/vr/ - Retro Games

>>10645169
>Then again ideas go around and come around maybe your post affected some else's thinking on some game which changed mine
Excellent. I wholly believe that I am the future of video games.

As for the specific artistry of Naughty Dog, I think that they were obviously technical innovators at one point. Jak&Daxter focusing on not having loading screens and running smoothly is great. And if you read about the creation of Crash Bandicoot you can see that a lot of thought went into things like colour balance, visual readability, they aren't pure computer-brains who would be happy with a game of wire-frame models. I think where they really fall down is on *vision*, which the Japanese always have. And what I consider to be the real dividing line between a craftsman or engineer and an artist. I make a point of calling the American works of this era "video game" because that's what they intended to make. The video game does not serve any higher aesthetic ideal or end, nothing is meant or communicated. It's just an iteration of a class of entertainment product. Within that frame they intend to do the best work they can, but nothing of great or lasting interest tends to spring from such a foundation.

When the Japanese created their mascot characters they were often trying to embody an ideal or fantasy, or give shape to a dream. Sonic is speed. Pokemon are the quaint wonders of nature. Mario is a bouncy cartoon strongman like Popeye. American ideas are far more crass, where they're even detectable. "Attitude". "Cartoon funny". Daxter is a very typical "funny irreverent cartoon sidekick" design, but I'll give them credit, he's funny in the first game, when he's directed by animators. I think he falls off massively when they try to lean on verbal humour. The humour of these games peaks in the pickup dances in the first games and little details like Daxter struggling to hold on while things go fast and getting flung around.

Just beat Jak and Daxter for the first time, what did I think of it?