/vr/ - Retro Games

[Anonymous No.2834603]

What's /vr/ stance on modern 2D indie games? Do you like their style, or do you think it's a bastardization of pixel art? It's excusable to make games that look worse than NES games in today's time? it's a budgetary reason, a graphic fetish, or just lack of talent? it's reasonable? how about making them with lower resolution than GBA games? what are some indie games with good pixel art? how many questions can fit here?

[Anonymous No.2834635]

My stance is that they're not retro and that I'm now going to do something that it would be against board rules to say what it is I'm doing.

[Anonymous No.2834645]

>>2834603

I only like 8 bit era pixel art, everything was tight as hell with simple animations and tight movement.

I have a huge dislike for 16 bit pixel art mainly due to liberal use of transitional animations which fucked with collision detection and general gameplay becoming mushy and not as tight, not to mention a big chunk of games used pre rendered CGI as sprites. So fuck that shit, NES games might have had some wonky physics but in comparison to visual diarrhea that were a huge bulk of SNES era games, i`d rather deal with slight delay in input.

I don`t mind Metroid, Megaman and Mario inspired 2D games because a lot of the tightness of gameplay has direct causal link to the pixel style. but that`s about it. Especially hate it when RPGs and Adventure games use retro style. Because they are the most style over substance genres in gaming.

[Anonymous No.2834654]

>>2834603
I like it when indie games try to faithfully emulate /vr/ graphics. I can respect it when indie games use pixel art because of the lack of resources. I can also dig pixel art if it's particularly exceptional or just has good aesthetics.

What I can't really stand is the "tall man with 1 px legs" style like on your 2014 example or Superbrothers or millions of indie games out there. It doesn't look like anything at all, it doesn't look remotely like it belongs on any retro console, it's a maddeningly pretentious artstyle that is just huge fat pixels and particles with no definition for the sake of it (pixels = retro LMAO) and worst of all, those games often aren't that bad in the technical direction, and could be so much more if the makers bothered to make better pixel art or use vector graphics altogether. But nope, MUH RETRO FEEL.

[Anonymous No.2834660]

>>2834603
My stance is that it's shit, but I dig undertale, just not enough to become a fanboy.

[Anonymous No.2834665]

In regard to the art style, the developers take the easy way out.

There's nothing impressive about taking a computer capable of displaying over sixteen million different colors and feeding it hand-picked color combinations to simulate an artificially limited color palette. What's even less impressive is doing nothing interesting with that "limited" palette and instead using glorified stick figures made with a generic template.

It's really sad that the games they often list as "inspirations" are games that pushed how legitimately limited palettes could be used to create a realistic scene. It seems almost juvenile to drag those titles down by mentioning them in reference to these talentless idiots looking for quick money.

Pixels are not a selling point. Stop using them as one.

[Anonymous No.2834678]

>>2834654
We still not retro.

But "A love letter to the MSX" is pretty accurate description.

[Anonymous No.2834686]

I like how people get bent out of shape about it even though it's done to reduce the amount of work needed for assets

The only reason it's interpreted as a selling point is due to communities just like this one that place retro aesthetics on way too high of a pedestal (though I will agree some devs pander as a result of this, which I will agree is annoying)

[Anonymous No.2834889]

>>2834603
There is no bastardization of pixel art, there are only piss-tiny budgets.
Give every indie dev a 500K dollars and they will be able to afford Metal Slug style pixel art.

Also, pic related - dev is a proffesional sprite artist and has worked for WayForward.

[Anonymous No.2834896]

>>2834654
This style got popularized by Superbrothers success, and now everyone is doing it because it's super easy to do and requires zero animation skills to actually animate.

[Anonymous No.2834897]

>>2834889
>Give every indie dev a 500K dollars and they will be able to afford Metal Slug style pixel art.

You can't seriously be this stupid.

[Anonymous No.2834905]

>>2834889
>1022x767 resolution

at this point there really is no need for pixel art, nor is there a point.

[Anonymous No.2834931]

i think it sucks shit and "indie" devs should kill themselves

[Anonymous No.2834947]

>>2834889
Christ does this "budget" garbage extend to old-school video game fans too? I thought it was just anime fan nonsense.

Konjak made Legend of Princess in a couple of months "for no reason" and released it for free and it still has very detailed sprites. He's just a skilled artist who can draw shit fast.

Metal Slug looks amazing not just because they had money to hire artists but because they had good TASTE and hired artists that were perfect for the game they were making. It's very possible to have a huge budget and still make something that looks like shit.

Similarly you can have a tiny budget but if you're a great creative artist you can make stuff that looks amazing.
>>2834905
It's not really "retro" because old games were smudged out by TVs and whatnot, but I think pixel art in itself is a valid artistic choice much like making a mosaic.

[Anonymous No.2834958]

>>2834645
>Especially hate it when RPGs and Adventure games use retro style. Because they are the most style over substance genres in gaming.
Adventure games are a different beast but, instead of continuing a shitty trend, I'd rather have more RPGs that take inspiration from the few RPGs that DO have truly good gameplay and aren't entirely carried by things that you could do in other mediums. Stat-gaining is interesting in a basic way, same goes with choose-your-own-adventure stuff, but it's much better if you also have solid and gamey mechanics to complement it. It doesn't even have to be hard, just... make fighting and exploration fun and creative and interesting.

[Anonymous No.2834970]

>>2834947
>but I think pixel art in itself is a valid artistic choice much like making a mosaic.

I disagree, at certain point you might as well have the real drawings instead of using a bitmap filter that you cleaned up slightly in photoshop.

[Anonymous No.2834974]

>>2834931
Why don't you make a game then if you're hot shit

[Anonymous No.2834979]

>>2834974
game maker studio is free now, anyone can do it

[Anonymous No.2834982]

>>2834970
Perhaps you're right that there's a certain level of detail where drawing stuff by hand would be better. But then, I dunno, "HD" 2D gaming often has art direction that I'm not a fan of; stuff like, for example, the Ys I & II remakes that you can get on Steam. There's something over-digitized and awkward about that style which you won't find in traditional pixel art.

So I guess hand-drawn sprites are cool but only if they're done really well, and I don't really trust most artists to not screw up more "next-gen, HD" visuals. I mean, fuck, Konjak said the HD remake of Mighty Switch Force is "fantastic" and does his sprite work justice; if his "HD games" looked that fucking awful then, no way, stick to the pixels dude.

[Anonymous No.2834987]

The reason the Super Brothers style caught on as "THE old school style" and why all the cool pink hair indie dudes with all the right politics have those avatars is because it's the perfect style to represent the ideas of the community that created it. It has all the important traits:

-It's nonthreatening (possibly the most defining aspect of the indie identity)

-The characters' limbs are noodly

-It's "minimalistic' and not "try-hard" (this is why ripping off the worst aspects of Adventure Time along with the intentionally-shitty ironic art of people like Kate Beaton is so common in these cliques). Another very common indie thing is to not look like you're trying your best to hint that you are a "self-aware, knowing" person familiar with "retro aesthetics" (it helps that your audience is too young to actually know what those old games looked like). It's the same with music, "trying too hard" can be considered "corny" by indie types and most indie music is laid back, chill and not very emotionally revealing. And this brings me to my final point:

-It's not emotionally revealing. Hipsters by and large are not fans of art that is particularly expressive unless it has some other approved indie trait to make up for it (for example, if a loud angry unironic punk band is made up of transsexuals and the lyrics are about how gross cis people are - this is a real example by the way)

So, I guess the way to make a... maximalistic 2D game and still make it appealing to indie culture would be to fill it with far-left rhetoric.
>>2834974
>>2834979
>you're not a cook so you can't say this food tastes like shit
stop

[Anonymous No.2834990]

>>2834982
>Mighty Switch Force
Yuck, that game is awfully sexist. I think I've just lost all respect for that Konjak guy.

[Anonymous No.2834991]

>>2834686
>reduce the amount of work needed for assets
A good artist can make appealing art in a short amount of time. A quick sketch by Moebius (rip) will be more interesting than a detailed painting by Pendleton Ward.

Most 'indie' types are not good artists.

[Anonymous No.2834992]

it's a pigdisgusting indie hipster cashgrab for people blinded by "nostalgia"

[Anonymous No.2834993]

>>2834990
See, I know you're joking but I was actually thinking about that when I typed that comment. He worked on a game people consider sexist and he even drew porn of his own character (Xoda from Noitu Love 2) but now, since he realized indie culture doesn't like him, he's going out of his way to pander with retarded clique-approved opinions like "DmC is a fantastic beautiful game, Metal Gear Rising is mediocre and ugly" and "Anita Sarkeesian finally opened my eyes about the treatment of women in media".

If his new game (if he finally finishes it) will turn out popular, I'm sure it won't be a result of the people who worship shit like Proteus, Dys4ia and Passage as "high art". In fact, there will probably be a large conflict between the views he's been espousing to fit in and the views of the fanbase he will gain through it.

It's really sad, I've followed the guy on Twitter for years and I've seen him sell himself more and more. Even got fucking pink hair.

[Anonymous No.2834994]

>>2834992
>blinded by "nostalgia"
But anyone who actually grew up on those games realizes this shit looks nothing like old games

[Anonymous No.2834997]

>>2834992

except the people who buy their shit aren`t nostalgiafags as seen on vr, nostalgiafags are much more into collecting , emulating and romhacking rather than buying failed abortions that are indie sprite shit.

[Anonymous No.2835000]

>>2834993
>Dys4ia

This is great. I'm so glad I found out about this videogame, I think trans people needed an outlet like this. Thanks for pointing it out.

[Anonymous No.2835004]

N O T R E T R O

[Anonymous No.2835021]

>>2835000
You forgot the best part, the one where she implies you shouldn't get a psych exam before hormone therapy.

[Anonymous No.2835025]

>Have more than double the display resolution of yesteryear.
>"Let's half the sprite resolution instead!"

[Anonymous No.2835040]

>>2834994
>>2834997

hence the " around nostalgia

hurr durr, i'm playing the newest indie shitfest on steam. It's like that time when I played NES games 10 years before I was born.

[Anonymous No.2835056]

>>2834603
>I will only cherrypic what I want
I'm having fun with Stasis, Grimrock 2, Undertale, and Invisible INC.