A general observation about graphics

[eastyy]

Last night i played streetfighter 2 turbo on the snes and i enjoyed it.When i played it though the graphics i thought were still pretty good and weaponlord again which does not look to bad.Then i played chrono cross and thunderforce 5 The first thing that hit me was how bad the graphics have dated pixelly and blocky.Is it because

1)3d graphics have advanced more and at a quicker rate so you notice faults in earlier games

or
2) 2d graphics do not really age

or

3) some other reason i dont know

[Mayhem]

The first imo. Some PS1/N64/Saturn games look terrible now, but the 2D stuff hasn't aged as much and still looks rather pretty in many cases.

[eastyy]

2D wise we did have streetfighter 3 which i think had stunning animation.But i think guilty gear x was the first step forward i have seen in a longtime.Hi res graphics good animation some wonderful effects.Just wish they came up with a casltevania game that looked that good.

[Lyris]

Although I found the gameplay let it down a bit, I still think Rayman (the first one) is one of the nicest looking games ever.

[fiendicus_prime]

I'd say the second.

A good screenshot from a 2D game can look like a real life scene. E.g. all you have to do is take some photos and display them on a screen - clearly they are going to look 100% real. Imagine how many polys you would need to get the same level of detail in 3D.

3D games don't look anything like real life (not even now, and certainly not 5 years ago). They just impress because they have that extra dimension to play in, which certainly adds depth (sorry) to a lot of games, but they don't look nearly as realistic IMO.

But, their time will come.

[Yoshitsune]

Last night i played streetfighter 2 turbo on the snes and i enjoyed it.When i played it though the graphics i thought were still pretty good and weaponlord again which does not look to bad.Then i played chrono cross and thunderforce 5 The first thing that hit me was how bad the graphics have dated pixelly and blocky.Is it because

1)3d graphics have advanced more and at a quicker rate so you notice faults in earlier games

or
2) 2d graphics do not really age

or

3) some other reason i dont know

Games are not just about graphics,im sure you relise that if you have been around or not,when you grow up in the very early 80's mate,you don't look back on old games as being "crap" because of advanced 3D graphics routines,and like i just said it's not all about the graphics,just look at the forthcoming Elder Scrolls 4-Oblivion,it's a showcase game graphics wise,but if it had poor gameplay mechanics and ****e music,the game would suck big time !
Im happy to play the latest games,but i don't forget about the ones i played years ago on older formats !

[forpey]

Well its all relative.

The 2D you are talking about is the 16bit era, the 'peak' if you like.

Going back to my Master System after playing on the Mega Drive is as bad as gonig back to PlayStation having just played on the PS2.

[Baseley09]

I don' care at all, sure i like seeing wonderfull modern graphics, but if the art direction & style of outdated graphic is good, then i'm happy.

[Dezm0nd]

like forpey says, the 16 bit era was the pinnacle of 2D graphics i reckon as they still dont look too bad nowadays, but however if you look at something on the Vic-20.. then thats like the start of the 2d world which is equal to the ps1 (the start of the 3d world)

[vertigo]

I think good-looking 2D is much more appreciated in my eyes than good-looking 3D because the systems that 2D was predominantly on weren't nearly as powerful, so well-constructed graphics that move well are technically more impressive.
Pretty tech-demoey stuff like the underworld in Terranigma or the rotating corridor in Castlevania 4 or the spider boss falling down from the sky in Contra 3 all seem far more impressive when done by a 2D-centric system than when done just shoving a few textured polygons about a bit in some 3D space.
Tales of Phantasia, for example, is utterly gorgeous whereas Final Fantasy 8 is like watching stick figures suffer a slow death from Parkinson's.
That's one of the things I find funny about the 32-bit generation. Everyone tried to give their 3D characters life by giving them breathing animations during cut-scenes which made them look like they were diseased, but when the same model stood still it didn't look too bad.
I saw shots from that PS2 Tekken tech demo the other day and it looks absolutely awful, even though back then it was pretty impressive-looking.
I agree with what forpey says about the SMS though, playing a NES now is just... this (safe for work) really. Godawful flickery jerky crap most of it. Especially TMNT which we used to play obsessively Thing is, we weren't anywhere near as critical in those days. I certainly don't remember all that flicker back then. I guess if you don't know about it, you don't look for it.
2D hasn't died, it's just gone on holiday while industry matures and realises that it's just another way to put pictures onto a screen.

[MikeRox]

Personally I think it's just a case that 2D has had alot longer to get where it is (even back in the 90s 2D games had been around a good 20 years) whereas textured 3D gaming has just broken the 10 year mark.

If you look at early 8 bit consoles such as the 2600 and the intellivision, the games are so primative that in many cases they're barely playable yet back when they were the best availible the fact that they were in colour was a revolution.

3D gaming is just about hitting the capabilities now that 2D hit in the 16 bit era and so I think from now on we'll start to see 3D games age far more slowly as all the big problems get ironed out (draw distances, slowdown, poor rendering etc) and it becomes increasingly smaller niggles that the power is used to iron out.

I think in another 10 years time, we'll probably look back at games such as the Wind Waker, Katamari Damacy etc and find that yes, they look "retro" in the way that SNES games do, but at the same time, they are still great to look at and play.

[eastyy]

My problem is i want to see the pinnacle of 2d games.I want a game.With hires graphics beautiful animation and well drawn animated backgrounds and smart effects.I suppose like castlevania symphony of the night just taken up several notches

[MikeRox]

I don't think ur alone in wanting to see that

[Sabreman]

Personally I much prefer really well done bitmap/sprite stuff to polygon stuff. I think in the early days of the PS and Saturn developers tried in vain to recreate some kind of recognisable reality and the machines simply weren't up to it. In most cases rather than falling back on their proven design abilities and going for a stylistic approach they got carried away with realism, and those games tend to look very bad indeed now.

There's just a certain charm and artistry to the old 2D stuff that seems to have been lost among the textures, polys and lightsourcing shenanigans of the last couple of gens.

[eastyy]

Fist of the north star is looking to be how to make a 2d game (though it is really hard to judge from 2 screen shots).

I suppose what annoys me more than anything is when capcom and snk reuse sprites over and over again.Snk i kindoff forgave because they were working with the same hardware the neo geo system.But now they have gone to new hardware the atomiswave there just not taking advantage of it.Capcoms fighting jam i felt was just so lazy.