What happened to "mature" art direction? Everything is Overwatch now

[Tyranicon]

The answer is simple and has already been touched on by multiple posters: game corps want the broadest audience possible, so they go for the lowest common denominator.

Yeah, old fucks and people with taste won't consume their product, but that's like a tiny percentage of their available audience. They can live without our money.

Corporations suck at everything, but sometimes they get the math right.

They wouldn't make any less profit with better art/design/writing, that's the tragedy

Scammers don't usually go after intelligent people.

Same principle here.

On some level you have to respect these media companies. Unlike mercurial so-called artists and intellectuals, they know they're peddling shit and they're unashamed. Profit is the only god they worship.

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

The answer is simple and has already been touched on by multiple posters: game corps want the broadest audience possible, so they go for the lowest common denominator.

Yeah, old fucks and people with taste won't consume their product, but that's like a tiny percentage of their available audience. They can live without our money.

Corporations suck at everything, but sometimes they get the math right.

They wouldn't make any less profit with better art/design/writing, that's the tragedy

Making a unique art style and getting 300 retards across the planet to stick to it is quite difficult. It's already an issue with coding to the point where games are written like your first c++ tutorial to make sure everyone can hot swap parts. Art is even harder to manage.

 

[Robber Baron]

WoW had great graphics and artstyle for its time and was pretty edgy with violence and what not
And no one ever could replicate that magic since then anyway
I still remember seeing that screenshot in a magazine all those years back and imagining what manner of amazing adventure that game is gonna be
And it was

 

[Bester]

WoW had great graphics and artstyle for its time and was pretty edgy with violence and what not
And no one ever could replicate that magic since then anyway
I still remember seeing that screenshot in a magazine all those years back and imagining what manner of amazing adventure that game is gonna be
And it was

I remember utter disappointment. It was a teddy bear of MMOs.

 

[Shaki]

WoW was dogshit and caused the decline of the whole MMO genre, which used to be actually decent before this trash. We had manly MMOs like Ultima Online, before Blizzard came with their themepark casual bullshit for normies, and ruined it all.

 

[Machocruz]

Bro just do your dailies and mythic heroics -whatever the fuck those are- and shut up.

 

[Axie]

"People want it! Markets want it! Average everything!"

The age of average — Alex Murrell

 

[Shadenuat]

It is just design pushing out traditional art so to speak since its appearance

What i think more practical problem of many games mainly 3d people dont seem to talk about is, how much harder it is probably for artist is to exercise control over art direction the larger game is.
Back in a day i think one artist could draw if not anything, but some majority of everything. Units lookmkinda dull in 2d game? Just some hours in photoshop and bam more colorful and nice. In an adventure game, good artist could make gorgeous backdrop and make it all look just like they want to.
In comparison, how hard is it to breath any life into souless unity standard grafix for example?

 

[Hagashager]

It's a counter to the the 00s and early 10s over-abundance of brown and grey corridors.

I find it funny that early Yahtzee was complaining about GTA IV being brown and muddy, but then 8 years later is pissing on Far-Cry for being eye-seeringly colorful.

 

[Machocruz]

Game industry can't into moderation. Mud or neon green, you must choose.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

I'm also not a fan of the grimdark style. Everyone says knights and chivalry are cliché but I can't think of a single property since Excalibur that actually plays it straight. Everything is a subvsersion, everything is an 'alternate take.' No one really wants to do medieval romance like 'The Song of Roland', even 500 years ago Cervantes thought knights were a joke.

Ironically Japanese people still play classic western fantasy tropes straight. Most Fire Emblem games I've played were about heroic nobles who fight for their people. There's an upcoming fantasy game Unicorn Overlord which seem to be in the same vein, MC is a good noble who fights evil tyrants.

 

[Tehdagah]

10 years ago everyone on the internet bitched about grey/brown visuals and now they want it back. Lulz.

 

[Hagashager]

That's what I'm sayin'!

 

[Great Deceiver]

No he didn't
He loved tales of chivalry
Dom Quixote is a parody, not a satire

This guy is usually wrong on just about everything, but he's right here.

Don Quijote is one of the most brilliant, funny, clever books ever written, especially because the author loved its source material so much. It's a beautiful thing, and anyone who doesn't understand that Quijote is in every way a powerful tragic figure rather than simply a ridiculous loser has watched too much Monty Python and suffers from brain rot.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

My guess would be it's backlash from the sea of brown 3rd person shooters. There was a good decade or so where every game looked like that instead, complete with the same face on every character. That plus a mllion artists that grew up playing crap early 3D stuff like WoW and FF7.

'Mature' art direction in 2011:

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

10 years ago everyone on the internet bitched about grey/brown visuals and now they want it back. Lulz.

Backlash against black and bloom might've caused the issue, but take old D&D art as an example. It's not brown, muddy and boring but at the same time it's not cutesy or infantile.

 

[Tehdagah]

My guess would be it's backlash from the sea of brown 3rd person shooters. There was a good decade or so where every game looked like that instead, complete with the same face on every character. That plus a mllion artists that grew up playing crap early 3D stuff like WoW and FF7.

'Mature' art direction in 2011:

We have to go back

 

[DJOGamer PT]

They wouldn't make any less profit with better art

Considering Blizzard games are the result of hundreds of marketing studies
I willing to bet that it's actually the other way around

No, Frazetta like art wouldn't suit games like WoW and Overwatch better

WoW is a cliché but silly fantasy world, Overwatch is a whacky hero shooter (with coomer bait waifus)
Their cartoonish art style is tailored for what their game experience's are (which is what's most important as far as game design is concerned) and what audience Blizzard wants to attract (which is their actual main concern)

This guy is usually wrong on just about everything

I am right on most things I talk about

 

[Luka-boy]

What happened? More pixels.

More like, more Pixar.

 

[Late Bloomer]

10 years ago everyone on the internet bitched about grey/brown visuals and now they want it back. Lulz.

Backlash against black and bloom might've caused the issue, but take old D&D art as an example. It's not brown, muddy and boring but at the same time it's not cutesy or infantile.

View attachment 45696

I like the art but that is pretty brown and muddy looking.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

10 years ago everyone on the internet bitched about grey/brown visuals and now they want it back. Lulz.

Backlash against black and bloom might've caused the issue, but take old D&D art as an example. It's not brown, muddy and boring but at the same time it's not cutesy or infantile.

View attachment 45696

I like the art but that is pretty brown and muddy looking.

How about this?

 

[luj1]

10 years ago everyone on the internet bitched about grey/brown visuals and now they want it back. Lulz.

I wish it were that

 

[luj1]

Don Quijote is one of the most brilliant, funny, clever books ever written,...

The most translated book in the world after the Bible.

 

[Great Deceiver]

Don Quijote is one of the most brilliant, funny, clever books ever written,...

The most translated book in the world after the Bible.

That'd be cool, but most lists I've seen have The Little Prince in 2nd place and Quijote trailing quite a few positions behind

 

[Halfling Rodeo]

My guess would be it's backlash from the sea of brown 3rd person shooters. There was a good decade or so where every game looked like that instead, complete with the same face on every character. That plus a mllion artists that grew up playing crap early 3D stuff like WoW and FF7.

'Mature' art direction in 2011:

Prey 2 is a joke right?
Dead island is dishonest. It's mostly a melee game and the city is 1/3rd of the game at most. It's tropical.
Far cry 3 is very green as well. It's weird they showed such a specific area