49 réponses à ce sujet

[JWvonGoethe]

NPCs should not have extremely low resolution face textures.

Flemeth should not look like something out of Final Fantasy.

Surfaces in cities, on walls and on the ground, should not be uniformly flat and largely monochrome.

Mage clothes should not be outrageously gaudy in colour and design.

The art style succeeded in DA2 in places like the Wounded Coast, Sundermount, and, to a lesser extent, Darktown, as well as in the design of companion outfits. I was also generally happy with building interiors and the Deep Roads, though these were maybe a little bland. Getting rid of the general sterile feeling in areas would be good too, though I'm not sure this was entirely caused by art style (for instance, ambient dialogue spoken by NPCs often sounding distant and thin did not help here.)

Modifié par JWvonGoethe, 29 octobre 2012 - 11:58 .

[DarkKnightHolmes]

DA2 looked like bloody plastic men walking around and those elves........ God, those elf faces.

They changed their art style once from DAO to DA2, they can do it again!

[BouncyFrag]

Lathrim wrote...

BouncyFrag wrote...

Maclimes wrote...

Fix the elves. I'm not saying they have to go back to being pointy-eared humans (in fact, I would advise against that). But meet somewhere in the middle.

So true. This must be remedied.

Definitely. The Elves looked ridiculously bad in Dragon Age II IMO. This is a bloody insult to Zevran. <_<

I bet he would be forced to agree with the statement that he no longer looks "ridiculously awesome."

[Bernhardtbr]

I suggest the game uses contemporary art as inspiration. Therefore armor should be made of toilet parts wrapped together.

[EpicBoot2daFace]

One of my issues regarding mages and clothing in general was how everything lacked detail. One could say that this is a graphics issue, but I think art style also plays into it.




There's a good amount of color in Witcher 2 and I think that's often overlooked. You can also see the stitching other tiny details. The graphics engine does wonders, but if Cd Projekt didn't have such great artists, it wouldn't look nearly as good as it does.

[marshalleck]

Parallax mapping go.

[marshalleck]

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

One of my issues regarding mages and clothing in general was how everything lacked detail. One could say that this is a graphics issue, but I think art style also plays into it.

FFS I had forgotten the man-hands in DAO. Look at Wynne's paws! They're bigger than her head. 

[tishyw]

Mark of the Dragon wrote...

Change the art style. The cartoony look of DA2 really killed the feeling that it was a mature game. Do i want revamped looks for elves and darkspawn? Of course. I would love to see the models made better BUT more important bring back the more realistic style of Dragon Age Origins

Agreed, I loathed the cartoony art style of DA2.  Unfortunately the devs have already said that they're not going to change the art style for 3, so I don't hold out much hope for it despite the game engine.

If they can get it looking like the concept art then I'd be a very happy camper indeed!

[LTD]

As long as nothing in DA3 in no way reminds of DA2's art style I'm vaguely optimistic.

[EpicBoot2daFace]

tishyw wrote...

Mark of the Dragon wrote...

Change the art style. The cartoony look of DA2 really killed the feeling that it was a mature game. Do i want revamped looks for elves and darkspawn? Of course. I would love to see the models made better BUT more important bring back the more realistic style of Dragon Age Origins

Agreed, I loathed the cartoony art style of DA2.  Unfortunately the devs have already said that they're not going to change the art style for 3, so I don't hold out much hope for it despite the game engine.

If they can get it looking like the concept art then I'd be a very happy camper indeed!

You know, if you drop the resolution down to 640x480 it almost looks like a PS2 Final Fantasy game.

Modifié par EpicBoot2daFace, 30 octobre 2012 - 01:36 .

[challenger18]

I have no problem with the art style in DA2. I just wish they would work more on coming up with a way to fix things that seemed off in DA2 as well as fix the backgrounds from DAO and DA2. If you look at the concept art for DA game, it looks fantastic, but when you look at the games themselves they lack detail. DAO backgrounds looked like you were running on a landfill, whereas if you weren't in Hightown in DA2 then everything looked bland, empty, the walls looked like they only had one texture. All of that is a huge miss if Lowtown and Darktown are were the worse off and refugees are supposed to live.

The elves are something that also needs to be addressed. While I don't mind the redesign, I think if you're going to with something that looks human but still alien then you need to put in the time to make sure it's done right. It can be done. Fenris and Merrill got the time and effort to ensure to ensure they look good, but every other elf in the game looks horrible. Either come up with a different aesthetic that is attractive to people (if the elves are supposed to look pretty lore-wise) or spend the time and effort to make sure the design of your elves actually look good with DA2 design.

I am hoping with the new engine as well as the time that BioWare is given, their art team will be able to have the graphical power as the time to put together an aesthetic that is pleasing to look at from the environments down to the details on character's clothes.

[Doctoglethorpe]

Amycus89 wrote...

it has to do with the engine. The witcher 2 uses the "RED" engine. DA:O and DA2 uses an entirely different one. The engine used can make a major difference in the look of the game. The reason why people are in awe of the graphics in BF3 isn't because of any special artstyle, far as I know...

While I do think that they should scrap that cartoony artstyle and go for a more realistic look, it doesn't have that much to do with the graphics.

Thats simply false.  It has everything to do with the art style.  DAO vs DA2 is proof in itself as both games are on the same engine.  (When devs say they are using meavily modified and enhanced versions of engines, they are basically just saying they added to its capabilities but its still the same engine fundamentally) 

Engines can help squeeze out more detail, handle more effects and moving objects and etc, but in terms of the basic look of a game that has everything to do with art direction.  If engines dictated the appearence of games then every unreal game would look like Gears of War.  They don't.  Games on Frost Bite 2.0 are not all going to look realistic.  They will share the engines great texture detail, various effects and optimization, but they will only look the same if intentionally made so. 

DA3 can still share the same art direction of DA2 on a new engine, but now with far greater detail and effects, and hopefully run better too if they don't over do it.  DA2's PC optimization is pretty bad but BF3 ran like a god.   

[Quicksilver26]

Maria Caliban wrote...

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

What are some of your suggestions for Bioware's art team?

Hmmm...

Dear BioWare art team,
You are professional artists. I am not.

I suggest you do arty things and stuff.

Yours,
Maria!

QFT
Gosh dren it dude how do you do it every thing you right is pure win. 

[Rawgrim]

tishyw wrote...

Mark of the Dragon wrote...

Change the art style. The cartoony look of DA2 really killed the feeling that it was a mature game. Do i want revamped looks for elves and darkspawn? Of course. I would love to see the models made better BUT more important bring back the more realistic style of Dragon Age Origins

Agreed, I loathed the cartoony art style of DA2.  Unfortunately the devs have already said that they're not going to change the art style for 3, so I don't hold out much hope for it despite the game engine.

If they can get it looking like the concept art then I'd be a very happy camper indeed!

Seriously? this has been confirmed? If this means DA2 elves and cartoony combat, yet again, I just might give up on Bioware.

[goofyomnivore]

I don't think DA]['s art style is salvageable. Not saying Origins was amazing, but I thought it was a decent foundation to build on. I can't wait to see an in game screenshot on Frostbite. Although that probably won't be till sometime next year.

[Plaintiff]

I prefer DA2's artstyle vastly to Origins and I hope they keep it. 'Cartoony' is not bad (which is not to say thar DA2 looks like a cartoon, because it doesn't, and I think anyone who says it does has probably never seen one).

Simple aesthetics can often be beautiful. I think that all the current artsyle needs is more colour and texture.

Modifié par Plaintiff, 30 octobre 2012 - 08:59 .

[Pzykozis]

marshalleck wrote...

Parallax mapping go.

Abit old hat, all the cool kids these days use displacement mapping.

Im not really bothered about overall style, I just hope that we get far more detail on a micro level large empty flat areas are not your friend.

[fchopin]

Graphics are very important, it does not mater what art style you pick if the graphics are not good.

I don't want to see any more wooden and plastic graphics.

[h0neanias]

I am definitely on the side of aesthetics, as opposed to mere technicals. Infinity Engine games still look beautiful after all those years, whereas NWN is almost insufferable to look at. Realism, however, is another topic entirely. You can go real or go fancy, that's the team's call, but what you need in both cases is sense and skill.

[Amycus89]

EpicBoot2daFace wrote...

Amycus89 wrote...

it has to do with the engine. The witcher 2 uses the "RED" engine. DA:O and DA2 uses an entirely different one. The engine used can make a major difference in the look of the game. The reason why people are in awe of the graphics in BF3 isn't because of any special artstyle, far as I know...

While I do think that they should scrap that cartoony artstyle and go for a more realistic look, it doesn't have that much to do with the graphics.

Do you think Dragon Age 2 would have looked amazing if it were using Frostbite 2?

Nope. Not if that was the only change, where they just used the same assets and so on. However, a good engine can make it psossible to use a larger polycount among other things. And more polygons allows for better models. If you look at the poor citicens of Kirkwall you will see that Bioware was really trying to save up the amount of polys used, despite the areas being pretty small compared to other games. I liked the artstyle that was in the concept art for example, elves included. Unfortunately the in-game assets didn't look nearly as good, and had a bit of a more "cartoonish" feel - something that is often used in games that tries to save in on the polycount.

Like I said before, I still prefer a "realistic" look, but I still did like the syle they used in the ARTWORK as well.
Compare the elves in this image to what we actually got in-game:

Modifié par Amycus89, 30 octobre 2012 - 10:48 .

[h0neanias]

Absolutely. It is hard to argue against the view there was a serious disconnect on the road to the model artists. Plainly put, they screwed up. Which is surprising, since other races were done quite well.

Modifié par h0neanias, 30 octobre 2012 - 11:07 .

[Bernhardtbr]

It´s hard to do decent artstyle and aesthetics when the game hasn´t decided what it wants to be.

The Witcher 2 looks intersting and fresh because, well, it uses something that isn´t fresh which is realistic medieval and knight armor and looks. DA hasnt decided if it wants to be AD&D with a different name or something else. Also, I´ve said before they should try to put more plausible weapons in size and proportions instead of gigamegaGreatsowrds that even Conan would have trouble using (and what´s worse, wielded by thin elves).

Modifié par Bernhardtbr, 30 octobre 2012 - 11:32 .

[TheRealJayDee]

TsaiMeLemoni wrote...

I do think the quality of the artstyle will determine whether a game looks good or not, no matter how good the graphics are/can be.

I actually don't want a 'realistic' art style for DA...I think they tried for that, especially in DA2, and the result is the bland,mostly color-less environments. I want them to go bigger and more fantastical, especially since we're playing a fantasy game.

I really don't think it can be said DA2 was the Bioware's attempt to go for a more 'realistic' art style, not at all. They were explicitely going with a more 'artsy' approach, with questionable results. Also 'fantasy' doesn't neccessarily mean everything is big and fantastical, that very much depends on the the respective setting.
 
But I agree, the artstyle is extremely important. DA2's changes in artstyle compared to DA:O resulted in me getting a significantly reduced Dragon Age feel from it. I'll wait and see what they do with DA3.


I was, for example, really surprised how well the cartoonish style of Telltale's The Walking Dead game worked for me. At first I was kinda turned off by it and thought it was not fitting, but soon I was convinced otherwise. It does do an amazing job conveying the emotions of the characters and the overall horror of the setting, and that's what counts.

[EricHVela]

Any graphic designer should know that impression is more important than actual measurements.

[Bernhardtbr]

That depends on the public that it´s aimed. If I liked Final Fantasy I´d be playing Final Fantasy. Cool and realistic aren´t opposites.

As any graphics designer should know.

Modifié par Bernhardtbr, 30 octobre 2012 - 02:23 .