imagination which might otherwise not go together in another game.

If you're a hermit who wants to go really deep into a game, you'd probably like a game like Dwarf Fortress more. If you want instant gratification and don't want to spend too much time trying to see the brilliance and beauty and fun in a cerebral game like Dwarf Fortress, then you'll like Crysis more.

I find Dwarf Fortress confusing though and don't understand what all the different colored symbols stand for. I don't know if it would take much work, but if the game used even pixelated 8x8 or 16x16 8-bit or 16-bit bitmaps, it would make it a lot more playable and beautiful to look at (e.g., looking at your fortress or at a landscape scene).

And the zooming-out could be done with the bitmap graphics and would be very cool, although it might be slow rendering many, many tiny (possibly pixel-size blended) pieces at a high zoomed-out level. It kind of reminds of Supreme Commander in this, in how you are able to zone out from local, to regional, etc., levels. It would probably be easier to do with the HGE graphics engine rather than in DOS though (I myself was thinking of playing around with making a game like this in HGE).

[Edited by - polyfrag on April 13, 2009 2:30:09 AM]

That is a good point "adding content to DF is like adding Pokemon to any of the gazillion Pokemon games" that can ben true in most cases indeed.

I was very interested in making a game that creates content on the fly, quests, situations etc etc. Hence why I was thinking 2D graphics, it is a lot less taxing on a computer to have some heavy thinking going on, and I mean a lot.

It is such a broad question indeed, ofcourse it can be beautifull it is just the way the creator handles the design of the game and it can be just as visually appealing as any other form of graphics, even more so because you have more control over the look that is displayed on your screen.

I am just wondering if the mass market would buy a product that is retro but just as solid as any other AAA title, even if its gameplay is a bit abstract and broad instead of simplified?

What this all leads me to is, you see all those Indie Studios popping out of the ground, lots en lots of em its a very very alive scene that keeps growing with the day. But most of them, I think, are people who next to their full time jobs, love to make games. This gives me the idea this is not at all feasible, and it isnt a way to have real succes and be able to live from only that?!