90 réponses à ce sujet

[lyleoffmyspace]

Two of my favourite fantasy franchises of late have two things in common - realistic down-to-Earth aesthetics.

The first is Game of Thrones - it perhaps might be a little dull but at least it's realistic. I understand in a videogame you might need more interesting aesthetics to tell different characters and armours apart.

I felt like DA:O had this - a lot of the armours felt realistic, if a little plastic, and the weapons were oversized. DA2 went the other way - apart from the champion armour, everything looked overly plastic, oversized and needlessly spiky. It didn't feel real. Meredith's sword was stupid and oversized and everything was so spiky and ridiculous.

The Witcher 2 though, hit a sweet spot. Every character and faction and had unique look and design. Weapons had weight and everything look really good, as well as plausible and realistic.





Could we get a similar art style into the Dragon Age universe or are we stuck with oversized swords and spikes and exploding?

[cJohnOne]

Those ;pictures shows lots of detail on the costumes but to my eye they are overly detailed as in not realistic. Having more detail and color than a real costume. I don't want that. On the other hand I find the males to be too wide and bulky in DA2 and the art style could be improved.

[Maria Caliban]

The use of color on the costumes is realistic. The pre-modern world had more dyeing options than 'dung' and 'soot.'

[cJohnOne]

real as in real or real as in possible?

[LolaLei]

I'd like for it to have a slightly more realistic style, maybe closer to The Witcher 2 but not too much. I like the idea of costumes and settings to be more colourful and dynamic than DA2 was.

[Servo to the bitter end]

Maria Caliban wrote...

The use of color on the costumes is realistic. The pre-modern world had more dyeing options than 'dung' and 'soot.'

This.

I don't know how the OP defines "down to earth realism," but the armor designs in DAO were pretty boring and samey, as was the whole aesthetic, including the character design. I like a little color and dynamism in my fantasy.

DA2 didn't nail it, but it was certainly on the right track. At least it had characters with teeth, as opposed to baleen.

Modifié par TommyServo, 19 avril 2012 - 05:47 .

[Dutchess]

Agreed. Also with the make up. Many NPCs looked ridiculous, with their lip color slider to the most extreme side. Really, what were they thinking?

[Maria Caliban]

cJohnOne wrote...

real as in real or real as in possible?

It's fantasy. Not non-fiction or historical fiction.

By definition, it can be appropriate for what we know of the setting but never real.

[Eternal Phoenix]

You mean like this?

  


 
The armor seems more realistic to me and yet retains a form of uniqueness to it. I hope Bioware use their own concept art as inspiration for armor in Dragon Age 3.

[lyleoffmyspace]

The new designs are pretty decent, but the swords and pauldrons are a abit overboard.

Its definitely an improvement on Dragon Age 2.

[bEVEsthda]

Maria Caliban wrote...

The use of color on the costumes is realistic. The pre-modern world had more dyeing options than 'dung' and 'soot.'

Particularly because that's the king.

But the colors are quite realistic. The blues are muted the way they should be. Only blue dye available was from Woad, which provides the exact same dyestuff as Indigo. Which means it's rather low saturation, rather blackish, greenish hue. And cannot become brighter.

In a fantasy world like DA, of course, any dyes can be available.

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 19 avril 2012 - 07:36 .

[Das Tentakel]

A nice example of what seems to be more or less accurate colour reproduction using old-fashioned methods is in this modern replica of the Pazyryk carpet (4th/3rd century BC).



The site itself (www.azerbaijanrugs.com/arfp-historical_classical_pazyryk-203x250cm.htm) has a listing of the dyestuffs, including onionskins

I posted the carpet mostly because it contains a fairly wide range of colours. But look at paintings of, say, a Lucas Cranach, or modern reconstructions of La Tene Gaulish armour or Hallstatt era clothing, and the Witcher 2's use of colour proves to be fairly credible.

More so than the brown and grey esthetic of many movies and games in a quasi-medieval setting actually<_<

Elton John is dead wrote...

You mean like this?
 (snip)
The armor seems more realistic to me and yet retains a form of uniqueness to it. I hope Bioware use their own concept art as inspiration for armor in Dragon Age 3.

I am sort of meh about this. I somehow get a WoW vibe - a more 'realistic' version of early WoW human armours, for instance. Bioware's artists sure love their pauldrons and belts. I like it more than the worst excesses of DA3, but I don't find the art either distinctive nor genuinely realistic. It does, however, sort of fit the DA tradition of being somewhere between realistic and unrealistic, stylized yet generic, not-quite-there feel.

And I 'love' () the DA tradition of providing armour for the rib cage but leaving the belly exposed. Good for morale

Modifié par Das Tentakel, 19 avril 2012 - 08:53 .

[bEVEsthda]

Das Tentakel wrote...

A nice example of what seems to be more or less accurate colour reproduction using old-fashioned methods is in this modern replica of the Pazyryk carpet (4th/3rd century BC).

<Snip>

The site itself (www.azerbaijanrugs.com/arfp-historical_classical_pazyryk-203x250cm.htm) has a listing of the dyestuffs, including onionskins

I posted the carpet mostly because it contains a fairly wide range of colours. But look at paintings of, say, a Lucas Cranach, or modern reconstructions of La Tene Gaulish armour or Hallstatt era clothing, and the Witcher 2's use of colour proves to be fairly credible.

More so than the brown and grey esthetic of many moves and games in a quasi-medieval setting actually<_<

Yes, that carpet looks very good. Basically, the only colors medieval textile dyes could make really saturated and bright are yellow - orange (pomegranate). Reds weren't bad though, a bit maroon perhaps. Many of those threads shown in the columns are NOT dyed with the dye matters listed though. So there's some disinformation going on.
 

Modifié par bEVEsthda, 19 avril 2012 - 08:56 .

[Sutekh]

sjpelkessjpeler wrote...

I hope that DA3 will be more realistic in their armors. Like stated above it looks wierd when a rogue like Isabella frontally attacks a templar in full armor and kills him without a scratch so to speak. I do have imagination but logic overrides this.

I really don't care about realism in fantasy; sounds a bit to me like an oxymoron. Even low fantasy settings have their non-realistic parts (e.g. Game of Thrones). As long as the design fits the internal logic of the world I'm playing in or watching / reading about, that's fine. The rest is really a matter of whether or not I find it good looking.

Besides, if you take the realistic route, armors should come with realistic downsides too, such as no running in massive armor, once you're down, you don't get up, and don't even think of crossing that river. Gravity's a b*tch.

As for the TW2 shots in the OP, they are indeed gorgeous - and have a "historical accuracy" to them that I very much like because it generally fits TW2. But they are TW2 shots, with a TW2 look. I'd rather have DA3 looking like its own game and find its own aesthetics.

((Possibly without huge swords and ugly pointy neck-guards))

[eroeru]

I actually love the new design - its reminiscent of truly borderline games in the high-fantasy/medieval genre. More specifically reminds me of Diablo - this in a good way (you got to admit that game had so much done right in terms of aesthetics). Diablo was out-of-this-world, really, yet believable in its dark tones and nihilistic, grim, and desperation-feeling approach (we probably won't be getting that feel in DA, so I don't know how I'll approach the use of this design in the real game - still, the designs remain good).

But it is slightly reminiscent of Blizzard games in a bad way as well - the characters look a bit stunted.

EDIT: actually, I take that back. They don't seem stunted in a bad sense - only problem really is that I don't imagine these characters play out in DA2-type story-telling. Would play out ideally in a more silent setting, where there's less cinematics. But with the current direction? I don't know... (this might indicate a more interesting approach in the story-delivering apartment too though, which I will greet with anticipation ).

Modifié par eroeru, 20 avril 2012 - 05:54 .

[Chaos Lord Malek]

lyleoffmyspace wrote...

The new designs are pretty decent, but the swords and pauldrons are a abit overboard.

Its definitely an improvement on Dragon Age 2.

Omg, where is this from??? It looks extremly good. Is that a concept for Dragon Age 3 ????

[lyleoffmyspace]

eroeru wrote...

I actually love the new design - its reminiscent of truly borderline games in the high-fantasy/medieval genre. More specifically reminds me of Diablo - this in a good way (you got to admit that game had so much done right in terms of aesthetics). Diablo was out-of-this-world, really, yet believable in its dark tones and nihilistic, grim, and desperation-feeling approach (we probably won't be getting that feel in DA, so I don't know how I'll approach the use of this design in the real game - still, the designs remain good).

But it is slightly reminiscent of Blizzard games in a bad way as well - the characters look a bit stunted.

EDIT: actually, I take that back. They don't seem stunted in a bad sense - only problem really is that I don't imagine these characters play out in DA2-type story-telling. Would play out ideally in a more silent setting, where there's less cinematics. But with the current direction? I don't know... (this might indicate a more interesting approach in the story-delivering apartment too though, which I will greet with anticipation ).

I think the art for the new characters is overstyled - but it's art so you expect that.

In the actual game I'm hoping for smaller pauldrons and stuff.

[Das Tentakel]

lyleoffmyspace wrote...

eroeru wrote...

I actually love the new design - its reminiscent of truly borderline games in the high-fantasy/medieval genre. More specifically reminds me of Diablo - this in a good way (you got to admit that game had so much done right in terms of aesthetics). Diablo was out-of-this-world, really, yet believable in its dark tones and nihilistic, grim, and desperation-feeling approach (we probably won't be getting that feel in DA, so I don't know how I'll approach the use of this design in the real game - still, the designs remain good).

But it is slightly reminiscent of Blizzard games in a bad way as well - the characters look a bit stunted.

EDIT: actually, I take that back. They don't seem stunted in a bad sense - only problem really is that I don't imagine these characters play out in DA2-type story-telling. Would play out ideally in a more silent setting, where there's less cinematics. But with the current direction? I don't know... (this might indicate a more interesting approach in the story-delivering apartment too though, which I will greet with anticipation ).

I think the art for the new characters is overstyled - but it's art so you expect that.

In the actual game I'm hoping for smaller pauldrons and stuff.

It's just 'working concept' stuff so we should not expect any close correspondence between the final result in DA3 and this art. Some of the DA:O concept art was terrific as well, but did not translate too well, if at all, in the game itself.

And yes, there's a bad case of pauldronitis there. The Wardens, especially, look uncomfortably similar to a more (semi-)realistic version of the Stormwind army (mainly because of the colour scheme, the pauldrons, triangular shields and some of the helmets). In fact, if I had read that they were concept art for the Stormwind army for WoW 2.0 I would have believed it immediately.
There are differences of course - the Stormwind troops seem to be better protected overall, and wear the emblem of Stormwind on their blue tabards (whereas the wardens have blue gambesons).

Modifié par Das Tentakel, 20 avril 2012 - 11:04 .

[MILK FOR THE KHORNE FLAKES]

MUCH AS I LOVE OVERSIZED WEAPONS IN THE RIGHT CONTEXT, THAT KNIGHT'S WEAPONRY IN THE CONCEPT ART LOOKS A BIT MUCH FOR A GAME THAT'S TRYING TO CONVINCE ME IT'S "GRITTY AND MATURE" VS. "GLEEFULLY IMMATURE."

[BomberJR]

The art direction for DA2 was too over the top for me. One step further and they might as well called it Final Fantasy: Dragon Age. Pull it back, make real looking swords and armour, and no more spinning, flipping, "super attacks" (yuck).

[brushyourteeth]

If we're going into Orlais, believe me -- there WILL be color.

[cJohnOne]

Yeah the guys sword is too wide for my tastes. From my point of view using historical stuff would be great!

[eroeru]

Nah, that sword and stuff seems just right - it's somewhat magical and high-fantasy, and believable at that. I believe that's what Bioware is aiming for anyway. Not a medieval simulator, but rather a game with (dark) magic.

Modifié par eroeru, 20 avril 2012 - 06:17 .

[lyleoffmyspace]

eroeru wrote...

Nah, that sword and stuff seems just right - it's somewhat magical and high-fantasy, and believable at that. I believe that's what Bioware is aiming for anyway. Not a medieval simulator, but rather a game with (dark) magic.

Having a sword that big is just wasteful. The Swords in Lord of the Rings look magical (look at Sting) but they don't have to be giant and stupid.