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TIGSource ForumsPlayerGeneral[ ? ] 8-bit is more popular than (o) cutting-edge?
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Trystin
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« Reply #40 on: April 04, 2013, 03:01:09 PM »

If minecraft wanted to be retro, they would have used the low-fi textures as well as a low resolution to imitate the old Doom, Starfox and stuff.
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gimymblert
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« Reply #41 on: April 04, 2013, 05:29:33 PM »

Transformation matrix can be avoided thanks to a magic spell call unity.

I know, I know, just was an example. In general, going 3d adds more complexity to any project, and for purely design-oriented developers who don't want to deal with such details (which happens to be a lot of the people who get into games just to make their idea a reality) it is a hassle.

We all know how to draw on a 2d paper, so it is hardly surprising that many, even having the tools to make 3d games, prefer to stick with 2d.

That's very very relative, street of rage is a 3D game, you move in xyz, so is zelda snes and GB. The complexity is a perceive complexity, you don't need mesh to do "3D", not free, 3PS or FPS camera. Isometric game are harder to conceive in 2D than in 3D.

The thing is people are thinking of 3D from the format of modern 3D game. For me 3D as a production method handle a lot of thing, you don't need all those fine rotation anymore you need them in 2D. Also 3D has started with freeform level mesh, it's only recently that tile base world has been big (thx to minecraft) which is easy and more intuitive, 2d has been tile based for so long its almost an invisible convention that mean "2d".

I try to make 2D game before, I had a lot of trouble, the day i start blitz3D I had a prototype running in less than 15mn I was impress + I didn't have to draw all direction. Most 3D engines have more robust collision than 2D engine (handling penetration and sliding) and more vector tools (having collision normal is priceless). You don't have complex layering to sort visual data too.

The problem with 3D for me are just bad complex example and wrong envy.
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« Reply #42 on: April 05, 2013, 02:59:19 AM »

@Gimym TILBERT:

I agree with you. I personally see that 3d actually simplifies a lot of things, specially in the long term, once you have a workable framework built.

My point, actually, is exactly this thing you said:

The thing is people are thinking of 3D from the format of modern 3D game.

The OP was about the apparent popularity of 2d vs. 3d, and thus we're talking about statistics more than individuals. And from a statistical point of view, the common-denominator tends to be people who are not as technologically saavy or experienced to see much beyond basic preconceptions.

That's why I used a random technical concept like a transformation matrix. It is not relevant what it is or what it is used for, for a big portion of people wanting to "make games", any technical term like it sounds like some arcane unknowable secret that requires years of practice atop a secluded tower to master.

Furthermore, as you stated, most people see 3d and think AAA Action Game, not stopping to contemplate whether the 3d applies to graphics, gameplay, or marketing.



You know, it'd be funny how many people have missed the point of my post by fixating on the transformation matrix thing if it wasn't so.... Wait, I even explained my meaning a few posts up! It is funny!  Big Laff
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #43 on: April 05, 2013, 08:40:04 AM »

perhaps because you didn't give any other examples of why you believe that 3d is harder to make games in (with engines) than 2d is
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« Reply #44 on: April 05, 2013, 02:56:00 PM »

For a lot of people the concept of "transformation matrix" is up there with "klatuu veratta niktu".

Really, I did a dual Day Earth Stood Still / Army of Darkness reference. Do I need to drown posts in smilies to make it clear it is a tongue-in-cheek comment?
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #45 on: April 05, 2013, 05:23:29 PM »

no, i understand that, but you still claimed that making 3d games is harder than making 2d games, even if the example you used for that was humorous. so i was just wondering if you have any real examples of that claim, unless that claim itself was also joking or something. e.g. if making 3d games actually is harder, why? is it that level design takes more time because you are placing things in all 3 dimensions, which takes a lot more time? is animating a model harder than animating a sprite? i don't really understand what would be different
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« Reply #46 on: April 05, 2013, 06:53:51 PM »

just ask any modeller if it takes more to make an AAA-standard animated character or a random pixelated walking cycle... last time I asked the first was more than a week while the second is around half an hour.
I think you can guess where most of the work in 3D goes Smiley

Also, 3D control systems are harder, and thus gameplay is harder to design; you will need custom shaders; you will need HD textures which are often harder to do than some random pixelated noise etc...
And if you don't use something like Unity 3D requires a solid maths background for pretty much everything (3D rotations, quaternions, transforms) which for many indies is just too much to tackle (but even with Unity, being able to use that stuff helps a lot).
Of course, making a game like Street Fighter II is a massive amount of work even if it is pixelated (or more if it is!) but your typical fake-8-bit-puzzle-platformer is just no work compared to the minimum acceptable 3D game.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #47 on: April 05, 2013, 07:08:03 PM »

most of that stuff is irrelevant, though. i wasn't talking about 8 bit platformers or indie vs AAA, i was talking about 2d vs 3d in general. take well-animated 2d AAA games like odin sphere:

-- from what i remember, atlus said that making that game was more expensive than any 3d game they've ever made, because of the amount of artists required

and sure if you ask a 3d modeler which is harder they'll say 3d modeling -- because chances are they've never done 2d animation. if you ask a 2d animator chances are they'd say 2d is harder. that doesn't really mean anything. everyone values their own skills above the skills of others

it's somewhat ridiculous to compare animating a modern AAA character (with all animations, for every action) with an 8-bit sprite's walk cycle. i wasn't comparing those two at all. animation means animation: all the actions. for 2d objects, this can include thousands of frames. there's no way to draw all that in less than a week.
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gimymblert
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« Reply #48 on: April 05, 2013, 07:37:08 PM »

just ask any modeller if it takes more to make an AAA-standard animated character or a random pixelated walking cycle... last time I asked the first was more than a week while the second is around half an hour.
I think you can guess where most of the work in 3D goes Smiley

Also, 3D control systems are harder, and thus gameplay is harder to design; you will need custom shaders; you will need HD textures which are often harder to do than some random pixelated noise etc...
And if you don't use something like Unity 3D requires a solid maths background for pretty much everything (3D rotations, quaternions, transforms) which for many indies is just too much to tackle (but even with Unity, being able to use that stuff helps a lot).
Of course, making a game like Street Fighter II is a massive amount of work even if it is pixelated (or more if it is!) but your typical fake-8-bit-puzzle-platformer is just no work compared to the minimum acceptable 3D game.


Minecraft
except the procedural world and chunk management)
Also You can just do an isometric camera or fixed camera like in 2D, no difficulty at all.

3D != AAA HD
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J-Snake
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« Reply #49 on: April 06, 2013, 05:12:28 AM »

I can imagine that creating a single high detail 3d-model is a lot more work than a 2D-sprite version of it. But once the 3D-model is done animating can be a lot less work since it is more and more driven by algorithms/tools. In 2D every sprite needs the same dedication in general.

My estimation would be that it will be less work to create a fighter with 3D-models than with 2D sprites, especially when you need a lot of frames for fluidity.
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« Reply #50 on: April 06, 2013, 06:18:35 AM »

most of that stuff is irrelevant, though. i wasn't talking about 8 bit platformers or indie vs AAA, i was talking about 2d vs 3d in general. take well-animated 2d AAA games like odin sphere:

-- from what i remember, atlus said that making that game was more expensive than any 3d game they've ever made, because of the amount of artists required

and sure if you ask a 3d modeler which is harder they'll say 3d modeling -- because chances are they've never done 2d animation. if you ask a 2d animator chances are they'd say 2d is harder. that doesn't really mean anything. everyone values their own skills above the skills of others

it's somewhat ridiculous to compare animating a modern AAA character (with all animations, for every action) with an 8-bit sprite's walk cycle. i wasn't comparing those two at all. animation means animation: all the actions. for 2d objects, this can include thousands of frames. there's no way to draw all that in less than a week.

just look at the title of this thread and you'll see why I was talking about 8-bit vs AAA Durr...?

Besides, talking "in general" is pretty much a sure way of saying nothing, because "2D" and "3D" are too diverse to draw any conclusion just from how a game is rendered.
But I think it's pretty safe to assume that the "least" you can do with 2D that is still fun(ie. SMB ) can be pulled together in hours with today's tools, while the "least 3D" (doom?) is much more complicated even using tools like Unity, let alone coding it from scratch.

I see people have used Minecraft as an example, but that is a quite bad example, too - as it requires fairly advanced knowledge about tesselation, threading and VBOs to be done right, and it's still pretty heavy even if it is just blocks.
For sure it can't be done by plopping boxes in Unity... so yeah, it's a good example of how even the simplest 3D games can have hidden quirks that make them harder to make.
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J-Snake
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« Reply #51 on: April 06, 2013, 09:14:09 AM »

When not "general" then "depends" is the answer.

With tools a lot is possible:




In case some of you are interested in the whole video about a modern 3D game engine (it covers only the rendering part though)



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gimymblert
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« Reply #52 on: April 06, 2013, 09:54:19 AM »

My point with minecraft was the modeling; especially if you use tool, you won't even need to open blender to do it with unity.

Also From my experience, with tools, 3D is way easier, like no match at all. Unless you try having a character running on a sphere and turning dependently from the camera, but you are doing advance stuff and the point is lost.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #53 on: April 06, 2013, 10:00:53 AM »

just look at the title of this thread and you'll see why I was talking about 8-bit vs AAA Durr...?

Besides, talking "in general" is pretty much a sure way of saying nothing, because "2D" and "3D" are too diverse to draw any conclusion just from how a game is rendered.
But I think it's pretty safe to assume that the "least" you can do with 2D that is still fun(ie. SMB ) can be pulled together in hours with today's tools, while the "least 3D" (doom?) is much more complicated even using tools like Unity, let alone coding it from scratch.

I see people have used Minecraft as an example, but that is a quite bad example, too - as it requires fairly advanced knowledge about tesselation, threading and VBOs to be done right, and it's still pretty heavy even if it is just blocks.
For sure it can't be done by plopping boxes in Unity... so yeah, it's a good example of how even the simplest 3D games can have hidden quirks that make them harder to make.

the topic had changed by that point, we weren't talking about 8-bit games at all anymore, but rather whether you need more knowledge to create a 3d game than a 2d game when using engines

also i doubt anyone, even with today's tools, could make a game as content-filled and polished as super mario bros. 1 in a few hours
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J-Snake
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« Reply #54 on: April 06, 2013, 11:27:20 AM »

also i doubt anyone, even with today's tools, could make a game as content-filled and polished as super mario bros. 1 in a few hours
More importantly, even less so with the same quality in mind, not just an arbitrary approximation of it.
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Oskuro
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« Reply #55 on: April 07, 2013, 07:38:50 AM »

so i was just wondering if you have any real examples of that claim

Ok, from the "No shit Sherlock" list of points so obvious I didn't think it was necessary to mention them:

  • From a mathematical standpoint, adding another dimension greatly increases complexity, both for design and implementation of even simple data structures.

    Yes, for people who grasp the concepts, most 2d data structures (vectors, matrices) can be easily extrapolated to an arbitrary number of dimensions, but, again, common denominator, for most people, having to mentally handle an extra dimension is a problem.

    And not all mathematical concepts scale easily anyway, for example trigonometric calculations are trickier in 3d.

  • From a computational standpoint, the extra dimension directly multiplies the processing requirements of a given program. Traversing a 2d matrix in search of an specific entry might take a maximum of width*height (n2 for width==height) operations, but on a 3d matrix it becomes width*height*depth(n3  for width==height==depth).

    Certainly there are tricks and techniques to optimize 3-dimensional operations, but that's the point, the need for optimization techniques directly implies that there has been an increase in complexity.

  • From an art perspective, creating 3d assets is more complex. As I said earlier, everyone has some skill drawing on paper, if only because we all doodled as children. Moving to 3d asset creation, even with user-friendly modelling suites, is a new skill to be learned by someone trying it for the first time, which means more complexity from the get go. And then, the modelling process is tougher as you have one more dimension to keep in mind, which is analogous to how sculpture is more complex than painting.

    And let's not get into the complexities of 3d animation, 3d ligthing, or model texturing (this last one being one of my most hated parts of 3d modelling).

    Additionally, if you have a 3d environment the player is free to look around,you no longer have a 4th wall and a fixed perspective to hide things, and thus more work needs to be done since the player has more places to look at.

  • From a gameplay design perspective, 3d can be a can of worms. For one, in the real world, we move in 3d, thus we can easily spot inconsistencies in a 3d game that deviates from what is expected. From shooters feeling like the characters are hovering cameras with guns attached, to cars handling like supermarket carts full of rocks.

    And then, of course, we bump back into both the mathematical and computational complexity. Designing a plumber that moves on two axes, and whose enemies come from two possible sides of the screen, is drastically simpler than having every direction open for movement and attack. Not to mention making the computer controlled entities navigate said environment.


Do I really need to bring up more?

Yes, 3d is more complex, but even if it really wasn't, the point still remains that, for most people facing the choice between 2d and 3d, the perceived greater difficulty of 3d results in many favouring 2d to avoid moving out of their comfort zone.

Again, I'm talking statistics and referring to the common denominator here, and I do agree that the perception of 3d being harder is often exaggerated. Many have found out later that good 2d art, for example, isn't exactly a walk in the park either.
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ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)
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« Reply #56 on: April 07, 2013, 08:35:56 AM »

none of that is at all convincing to me. about half of it deals with math issues, and the question was the difference between developing a 2d game and a 3d game in an engine, and engines take care of the math for you. users of unity don't need to learn three-dimensional trigonometry to make a game. the other half deals with art asset issues which was already discussed above: e.g. the odin sphere discussion

the gameplay issue is new but you didn't really mention *why* 3d gameplay is harder to create than 2d gameplay, you just said that it is, which is assuming the conclusion. i don't see why, for example, the gameplay of the same game in a 3d vs a 2d perspective, within the same genre, is any harder. e.g. compare 2d jrpgs and 3d jrpgs; they typically have identical gameplay, the transition from ff6 to ff7 didn't make the gameplay any more complex

regarding the artist training issue, i don't really understand what you mean; everyone learns how to scribble as a kid, sure, but if that's all you've ever learned, you cannot be a 2d artist for any videogame, you need specialized training and tens of thousands of hours of practice regardless of whether you create art in 2d or 3d. there are plenty of issues the 2d artist has to deal with that the 3d artist does not: learning how to represent perspective in a 2d plane, shading, etc. -- those are all much simpler in 3d art
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« Reply #57 on: April 07, 2013, 10:11:05 AM »

I think that you should really try to finish a 3D game, maybe a 3D version of your game, and see if you are still unconvinced Smiley
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« Reply #58 on: April 07, 2013, 12:17:53 PM »

e.g. compare 2d jrpgs and 3d jrpgs; they typically have identical gameplay, the transition from ff6 to ff7 didn't make the gameplay any more complex

Perhaps from the player perspective, but not for the developers. FF7 would definitely have been much more complex to implement than the SNES era games were.
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« Reply #59 on: April 07, 2013, 12:24:00 PM »

Legend of Grimrock had pointless tedius battles. You could have only left the riddles and the game would have been more fun and would take less time to develop.
So not only AAA are guilty of putting too much effort where it "doesn't count".
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