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Do you like pixel art?

Pixel art is:


  • Total voters
    129

likaq

Arcane
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?
 

Cassidy

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I like pixel art





From games released in the late 80s and early 90s and a few modern exceptions like Serpent in the Staglands and Heroine Quest.

:obviously:

Hipster 2deep4u le retro "art" is complete excrement for the kind of people who play their "games" in Starbucks.
 

vean

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Jan 3, 2016
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296
I don't like it. It's at best a tolerable compromise if the dev doesn't have the money to do high res graphics.

It's especially bad when text-heavy games have pixelated fonts. I took one look at SITS and noped right out of there. Underrail also had terrible pixel fonts with scanlines... like what the fuck?
 

Jarpie

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Codex 2012 MCA
qrR4NLL.png


I love the old C64/Amiga/PC-VGA/-SVGA pixel art, or the modern games which uses the very similar style, such as SitS or Primordia. I fucking loathe the fucking lazy hipster pixel art which has huge pixels.
 

likaq

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I can add more options to the poll, any suggestions?
 

JarlFrank

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Agree 100% with Cassidy and Jarpie, oldschool 199X pixel art is goddamn beautiful, glorious Lucas Arts and Sierra adventure game pixel art, early 90s dungeon crawler pixel art, all of those are gorgeous as fuck. Modern indie pixel art is beautiful only in very few games (the games that are *actually* retro and try to emulate the old artstyles at low resolutions and 256 colors, rather than just going for the "lol I got pixels cause I'm hip" style that is in nowadays).

This shit is beautiful:
prim2.jpg

Screen5-S7Street_zps4009357c.png

Heroines-Quest.png

gemini-rue-2.jpg

6-a-tale-of-two-kingdoms.jpg
 

Riskbreaker

Guest
Hipster 2deep4u le retro "art" is complete excrement for the kind of people who play their "games" in Starbucks.
Sadly, I reckon that a large number of votes will be based on (completely justified) disdain for that particular strain of pixel"art".
 

Bumvelcrow

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I love pixel art done well. As JarlFrank said, some of the VGA/Amiga era adventures and RPGs were amazing then and amazing now. At least I think so. Sometimes I wonder, though, whether it's just nostalgia speaking. Would today's indoctrinated masses appreciate it or will they be posting 'Do you like non-full-sensory-experience art' threads in 20 years time while tears stream from their genetically modified cyber-implanted eyes?

Does it matter? I like what I like. Get off my lawn, etc...

I hate smoothed pixel art, which is an annoying feature in some emulators.
 

Melan

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Pixel art as a medium developed on computers, and it is uniquely suited for the computer screen, just like computer game music (for lack of a better term) developed within the technological possibilities of older hardware. Well done pixel art is a valid form of artistic expression even today, when the technological limitations that had created it are no longer around. Certainly, it is more exciting than when computer graphics try to imitate movies. It can also have cost advantages.

Of course, there is lazy or plainly bad pixel art, just like there are bad paintings and bad sculptures. It would be foolish to blame paint for a bad painting, though. It would also be foolish to say that just because we have gajillion-megapixel cameras, artists should abandon painting.
 

commie

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What Jarpie and Jarl said...Might and Magics of yore, adventure games, shit, even old simulator/strategy games had great pixel art, XCOM, Dune... but it continued on through the later IE's/Fallouts, Stronghold, Commandos, Robin Hood, Desperados etc. which also are pixel/sprite based games though not always thought as such(some did use prerenders of 3d that were drawn over, but still it's fucking pixels)....

Nowadays 'pixel art' denotes bundle filler garbage platformers where you are a red square trying to get past a 2 colour palette maze made of a thousand spikes to instakill you a billion times, while some pompous Limey voiceover talks existential bollocks. 2Deep4U hipster faggotry and pixel art go hand in hand these days, making those two words: 'pixel art' evoke involuntary revulsion in increasing amounts rather than a fond remembrance of a glorious age.
 

Siveon

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If it's good, yes. I don't really have a preference for it one way or the other. That said, badly made 2D is the worst thing to graze my eyes. Next to old polygon graphics and unity assets of course.

EDIT: There should be an option like, 'can be good'.
 
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I like pixel art. In fact I make pixel art sometimes.

crank_by_nekot_the_brave-d92b8lc.png


What I don't like is 'retro pixel art', like the last two images in the picture that Jarpie posted.
 
Last edited:
Self-Ejected

supervoid

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Pixel art is clearly defined style of digital art, and neither screens from JarlFrank's post nor isometric pre rendered games are pixel art. Going by "still it's fucking pixels" rule we can say that vector art is pixel art when saved as bmp.
 

Cadmus

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There's something to be said about an art style that lets your imagination connect the (literal) dots. I like plenty of low-detail style art but with the pixel art there's the problem it's fucking always used inappropriately or the art is fucking shit or if the execution isn't shit the art part is missing. It's usually one step above a five year old's crayon drawing but sure it can be pretty. I think the best chance for it to be good is when it's used out of necessity.
 

JarlFrank

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Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag.
Pixel art is clearly defined style of digital art, and neither screens from JarlFrank's post nor isometric pre rendered games are pixel art. Going by "still it's fucking pixels" rule we can say that vector art is pixel art when saved as bmp.

This woman makes some quality pixel art that I like:
waneella.tumblr.com
It is not too different in detail level from the screenshots I posted, which do count as pixel art btw. You can clearly see the single pixels that make up the "painting".

Just because modern hipsterfags define pixel art as something different, doesn't make these games anything other than pixel art.
Remember those old Amiga demos from the demoscene? They often featured amazing (for the hardware) 3D animations combined with pixel art of exactly this quality.
 
Unwanted

Irenaeus III

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Pixels™ are just the technique and instrument for painting. It obviously can reach high levels of art in the hands of competent and divinely inspired artists. Here are some good examples:

Zelda-II-Iron-Knuckle.jpg


hqdefault.jpg


Karateka_Fighting_Akuma.png


StreetRod_Tuning.jpg


hqdefault.jpg


hqdefault.jpg


tumblr_m3051uZZGs1rubb8do1_500.png
 

Crazed Weevil

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The old school point & click games that used pixel art were good, some were real works of art, but the modern trendy stuff is bloody awful.
 

tormund

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Good pixel art is timeless. This thread could (and should) be littered by pictures and gifs from Neo Geo and Amiga games...

Problem is that term "pixel art" these days is often used as a shield by loads of unimaginative indie devs without talent or willingness to put any sort of effort into visual side of their games.
 

Broseph

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Yes. Doesn't necessarily have to be super high detail or colorful to look good, either. Art style is everything. Snatcher for example, even on the relatively low-color Sega CD, looks fantastic.


bork-620x.jpg


6SNATCHER_000.jpg
 

Zed

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JarlFrank's screenshots are scanned paintings with paint-over. The paint-over, and sprites, still count as pixel art. So it's at the very least part pixel art, part digital art. Good art, but not what I would put out front as representative of pixel art.
 
Last edited:

Melcar

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Merida, again
So everything is pixel art?

I love "pixel art". And yeah, that stuff from the 90s is awesome. Most hipster art is awful.
 

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