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[Photon]

I once heard someone say there were more retro throwbacks than there were actual retro games. It does seem like something a lot of people want to do, including myself. I have some very fond memory of old classics, but even when I fire up my DOSBox emulator to play something like the original Duke Nukem, they can still feel exciting and fun. Some of that may be "childhood" speaking, of course, but I want to think there is still a place for games like these.

What do you consider to be the advantages and disadvantages of using a retro style of graphics (NES, EGA, etc.)? Some observations:

• I like how some old games, especially EGA ones, just kind of pop. It looks very satisfying and, in some games, adds an eccentricity to the environments and characters.
• Smaller resolution/camera. This can be done with newer games of course, but in some old games where it was necessitated it could be used very advantageously. Restricting view made otherwise small levels (by today's standards) feel much larger and gave off a greater sense of exploration since you couldn't see as much.

[EvilDingo]

The biggest issue with retro games isn't the gameplay. Great gameplay is timeless. The problem with making a retro game is the art. There are so many retro 2D games, for example, that your game will need excellent art (even if it's pixel art) to stand out.

A lot of people feel the barrier of entry is lower for making a retro game, and it is, but for your game to stand out, you need extremely good art direction.

Just look at the pixel art thread here on TIG. Your game has to have art as good as the best art in that thread.

None of this applies if you're not making a commercial game.

[CaLooch]

I was talking to someone recently about the idea of things aging well: games, movies, music, whatever.  My friend bluntly said "quality".  So when it comes to video games, I think that the games that age the best are the ones that are solid games at their core.  I actually have my SNES hooked up to my tv atm and Im playing through super mario world again because its just a solid game. 

I think the issue with making a retro style game nowadays is bringing something new to the table, gameplay-wise.  There have been so many games in the past few years that have rehashed old mechanics from retro games and end up having a been-there-done-that feel.

The art... @EvilDingo makes a good point

[DanglinBob]

Heh yeah if you can't beat Shovel Knight you shouldn't throw your hat into the retro ring.

[Elsaess]

As EvilDingo said, the lower barrier to entry is the reason for a lot of these retro-style games. The issues arise when this is the sole reason for the use of retro-style.

Some of these developers seem to prefer the idea of being a game developer to actually developing quality games. If it's your first game and you're practicing, fine. If the retro-style really suits your game, fine. I don't see why you can't step up the quality otherwise though.

[JK]

I don't see any disadvantages of using a particular art style as long as it suits your game.

The truth is, there isn't a lower barrier of entry for pixel art. Most artists understand that drawing and animating a polished spritesheet can be just as arduous as modeling and rigging a polished 3D model.

Tenchu 2 and Minish Cap have very different art styles. However, they're both great games! Art matters because it's what the players see, but hardly anything will save a game from dull gameplay.

[CyangmouArt]

a "retro" game shouldn't be considered because of the scope of anything.
It's not less work to develop a "retro" game compared to developing another game of a similar genre.
To get the gameplay routines going the look of the game is nearly completely irrelevant - except the big decision if you are going for 2D or 3D.

For the art side:
What makes the big difference for the art is:
For 2D art you literally just need 1 artist who excels at drawing (more artists mean of course more productivity, if you have specialists for special subjects to draw, like an anatomist for human figures or a landscape painter for backgrounds, it's a big plus too) - the programmer "simply" has to place the images - which supports small teamsizes.

For 3D you don't necessarily need people who excel at drawing (except for the concept part where this is a requirement), but are very good at handling different tools, which is the reason why there are specialists for modelling, texturing, rigging and animating and then you need all the technical stuff and technical artists to get the placement of the models in the gameworld right etc. It's just a lot more work.

At the end what matters is simply how people see your game.
To stick out you need to have something special.
This can be an overall impression, a cool artstyle, quality, a innovative take on something or whatever.

But You should choose your artstyle because of the "product identity" and because you want your game/art/impression to stand for something specific. If you choose an artstyle first and foremost because of the cost factor and it won't support the vision of the project at all, you are plainly developing the wrong way.

At the end of the day any rpg will always be more work to develop than a bejeweled clone.
Pixel art can be as much work as 3D art can be as much work as 2D animated art - it just depends on the style and quality you are going for.

[Sik]

The truth is, there isn't a lower barrier of entry for pixel art. Most artists understand that drawing and animating a polished spritesheet can be just as arduous as modeling and rigging a polished 3D model.

Honestly the only real advantage of pixelart is that it's much easier to tweak when you're drawing a sprite. It's easier to just plot individual pixels than having to redo entire operations accurately without affecting parts of the drawing you don't want to touch. Also the part where pixelart's lower resolution means you don't need as much accuracy when making traces (using a mouse can make this a severe issue compared to drawing on paper).

[Melon Mason]

I find pixel art a huge cliche in indie games, and it's something I've never wanted to partake in. I think it's nobler and a lot more fun to see people exploring their art skills and finding their own style, however crude or unusual.

[The Translocator]

I find pixel art a huge cliche in indie games, and it's something I've never wanted to partake in. I think it's nobler and a lot more fun to see people exploring their art skills and finding their own style, however crude or unusual.

You can have "your own style" in pixel art. You just have to avoid the "use graphics capabilities from a specific system" thing most indies tend to do with pixel art and make your own palette and limitations/guidelines. Obviously if you have a hard limit of, what, 4 colors it's going to be hard to have your own style- so if you want your own style, just don't do that.

[Melon Mason]

You can have "your own style" in pixel art.

That's definitely true. There are some games that really knock it out of the park when it comes to harnessing a style of pixel art.

I think my criticism of it is mainly targeted at simpler forms of pixel art. I do believe your average joe will pick up pixel art over anything more complex, because simple styles of pixel art are undeniably easier to create and they are heavily associated with the indie brand. You can make pixel art in virtually any drawing program. It requires no previous experience, just trial and error. It also creates the illusion of a professional graphical style, because you get to claim the retro label which unfairly compares it to titles of the past (which were impressive then only because of the technical limitations that existed, the ones you don't have to battle with any more).

If you are working in a 16x16 canvas, you are literally making a mosaic and you have the cheat of foregoing any actual detail. For someone to digitally draw a 400 pixel version of the same character in virtually any other visual style, it requires some degree of drawing ability, a basic understanding of a digital art program (and the cost of a decent one too) and self confidence. Any newbie to game development, who doesn't have much experience drawing, almost never dares to invest their time in this aspect of their game. I think this is demonstrated clearly in a lot of games, so many use a pixel art style that simply does not suit the game in my opinion. They feel safer doing what everyone else does, I'm very much convinced of it at this point.

[Zorg]

In my optinion, a limited artstyle can help to keep the graphics consistent - if you respect the limitations of the chosen style.

[Melon Mason]

Well that may be, but good design keeps graphics consistent regardless of what style you choose.

[ｂ∀ ｋｋｕｓａ]

a talented artist keeps graphic consistent.

[Melon Mason]

a talented artist keeps graphic consistent.

That's true, but design is part of artistic talent, at least with regards to game artists. The two are not exclusive.

An artist finds their consistency in process, much like a game does. A game that has a beautiful, consistent design did not achieve it by hoping for the best; they followed a process of concept art and development.

If you follow a design process, you can be a mediocre artist and be consistent.

[FNKVSSL]

I'm not married to the retro style, and I can see myself working with higher fidelity graphics in the future- especially considering I start all my pixel work by quantizing colors on digital paintings anyway- but there are distinct advantages to working with low res indexed color artwork: Since every color is explicitly defined, it's a hell of a lot easier to make precise masks and nonuniform color adjustments. I waste so much time futzing with transparent pixels and anti-aliased edges to keep them from screwing up my selections when working on polished true color illustrations, and it's virtually impossible to affect radical color changes without working around luminosity limitations or deferring to expensive third party software (I wish I had this). With pixel art programs, you just select a range in the color table and drag some sliders. It's great, I love it.

There's also color cycling, which is a fast and actually pretty easy method for generating organic animations on a large scale. Plus, since every color is on a table, you can just lerp the values of each index for smooth color transitions. Index manipulation is a dead art these days though, I only know of one engine that supports it. It pains me to see that none of you retro guys are leveraging the strengths of your format!

The big con here is that pixel art isn't as appealing as we think. It's apparently the recourse for myopic manbabies fetishizing the ignoble past (of which I surely am one) and amateurs who think they can hide their lack of drawing skill. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[lithander]

[Pixel-style is for] amateurs who think they can hide their lack of drawing skill. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Well, this is nothing to be ashamed of. The "ease" of creating assets *is* an important factor to consider when chosing an artstyle for your low-budget project.

Pixelart is the only kind of graphical asset I can produced in a decent quality and speed. (Example: http://runehunt.pixelpracht.net/) And I guess that the same reasoning applies to many other game developers picking the "retro-style".

Even if you can hope to create (or have created) less abstract art assets in reasonable quality, to do so might blow up the scope of your game project and renders it undevelopable. In a retro-style game you can use a lot of shortcuts that are no option if you aim for more detailed graphical presentation.

But I think more devs should consider different, equally efficient artstyles instead of picking the retro-style without much thought. If you find an efficient and unique style (e.g. http://www.ridiculousfishing.com/) you stick out from the crowd without losing many of the retro-style benefits.

TLDR: Artificial constraints can be benefitial when finding an efficient style. But why not consider constraints other then paletized, low-res pixel graphics?

There are a plethora of pixel editors but too few graphic software that try something fundamentally different. (Like maybe a triangular lattice instead of a grid?)

[FNKVSSL]

There are a plethora of pixel editors but too few graphic software that try something fundamentally different. (Like maybe a triangular lattice instead of a grid?)

Hexels!

[Sik]

There's also color cycling, which is a fast and actually pretty easy method for generating organic animations on a large scale. Plus, since every color is on a table, you can just lerp the values of each index for smooth color transitions. Index manipulation is a dead art these days though, I only know of one engine that supports it. It pains me to see that none of you retro guys are leveraging the strengths of your format!

The problem with palette cycling is that often it looks like shit, you can tell the boundaries of the shades rather quickly and once you do the effect is completely ruined for you. It doesn't help that the most common use is for running water and such, but palette cycling is completely awful for the water splash at the end (since it can't change shape). It looks better in stuff like cycling lights and the like, or maybe stuff like spirals (but those have their own set of issues).

(and before you complain: there are snowfall and rain examples in your link, but unless you're on an actual retro system with a hard sprite limit, you're better off drawing those as sprites instead, it's awfully hard to draw color cycles with gaps in them)

As for plain palette swaps, well:
http://gameaccessibilityguidelines.com/ensure-no-essential-information-is-conveyed-by-a-colour-alone

[FNKVSSL]

The actual problem with palette cycling is that the method hasn't progressed any since its introduction in the 80s. If we could cycle alpha values (possible in Pro Motion, actually), you could overlap asynchronous cycles or even throw some blending in there to eliminate visual repetition and contiguous shapes. Mark got a lot of mileage out of it, but it should have only been the beginning. It's still useful today if you're rendering cycles out as frames and compositing them elsewhere. It's great for fluids in general- water, smoke, fire, all the effects that are hardest to animate traditionally.

It's also incredibly easy to draw cycles with gaps in them if you leverage

and continuous brush feedback: All of these took seconds to produce. It's the whole reason I get excitable about cycling, I'd do a tutorial if I thought it'd be of use to someone. Right now I'm experimenting with using cycling to provide ancilliary motion to traditional frame animation, I think special effects stuff like that is where the technique is really going to shine.

(Also first SRB2, then Retro, now here- we always wind up in the same place somehow!)