Weekend Debate: Your favourite video game art style

@CaZpeR

Hey fellow adventurer! Toonstruck is BRILLIANT in every respect, be it graphics, voice acting or humour. Another gem from that era is The Neverhood Chronicles, which was released on PC – and the PS1 as I recently found out – and is my nomination for its excellent use of claymation (and sense of humour as well).Ah, those were the days…

I’ve been a fan of 2D animation for a long time, since a child really and I originally wanted to be an animator when I grew up, so anything in a 2D cartoon style gets my vote.

Rayman is an obvious choice as it’s gorgeous, even today and it’s great to play to boot, but I suppose my all-time favourite has to be Heart of Darkness for the reasons I’m about to explain.

It too was a 2D platformer, but due to the painstaking detail the developers went to with animating each frame and drawing every background it took six years to develop! There were literally thousands of animations, some exceptionally gruesome for a child’s game, but thanks to how fluid they were some really demanding gameplay was possible. In truth it took me about six years to finish it too!

You could tell the game was a labour of love, and even though it sold well it ended up bankrupting the company, like many games with a strong art direction have. While others like Okami who too shared a similar fate get the recognition and are remembered, games like Heart of Darkness can get forgotten and so that’s why I’m championing it.

To me it’s without doubt Shadow Of The Colossus. The way the main character moves, how beautiful the colors in the world are. And probably the most important thing about the game: The colossi. Damn they where something amazing and it still confuses me how the PlayStation 2 could handle such a game. It bothers me that The Last Guardian still isn’t released but I keep waiting for that day.

So Shadow Of The Colossus is my number 1 in art style but Journey, LittleBigPlanet and The Walking Dead (The Game) come close!

The game that impressed me for its art style was Machinarium. Every time you scroll to a new environment you believe you’re looking at a figurative piece of artwork. Even if people aren’t into point and click games, you can play just to marvel at the stunning 2D visuals. The game looks like it’s been hand drawn; and also painted, as the washed-out, rusty colours fit with the setting perfectly. The animation gives a feeling of a dreary and lonely world, but it’s somewhere you can imagine would be an ideal place for a world with robots. And even though everyone stays mostly silent, the background feels alive, with lights flickering, pipes blowing out steam, even the robot residents add humour with their comical responses. This is all without dialogue, something a lot of games would be useless without, but this thrives on telling and showing a world with artwork and sound. I like how the thought bubbles are cleverly crafted with a pictogram to solve a puzzle. It is one of the best looking games I’ve played, or set my eyes on. The game itself is over quite quickly, but I do believe it’s more about the visual presentation that makes Machinarium a memorable game.

This is a tough question for me as there are so many art styles i like. Games i have chosen are:

Parapper The Rapper because it had a distinctive almost home craft look.

The original Resident Evil trilogy that paired 3d models with beautiful pre rendered backgrounds.

The Metal Gear games lead by character designs from Yoji Shinkawa always look great.

My favourite artistic game this generation would go to Street Fighter IV, its dazzling use of colour, and the character and backgrounds are superbly detailed.
If i had to choose a all time favourite it would be Wind Waker, it really was like playing a cartoon.

My favourite art style has to be Deus Ex Human Revolution. It made not a an “Art” game like Okami or Unfinished Swan. To me the visuals and design really appealed to me. This generation didn’t have much Cyber-punk theme games so Deus Ex had no design template of sorts it can base its aesthetic on. It made its own.

First off is the almost monochromatic tone to the whole game. Yellow/Gold was prominent colour through out which didn’t please everyone. But to me it gave a Neo-Noir feel which felt exactly right for this Deus Ex game and I wouldn’t have wanted it in any other way.

The interior design specifically Adam’s apartment and David Sarif’s office is amazing. It has the expected futuristic aesthetics but Victorian(ish) design of the furniture really attracts me. I would love to have an apartment with the same design. Fashion wise ,again same as the interior design, Futuristic with a slice of Victorian( I’m still saving to buy Jensen’s coat on the Eidos store). Enemy Design is also amazing especially the Augmented Gang members, has Ghost in the Shell vibe to it.

This is actually the only game which I went out of my way to find the concept art. It may not be everyone’s cup of tea but it certainly is mine.

Art Style and Abstract Style, if could be talking of Dyad, Alien Zombie Megadeath or Cubixx HD, instead I am going to speak of Rocketbirds Hardboiled Chicken

This game along with providing a full experience of imersion into the game and a beautiful soundtrack shows an art style done into a penguinnazicity it is something unique , everything has been succesfully, art is top notch you can feel like you are there since the background moves with you, also with 3D enabled it is even better, and you go to fight even in space.

It is really is a great art style which they made, because it is something unique.

Rayman Origins was my first game for Vita and a complete surprise in terms of art style. By using a classic gameplay and making dialogues and deep storyline seem unnecessary, the focus of the game is its environments and the ammount of detail given to each level and character in order to provide the player a completely new and unique experience. A 5 star game and one of the best examples of art being put to good use.

Hi,
I would love to see the art style of Psygnosis games back.
Why? beacaue that would be a dream come true to have an open world Shadow of the beast game with that particular art style. Those Psygnosis games where so far ahead it was ridiculous. Come back please!

BTW,
last weeks psn update was grand! Bravo PlayStation. I love my PS vita!

Machinarium! With its amazing steam-punk hand drawn art style! With its charming sketch book-like locations and thoughtful and wacky character designs it was a game that really surprised me! The best part of all was that it was free! Thanks to ps plus! I’d love to see more games with this kind of imagination on psn and I love games that are hand drawn! Long live sprites! XD

@ Fred
Thanks for reply telling me the winning posts aren’t chosen by yourself.. i doubt i could write a winner, or a good post about CoDs or FIFAs art styles myself, but am sure someone else might of, after reading through ‘a lot’ of replies though i kind of get the intention of the topic now, so all makes more sense, anyhow whomevers job it is to read through All of this weeks comments is has got there work cut out, very good and plenty of comments, as allways, if i was on pc or using tablet i would try and find a appropriate smiley to add, a cheeky wink perhaps. Peace.

well done to all this weeks winners you have bagged one of the best prizes i have yet seen on the weekend debate.

very well done

Here is one very, VERY happy puppy ALMOST happy enough to do a Gangnam Style dance on Dancestar (almost!)

This is indeed one of the finest prizes I’ve seen on the weekend debate in the last half year. Thanks Mr. Dutton and those on the jury!

Sinterklaas (Dutch version of Santa Claus, but early December instead of end of December) has treated me very well this year…

Another week of not winning.
I must really be a missunderstood genious!
…
I was joking about this post…

i love lots of stile if ith go wel whith the game

like stile skirim ( leser bugs freezes + dlc )
like hitman stile in more adult games like gta – cod / bf3 / far cry 3
ac serie
borderlands 2 = also funy style
love good cel shade like dragons quest ( nintendo excl. = grrr )
whithe knicht – nino kuni dark -Dark Chronicle -Rogue Galaxy

OMG I won one of the biggest prizes I’ve ever seen on the weekend debate! I can’t believe it!

Thanks independent judge, for picking my comment, and thanks Fred for getting such a great prize!

I can’t wait to get it!

I gotta say…I was pretty confident I was going to win this week, then again I rarely do.

Congrats to the winners – a great prize !

@S-o-h-a-i-l

did you not win a few times in the last 2 months?

Haha sorry, I meant I rarely win when I’m confident, it’s a curse really !

I’ve always been a fan of retro gaming. In fact sometimes I still heat my old sega mega drive just to play one my all time favourites General Chaos. It’s still alot of fun to play after all these years. The graphics are still surprisinly good and the gameplay is still awesome.

Absolutely stunned but chuffed to b*****

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t in it to win it this week because I wanted the Loot Edition but couldn’t justify the price or explaining to my wife why there was a huge hole in our fundage in September ; )

Thank you so much PS Blog/Fred, very happy chappy!

See you Friday….

Wow didn’t expect to win this at all. Thank you very much . An i must say this one was a really fun debate. I hope the next one is as fun.

Wow!! Thanks Fred! Made my week already and its only Monday! So wanted one of the Loot Chests but no way I could afford one so totally made up to win one!

Why did my post get deleted?

I will say it again. My favourite art style is MY PS3 without the singspam!

Well done to all of the winners for a truly fantastic prize!

@ FRED:

If you do manage to get hold of any goodie-bags that include the game or Season Pass etc then please keep me in mind

The first Valkyria Chronicles game on the PS3 is visually stunning. No game this gen has an art style (or gameplay) that comes close to it. It is a gem in the PS3 library and in my opinion the best looking game. Talking about VC, I sincerely hope that Sega localizes and releases VCIII on PSN for the PSP/Vita.

I just remembered another gem too, Psychonauts, though I never played the game through to conclusion (I always keep meaning to) I felt the whole world reflected the subject matter entirely and with all of the different scenarios and worlds created it really was a showcase of a developer having fun with their imagination.

Similarly and also mentioned, Alice Madness Returns was an absolute dream. The level design and creativity in that game deserves to be witnessed. From character design to level styling, the game oozed the subject matter entirely.

Just popped into my mind again….

MY Loot Chest just turned up and i’m very impressed with it and a very happy and grafteful chappy!

Thanks Fred, the judge and the rest of the PS team.

Really enjoyed the debate too and enjoyed reading everyones entries!