A rather entertaining video, created by Daniel Floyd, explaining the Uncanny Valley and why this is effecting video games. Also looks at stylisation and photorealism aesthetics, which relates to my recent essay about this topic found here.
[photorealism] “… you may have noticed, it’s very brown looking over there!”
This is my latest bit of writing work. I will be developing this in much more depth over the next 8 months or so to form my dissertation.
You can either read it below or click here to download a PDF version.
Brilliant graphics are not essential for a successful game, but they do have a certain amount of importance when creating an overall game experience for the player. The game industry started with games that had no choice but to be highly stylised due to the technology available at the time. However, today’s technology has advanced to a point where photorealistic and hyper realistic visuals are possible, giving the game industry new windows of opportunity. Despite these stunning hi-res scenes and insanely high polygon models there are some elements which are yet to be achieved successfully. Stylised games have been using certain techniques to their advantage and have been doing so for years, this has played a huge part in the successfulness of video games.
I have always been naturally attracted to games with fantastical worlds, emphasised characteristics and highly stylised visual appearances. I find that games with highly stylised visuals offer a unique and far more rewarding experience allowing you to immerse yourself as a player in a new world. I will be investigating which elements work well together to achieve this and why many photorealistic games struggle to achieve the same experience. To illustrate my arguments I will be analysing and closely referring to the Sony PlayStation 2 game called Okami (Clover Studio, Capcom, 2006) due to its captivating game play and unique Japanese Sumi-e art visuals. For the photorealistic side of the argument I will be referring to a number of different games include Heavy Rain (Quantic Dream, Sony Computer Entertainment, 2010), Bayonetta (Platinum Games, Sega, 2010) and Vanquish (Platinum Games, Sega, 2010), which Okami creator Atsushi Inaba is currently producing.
Been meaning to publish this for some time. It is an essay I wrote recently about the emotional realism in computer games…
“While photorealistic animation and gaming visuals offer a graphic realism, in what ways have contemporary titles such as Half Life 2 (Valve, 2004) succeeded or failed in expressing an emotional realism?”
Computer games have achieved many realistic effects and are constantly improving each and every day as they continue to define and push new technology to its limits. Game developers have already acquired the skills enabling them to create photorealistic environments, characters and experiences in game worlds but how do they successfully create emotion? There are a number of ways emotion can be expressed in a game; the most obvious is through storyline. However, other effective techniques are more subtle and can be created within the character design, the environments, animations, audio and how the player portrays the game world as a whole. To explore this question I will be looking at the series of games created by Lorne Lanning at Oddworld Inhabitants, Abe’s Oddysee (GT Interactive Software, 1997), Abe’s Exoddus (GT Interactive Software, 1998), Munch’s Oddysee (Microsoft Games, 2001) and Strangers Wrath (Electronic Arts, 2005), with particular focus on Abe’s Oddysee. While looking at these games, as well as a number of other references, I will explore the different aspects of the game design and look at how they trigger different emotions within us as a player.
Emotion is an important factor in good game design as it makes the player believe in what is happening and feel involved with the events that occur during game play. It helps give the feeling of urgency and reinforces the actions in which the game is instructing us to take. The Oddworld games are an incredibly popular series. I believe a huge contributing factor to their success is the way they invite the player into the unique game world.
Characters are often an important part of a game and being able to relate to the characters, especially the main playable characters, is essential. A number of conscious design decisions have been made for all of the Oddworld characters with close consideration to their roles in each of the games. The most widely known character is Abe the Mudokon, the main character for the first two games; Abe’s Oddysee and Abe’s Exoddus. I will use Abe as my example as I discuss the character design aspects and how they enforce emotion upon us.
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| I graduated with a First in a BA (hons) in Computer Games Design in 2011. Currently I am working as a UI Artist for Fable: The Joureny at Lionhead Studios in Guildford. | If you wish to discuss my work please click here to contact me. I look forward to hearing from you. | |
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