detail shmetail
polycounter lvl 18
edit-- this title was supposed to be "detail shmetail"
i'm getting seriously sick of the amount of detail in games these days, is it just me? I'd love to know what everyone thinks about the high range of detail in games now a days, like seriously -- i don't like it, and i want to know what it's like for someone who does.
what do you like about it? what do you dislike about it? what is it about detail, or a lack of detail in games that creates a positive experience for you? whats it like?
for me:
i think a large range of detail distracts the player from the experience that is intended. i think detail should be used strategically, as it has the ability to guide someone's awareness. In my opinion, we're putting detail into our objects that are just simply.. at the wrong level of awareness for our games.. if i actually notice the detail on some of the art in the world, I'm not going to be able to play the damn game properly, and i probably will miss out on the experience that the developer intended. this is coming from someone who did detailed art for RTS games...
i personally miss old games with less detail that allowed you to fill in the blanks with your imagination.. games for the super nintendo, like secret of evermore, final fantasy 3, etc... that used excellent music to describe a feeling and just SUGGESTED visual content. IMO miles better.
do share
i'm getting seriously sick of the amount of detail in games these days, is it just me? I'd love to know what everyone thinks about the high range of detail in games now a days, like seriously -- i don't like it, and i want to know what it's like for someone who does.
what do you like about it? what do you dislike about it? what is it about detail, or a lack of detail in games that creates a positive experience for you? whats it like?
for me:
i think a large range of detail distracts the player from the experience that is intended. i think detail should be used strategically, as it has the ability to guide someone's awareness. In my opinion, we're putting detail into our objects that are just simply.. at the wrong level of awareness for our games.. if i actually notice the detail on some of the art in the world, I'm not going to be able to play the damn game properly, and i probably will miss out on the experience that the developer intended. this is coming from someone who did detailed art for RTS games...
i personally miss old games with less detail that allowed you to fill in the blanks with your imagination.. games for the super nintendo, like secret of evermore, final fantasy 3, etc... that used excellent music to describe a feeling and just SUGGESTED visual content. IMO miles better.
do share
Replies
There is a whole range of art and 'art detail' experience out there, especially with the Wii as popular as it is. The big budget games will make graphics that appeal to the largest number of people, I'm sorry this frustrates you. It is possible to make mass-appealing graphics with less detail and realism, but it is hard to make it as appealing. There's much more to play in graphics than simply what artists find visually appealing- you aren't making art, you're making a game.
As an artists i like making all those little details. Sure no one will ever see them unless they are running the game on max settings on PC but i still like knowing that its there.
As a gamer i get more out of just looking at the games art than the gameplay. Games like homeworld and EVE online i would rather watch it played so i can enjoy the art. It pisses me off to have the game push me forward because i want to look at the environments. I'm used to PC rpg's like ultima that have a story but let you do what ever you want when you want so you can take in the world.
but there's always the freaking awesome stuff like TF2 which doesn't push detail as in cramming as much as they can into the map, but instead in other more, creative ways.
but it does seem oversaturated at this time
That said, there are a fair number of games that go to that kind of detail level without smothering things with grey grunge and some that forgo photoreal rendering completely.
But detail as in all the little bits and pieces that get taken into consideration when creating a living, breathing game world to inhabit? I love that stuff. I love that it's there even if I don't see it. I can play through Deus Ex today and still find little bits that I never previously knew existed, bits that only 2% of the players would ever find. That's what makes a game special for me.
I can see why many people like to see realistic detail though, its kinda like watching a movie with lots of special effects - its cool! Maybe it helps with the whole immersion thing too, especially for horror games like resident evil/alone in the dark.
I honestly don't think that there is any way you can look at this and say "There is too much detail" or "There is too little detail". Mainly because it is so entirely dependent of the context.
Some games really need that high level of detail in order for them to work, specifically if they are going for direct themes or emotional impact. Games like CoD4 and Bioshock have a lot of detail which creates a world that feels more grounded in reality, or makes it feel as if the world that was created is more tangible, so that it feels like it could exist in some reality. This can be important for enforcing themes within that game. For instance, in CoD4, a lot of the really emotional impact is based around the fact that it feels like you really are in a battle field. If it was abstracted and had less detail portions of that impact could be lost.
On the flip side some games are trying to get across far more metaphorical or abstract themes and games like this are often better suited to less detailed and less grounded art so that the abstraction doesn't get cluttered or blocked by overly detailed or overly realistic worlds. A great example of this in recent games is Braid (Play it already you bastage John!)
So yea, I wouldn't really say that there is too much detail in games these days. It's just that the themes in many games are better suited to higher levels of detail. I would agree though that I'd love to see more games with more abstraction, and it seems like we are starting to see more of that to some degree (Mirror's Edge, PoP4, etc...).
Same reason some dudes like fucking fat chicks and others prefer the more socially acceptable hot athletic ones.
Or the inbetweens..awww yeah. just right.
Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_Valley.
It definately happens in cg films for cg humans.
I imagine there is something similar for environments, in which humans perceive something which is close to real but contains none of the flaws and dynamics of the real world (ie randomly chipped concrete, the way the cloud move in the sky, the way the sun and sky distribute light etc. etc.)
Things that are nigh on impossible if not actually impossible fix with current techniques and technology
i'm also sick of soul patches on many lead characters
ffs you are not howie mandel the only person in the world who is acceptably tolerable having a soul patch
if you ask me, i think this all might lead to another video game crash since everything has to look the damn same!
(Not to mention the zillion of puzzloop ripoffs in the casual market too)
also unrelated but i'm sick of the silly pixel shader 3.0 requirement even though the only use of that really is "optimized hdr bloom" or some crap that I don't like tolerating forcefully even though it's required to support it.
Basically, enjoy the games that are out there now that you like, and if you can't find a lot, just wait til we all get bored of this trend and move on to the next. :P
P.S. 3devo--Super interesting article! Thanks for posting it. And yeah, I can see what you mean... and I agree that it could relate to realistic games.
I have no qualms with games wanting to reach a higher level of realism, I welcomed the introduction of normal maps to the workflow with open arms 4 or so years ago when it became more available to the public. Although while I feel normal maps and all those fancy maps as well as the HDR effects are great things to utilize, I feel a company should only use them once they can achieve the best results with them, but the problem is most companies seem to use them just because they're available and, like mentioned before, is a trend, to not use them would seem silly to them.
I do have a feeling that if games ever do reach a point of being absolutely realism people will find them difficult and awkward to play. Not so much because of the art assets reaching a level of ultimate realism, but the things like Depth of Field and the like. They don't seem to translate well to a screen. Now if the fantastical world of VR is ever introduced, then that would be a little different.
Ironically enough, people usually find exaggerated things to be more realistic than if they were made to look like their real counterpart.
Also, i find it amusing that generally the people complaining about normals maps etc on these forums are people that have little/no experience actually working with them, and are just basing their opinions on doom3 or whatever old as shit game that was first to actually use the technology. Hey even people like b1ll who had super ignorant views about new tech for the longest time, saying normals were useless and couldnt capture the same style etc, look at him now, doing awesome highpoly work and baking normals and surprise surprise still keeping the same awesome style he has always had.
higher polycounts do not replace good design.
I think the unreal stuff is fine though.
not quite as fussed on the sepia stuff, but its not awful
I'd definitely say I have a similar viewpoint to Thegodzero, in the sense that I enjoy looking at cool art in a game more than playing the game. I do like playing games of course, but since I love creating really detailed sci-fi type art, when playing a game that contains that, my eyes tend to drift from killing the enemies to checking out the metal panels on the walls, etc., because that's just what I do. It's like when you are talking to a friend of yours and a then hot girl walks by and suddenly your attention is diverted.
Personally I get really bored hearing people complain that there are too many space marines and sci-fi FPS coming out. Being original and introducing fresh bold new ideas is admirable, but that still doesn't change the fact that "original" and "cool" are two different things. If I see a space marine or orc model that someone has posted on here, and it looks awesome and very detailed, I will still admire it and be inspired by it, regardless of how many orcs and space marines I've seen in the past. It may not be original but it is still awesome.
Some people give games like Doom 3 and other FPSs a hard time because they say "it's just the same old thing, killing demons in sci-fi corridors, playing as a space marine." And they are right, it does contain elements we have seen before. But that isn't a bad thing. If it is executed properly and looks awesome then it looks awesome. Even if it isn't as original as some bizarre new genre of games that is emerging, that has little to do with whether or not it is more appealing and cooler. I personally think space marines and dark horror sci fi games are awesome. It doesn't matter if I've seen it before. This is just how I view all of this though.
haha Jesse you are sooo going to hell.
I love it.
too many people think that just loading lots of detail in to a small space is a good thing.
I am running this less detail more design campaign alongside my 'lets kill gary glitter' campaign
random noisy detail = bad, properly applied details for whatever your project's artistic direction is = good, whee.
Now that we've passed gradeschool art class, cats?
To sound less like a troll: There's always value in minimizing detail, yeah. Even Call of Duty 4, lauded for its 'photorealistic' art style, minimized and stylized a lot of little elements of surface texture and lighting, to brilliant effect. The upcoming mad world, with it's three tone sepia/black/red color palette and total lack of smooth shading, looks awesome. That doesn't mean detail is a bad thing, or should be avoided. Obviously if minimalism and imagination was really the absolute goal to strive for you'd be pretty satisfied with a blank TV screen. Detail just needs to be applied effectively, in whatever style you're targeting.
The thing that jerks my chain in all these so-called "NEXT-GEN" games is there is GORGEOUS lighting, FLAWLESS characters but the animations are wooden and sliding around and the lip synching isn't even as good as the 1980's He-Man episodes. Some stories aren't much better either. :poly124:
There's an awful lot of bad mocap everywhere, yeah. It's really embarrassing when you're trying to explain to a nongamer how much quality there is in some games' artwork, and...
other suggested time saving posts:
'this movie's quality is a matter of personal taste and cannot be factually stated as being good or bad!'
and: 'this software will be more useful or less useful to users depending on how much they use the features of this software!'
;P
mentioning animation also I hate mocap without animation blending between sequences.
I don't know, maybe its just me getting older and more out of touch, what do you guys think?
So in that sense almost every game is way too detailed in art, or not nearly detailed enough in gameplay.
To establish a world, to create an atomosphere, to make a statement or convey information, to reward explorers and those who look for detail, to create a context for the interactivity, etc...
Also, detail and photorealism are not one in the same. Dunno why everyone instantly assumes photoreal when they hear detail... tunnel vision I suppose.
Some films are guilty of this too ...an obvious one that comes to mind is the last Transformers. The bots look like they're made of silverware stuck together. Can't tell their head from their foot.
I wish it were just a trend. However many people are attracted to shiny complicated looking things. I've always known this when making characters. I prefer to make simple TF2 type characters. But to make a popular character who stands alone without a premise people seem to prefer noise. Look at the character that won DWIII. He's just noise. No offense you know ...obviously people liked it? I prefer balance between lack of detail / detail.
everyone wanting to be like kenneth scott in the 90s/early 00s wasn't an issue, but hawkprey seems too influential in the games industry for his own good with all that techfiller designs industry people seem to love because if it looks 200x unrealistically busier, it's 200x profit
And citing things like transformers in that kind of argument is nonsense. It's like saying that because the majority of anime I've seen on deviant art is utter shit I prefer highly detailed art. It's a short sighted and narrowminded view.
How's about rather than being total arses we judge each specific piece of art on it's own merits before instantly jumping on the "I hate it cause I'm so trendy" bandwagon as soon as we see something that has some detail in it.
lol
And for what it's worth the current Epic bulky tech style isn't specifically hawkprey's. Its an iteration/assimilation from the artist of unreal 2 Anthony Pereira. The work on his own site does have a sort of theme to it, (part of which is bulk), but his designs certainly vary and many would not fit in with his currently published work.
There is something to be said for fine grain detail getting in the way of gameplay by creating visual noise, and there is something to be said for subtle detailing really getting a piece to pop.
Theres also something to be said for simple art being lazy and unrefined, and something to be said for creating the all the impression of form that is required with just a few strokes.
Just comes down to execution, as usual.
ditto
Does this look like a good use of detail to you?: Silverware Transformers. When I watched this film I had no idea what was happening in most fight scenes. They don't read well at all. They're complicated for the sake of being complicated. Similar to a style of games that I've not played for the art like UT and GoW. Detail in a still image is probably a lot different than detail in action as well. I can easily read and enjoy this image for example: Noah butterfly. I guess if those games are setting a mood... to me they say "look how busy and techy we are." I prefer Craig Mullins.
Syd Mead is cool too though.
That's just plain bad design, though, not the level of detailing. There are plenty of more detailed objects out there that read better. You can't hold up one example of atrocity to attack an entire range of design choices.
Again, this isn't a 'one size fits all' thing in the slightest.
I think there's something to be said for subtlety and moderation, but, creatively, the games industry doesn't have a lot of either one at the moment.
Something else worth mentioning too is that adding many details to models and textures requires a lot of time in some cases and effort. When I see a highly detailed model that has a ton of small details on it, I admire the artist, because they decided to bust their ass and put in the time and effort to do that. It's an artform in itself.
How about shit art but great gameplay? Never see any of that!! Pioneering games like pong or space invaders were so much fun to play and they had zero artistic content. But I do love the realism, spend alot more time looking around levels and checking out all the models and textures than ever before, which is fun, but this should never be a replacement for actual gameplay, if it ever is we have the lost the idea of what games really are.
when those robots were fighting I didn't have a clue what was what, because all the details looked so similar and they overwhelmed the recognisable parts
Yeah, that's true. I suppose I was really responding to the other comments about how a lot of detail is just not not necessary in general. But yeah I see what you mean. I think that if they were just still 3d renders for somebody's portfolio it would have been fine to do it as they did, but it is true that since there is so much action and movement in the movie it was hard to read.
Stubbs, i'd have to respectfully disagree. that something makes sense has nothing to do with it being astetically appealing. these are 2 different subjects. they could have designed the transformers to be less noisy and they would have worked. the truth is that they did it on purpose. it's a common trend now to have tons of little details... which I'm sure appeals to some sort of common psychology today.... but not with mine.
it should be already fully apparent that there are "different strokes for different folks." It shouldn't need to be said anymore in this day and age. i personally don't give a fuck if i sound sensitive to everyone, because i AM sensitive. i actually DO give a shit what your experience is. so tell me- detail oriented people. what do you actually experience? what's that like? i'm not trying to say "no detail FTW!" i'm interested in what the experience is like for the people who DO value detail. i've already taken it for truth that that value.... has value.
oh, and when i disagree with valuing someone just for putting a lot of time into something. detail creates a specific experience. if you're interested in that experience then fine! if you're not, or if the art style doesn't call for it, then you're actually ruining the piece by putting in too much detail, because the style doesn't call for it-- you'd be changing the style, and changing the art. different strokes, right? sometimes it's just not appropriate. sometimes it is.
It doesn't make sense to add windows in a shooter that you can't blast through, unless the atmosphere you are going for is "surreal". All the great "detail" in most shooters doesn't add too much to the experience to me because I am thinking "Why can't my megablaster 2000 shoot through this crummy warehouse window/cable bundle/chair/drywall?"
Anyway, we are not making movies, we are making games. It is not enough for something to work on just a visual level. If you want something visually stunning, go watch a movie. If you want something that is compelling and interactive then the art should match the gameplay.
In the past, great games conveyed more with less detailed visuals. I think both Deus Ex and System Shock 2 were deeper games than Bioshock, but the information was given with sound and interaction instead of trying to tell you everything with just the visuals (although they did that too).
In the last 10 years games have become a huge pop-culture influence, but the downside is that a lot of people playing games now are simply dumber than in the past. These people are happy to see a constant stream of explosions and titties but hate anything that takes the smallest amount of effort. Without a constant wall of moving detail they become bored.
I think that's fine, and it is fine for games to be made for those people, but it is not my thing.