Thread 720074771

What happened to this kind of aesthetic in video games? Worlds that are fantasy but still feel alien, super creative almost surrealist cultures and cities. Did people literally forget how to make it?

Id guess it's mostly due to the software they were working with at the time, but also lower general expectations in the videogame industry, leading artists to be able to branch out and try more odd and esoteric visuals. Instead of being directed to appeal to as wide on an audience as possible.

that look definitely hit its stride in the 90s and early 00s with games like Morrowind, Myst, Riven, Oddworld, Sacrifice etc. it made a huge impression on me back in the day, my favorite aesthetic
if I had to guess, it became a lot harder to make these kind of environments and assets in the HD AAA era of the 7th gen, plus keeping up with the demand that games only get bigger would put even more of a burden on the artists. for Planescape I'm pretty sure they used segmented limbs to make animation a lot easier, but that just wouldn't fly in later years
nowadays you practically never see this aesthetic, both because it's easier to just use UE5 marketplace assets and scan actors, and because the aesthetic itself is off-putting to mainstream audiences
the rare instances I see of this look are usually indies with stuff like Kenshi or Ace Team with The Eternal Cylinder and Zeno Clash

>>720074771 (OP)
The skull companions looks like a Redditor

>>720075617
Really? I fucking HATED it. It never made sense and wasn't tonally consistent. At least in BG 2 - why would Irenicus have what is essentially space-age tech? Why did Amn have all that stuff made out of brass? I could see it in SOME places in Torment due to Mechanus being a thing, but even so, I figured the aesthetics would still be more fantasy than that weird steampunk.

>>720074771 (OP)
Artists benefited from the improvements to tech.
No longer do you need exaggerated weirdness to stand out. Talent matters now.

>>720074771 (OP)
It's not like this was an original creation for the game, it's a pre-existing D&D setting they adapted.
And it's very difficult to convince Hasbro/WotC to accept anything video game that's not Forgotten Realms these days.

>>720075617
Yup, all the old ones that come to mind for me too, together with some JRPGs like Septerra Core, FF7 and Digimon World. It really was beautiful. It's strange the aesthetic never got a name, I guess because artistic analysis of video games wasn't as serious then, though I guess today people would call it some goofy 4chan slop word.

>>720074771 (OP)
I fucking hate that artstyle and I'm glad it died.

>>720076872
The majority of games are the same UE slop with imported assets. Talent matters less

>>720074771 (OP)
the real reason because the target audience has been changed (less nerds, more normalfags). This also caused lower creativity in gamedev teams

>>720074771 (OP)
Well, for a start, Planescape is a D&D setting and not an original creation. They had the aesthetic given to them.

>>720077027
>It's strange the aesthetic never got a name
it's called soul

>>720074771 (OP)
BG3 and Warhammer exists

>>720074771 (OP)
>super creative almost surrealist cultures and cities
Maybe people with good taste want that, but most people don't want that. They want Tolkein-esque fantasy for the 1000th time. Normies are the bane of everything.

>>720076872
Massive bait

>>720074771 (OP)
People back then were simply more intelligent, and therefore more curious. Tired of tolkienslop and its derivatives, they created and sought for new fantasy aesthetics that could revitalize the genre and therefore do again what fantasy is supposed to actually do: engage the reader's imagination and sense of wonder to the maximum extent. Nowadays people are stupid, more self absorbed and more cowardly. They see a threat under every corner and they seek the familiar and the mundane disguised as otherworldly in search of some momentary comfort, and as a result of this anthropological degeneration cheap wish fulfillment dominates the charts and creativity is only found in a bunch of C-Tier authors like China Mieville. Fantasy like Planescape is out of time OP, because people have devolved into lesser creatures and have lost the capacity to not only understand it, but to seek it in the first place.

>>720074771 (OP)
Holy shit. What a busy pic.
You can't tell what's happening in the thumbnail and even when you open the image it's just a fucking mess of elements.
And millennials still have the audacity to complain about visual clarity in modern games? Lmfao

Could a Torment Remake be successful if they kept all of the writing, but changed it to third person?

This game has the most overrated aesthetic ever. Everyone says its super weird and alien and interesting. But when I played it, it was just dull and gray and pretty much everything was about corpses and death. Every time you talk to an NPC it just tells you how their face has pus and rashes on it. I feel like I played a different game compared to everyone else.

>>720077279
Your eyes broken?

>>720078119
Don't think so honestly. MCG/inXile sort of burned that bridge when they made Torment:Tides of Numenera. It was supposed to be a spiritual successor in their words to Planescape:Torment, but a far too large number of people mistook it as an ACTUAL sequel as they dont' know the setting's origins as being from Dungeons & Dragons.
I honestly think that was on purpose, with teh confusion on the title to ensure bigger numbers on their Kickstarter.

>>720078073
>umm this doesn't follow my rigid understanding of art that I learned at calarts, what the fuck??

>>720078131
Your eyes might be if you can't spot EU slop and imported assets at a glance

>>720077946
I'd say this is only half true. People still TRY and make creative things, I'd say the MOST incompetent devs are actually OBSESSED with making new things, it's just that they're super dogshit at their job, so when they try and be "non-derivative" they end up just making something that looks like a pile of random crap. I feel like I've seen hundreds of "alien" glowing rooms and hundreds of cities made out of quirky geometrical shapes, but they just lack charm and depth.

Like this picture from League of Legends, it's someone trying too hard to make something new and coming up with a goofy triangle bridge, I'd rather have Tolkien than that.

>>720078604
>>720077084
Had Oddworld and prolly some more PSX games in mind.
God, that artstyle is so shit!

>>720078124
>and pretty much everything was about corpses and death
nigga thats probably because you never left the mortuary

>>720078073
You are an idiot, as I am sure you have been told hundreds of times before.

>>720078940
>PSX

I hate this shit.

>>720076087
Considering his main skill is making people angry, that tracks.

>>720077849
Not an argument.
It is like comparing cave paintings to the Mona Lisa.

I wish there was a way I could experience 90s tabletop games in current year.

>>720074771 (OP)
>why did bad sprties of bad 3D models die out
Gee I wonder why

>>720077946
tsar trvthbomba. It also coincides with far less White and Asian males in game development.

>>720077786
But there isn't even a game with Tolkien fantasy

>>720076298
Irenicus was one of the most brilliant mages of his era, and he nearly managed to do what Karsus the Netherese archmage did before him - attain apotheosis. Making high-tech machinery is pretty much par for the course. As for Athkatla, it's been a center of commerce practically since its founding, and the large quantities of brass (which is not locally sourced) is simply a conspicuous example of how fucking rich the city is.

>>720079127
>literally coolest thing ever

>>720077946
Based post

>>720078604
kek

>>720079827
There was the Lord of the Rings RPG on the PS2 that was a blatant rip-off of Final Fantasy X's combat system.
Was actually pretty fun, as long as you don't get TOO hung up on lore.

>>720079827
For starters, Forgotten Realms is tolkein-esque fantasy. I don't literally mean pure Tolkein.

>>720074771 (OP)
It's not relatable/an easy sell. Look at how humans and elves always dominate the most played races too, nobody wants actual fantastical fantasy.

>>720080225
Gnome Bard mains... rise up!

Planescape is a slop setting though
>We have Cynosure/Tanelorn at home
>Get ready to hear about all the philosophy shit I learned about in college
>btw don't try challenging the status quo or the super OP tranny of pain will kill your chuddy ass

>>720075617
A lot of the Infinity Engine environmental art was hand-painted and digitized. You won't find many artists willing to put that much effort into making a map these days.

>>720080398
Her rules are "no gods in Sigil" and "do not pray to the Lady of Pain". She literally does not care about anything else.

>>720075617
https://youtu.be/7s2Qkx3lN5s?si=N5_J_GzVyxY9pOUH

if you don't think this is the coolest shit ever you need a lobotomy

>>720080398
This point is devoid of information

>>720080523
>CHRISTOFASCIST GODS ARE NOT ALLOWED IN MY ATHEIST SAFESPACE CHUD

>>720080225
You weirdos are all the same. You can't be satisfied with an elf or something like that, you need all your games to have a race selection like this:
>Human
>Sharkgirl
>Jumping cactus
>Marionette
>Fire elemental
>Giant intelligent friendly talking spider

>>720080653
>t. Vecna angry that he didn't get to conquer Sigil

>>720080203
Forgotten Realms is not Tolkien-esque fantasy. It is traditional fantasy, though.

>>720080398
They should've let Vecna destroy Sigil.

>>720080675
There is no game that exists with that lineup because the only thing spammed over and over is humans and elves.

>>720080675
not that Anon, but I enjoy all kinds of aesthetics
generic medieval fantasy is one of my favorites, it just depends on the execution, same with alien fantasy or whatever we'd use to describe a setting like Planescape or Morrowind

>>720080203
It's horny fantasy is what it is. Ed Greenwood is the biggest old pervert in the genre not named Piers Anthony.

>>720074771 (OP)
same thing that happened to movies and tv shows: all the cool fantasy stuff got replaced with netflix-tier onions-fantasy garbage aimed at women, fags and leftist "men"(also fags)

>>720081191
>tfw The Dark Crystal netflix show got canned
we don't deserve good things

>>720081370
Nobody watched it. Meanwhile, House of the Dragon and Rings of Power are still going. Further proof that generic fantasy always wins.

>>720074771 (OP)
When I was younger, I thought surrealist graphics like Planescape (and Render96 for more cartoony games) would become more popular. I really liked a lot of the aesthetics of the late 90s and early 00s.

What we got instead was a lot more disappointing.

>>720081832
If anything surrealism in art design seems to have died out entirely. The world needs to feel 'lived in'.

>>720081559
Well, Rings of Power is still going because Jeff Bezos specifically wants to see it succeed, not so much due to it being a success itself. And it's his streaming service and he has fuck you money. So... ongoing trash it is.

>>720080675
This but unironically. You're free to design whatever the fuck you can think of and if the only "races" that you can come up with are humans, short uhmans, pointy elves humans, red humans with horns and green humans with large teeth and then MAYBE occasional furries, then something is wrong with you.
Tolkien ruined writing forever.

>>720074771 (OP)
Well anon there's a video game just like this coming out but you make way too many rpg threads every single day so I shan't be telling you about it

>>720082735
don't worry OP he's referring to this

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3940340/Entropy/

>>720082567
But anon, it's what works best.

>>720082567
Tolkien didn't do shit, blame the marketer who created the literary "fantasy genre" by directly listing off beats from LotR as a baseline requirement for any manuscript to be seen, treating LotR as just a fad to cash in on.

>>720082567
anon, Tolkien didn't ruin anything. everything basing themselves on Tolkien (which he himself based on old mythology with changes, he himself points out) due to Dungeons & Dragons directly lifting from it (as well as a bunch of sources like Vance and pop sci-fi of the time) resulted in the "baseline" that is largely used today.

>>720082567
The audience has a say.
You not liking things is a you problem. Weird isn't a popular art style.

>>720082792
>>720083746
capitalism killing creativity as always

>>720083832
Art would die without capitalism.
Who was the greatest Soviet artist?
If you want more of the art you like vote with your wallet. That or learn to draw.

it's a 90's/early 2000's aesthetic.

Clash: Artifacts of Chaos is a great game with what you want yet it flopped

>>720084108
I think it's just called "Weird Fantasy", that's what Kirkbride described Morrowind as. The late 90s and early 2000s were the peak of a weird fantasy wave and then they lost it.

>>720085438
Edgy nerds rebelling against Tolkien. Glad that fad didn't last.

>>720086043
this poster's brain is cute and smooth

>>720086105
> Doesn't like the same things as me. Must be retarded.
Whatever gets you through the day. The thing that helps me cope with your hurtful words is the odd aesthic fad died 20 years ago. It was never a thing in my lifetime.

>>720074771 (OP)
one of these days I'll play Planescape Torment. I loved Disco Elysium so it kindled my interest in this game, though I've heard unlike DE the writing in PS is a LOT more dense.

>>720086609
You'll definitely do a lot of reading, but the game achieves a lot with its writing. Plus, you get some fairly descriptive prose about scooping out your own eyeballs and organs.

>>720086475
I do envy your ignorance unironically.

>>720077946
Truth hydrogen bomb. Politicization of videogames also did not help, videogames are now the main political messaging tool now that the old media is basically out of the picture. People don't get their political opinions from books or universities anymore, they get them from fucking videogame streamers.

>>720089367
You skipped an entire generation who got all their political opinions from cable news talking heads.

>>720088834
You should envy my superior tastes.
Understandable you that can't. You were , sadly for you, born in the dark age of gaming thus cursed with inferior tastes.

>>720089367
Frank Zappa understood the music industry should be run by businessmen not producers.

Producers have their finger on the pulse of the fans and know what they want.
Businessmen want to make a buck.
If the producers were in charge Zappa never would have been signed.

Businessmen need to take over the gaming industry. The current crop of educated insiders are fucking everything up.

>>720074771 (OP)
People dont read so instead of being inspired by creative works in literature, art, and channeled through divine providence from the void they all just copy dungeons and dragons and lord of the rings.

>>720091236
You think fuckhead CEOs so well-insulated from the consequences of their actions that they've lost all sense of causality are the unsung saviors of the industry? Those are the kinds of assholes pushing for "quadruple-A" development strategies to make games you wouldn't pay twenty bucks for.

>>720091361
If the artist fails to reach the audience that is the fault of the artist.
The audience owes nothing to the artist. The artist owes everything to the audience.
Don't get it twisted.

>>720091510
Yes. Those only interested on making money should be in charge of the industry.

The retards who bang the table and demand more focus on diversity tp expand the audience need to go.

>>720080913
why would vecna even give a shit?

>>720091567
You're referring to people who make products, not artists. Producers require consumers. Artists don't require anyone.

>>720091805
He's a necromancer who thinks he ought to be a god, and intended to prove it by being the first "god" to set foot in Sigil since the Lady's arrival - failing that, he would be the one who destroyed it. He's extremely petty that way.

>>720091868
> artists don't require anyone.
The fuck they don't. Authors and musicians need publishers.
Painters need galleries.

No artist is able to succeed without the assistance of others.

>>720091868
I am referring to artists.
My statement is true.
It is incumbent on the artist to reach the audience. The audience owes the artist nothing.
If the artist fails to find their audince it is the fault of the artist alone.

>>720091361
Yet to argue against myself, people tend to view science fantasy or highly strange unique creative worlds as a niche thing. We may appreciate the unique worldbuilding, but normies get too ungrounded and cant appreciate it. Normal people in a strange world works, strange people in a normal world works, strange people in a strange world is tough to make work. Now, you might look at planescape and say these are strange people in a strange world. Alien cultures, manner of speaking, and philosophies within the strange tapestry of sigil, the city of doors- the normie mind cant comprehend. We see the humanity that shines through the characters, we appreciate the good writing and prose, so they aren't completely alien characters.

Its like how the NPCs cant understand the conditional hypothetical. We can imagine the motivations of the dustmen, the sensates, the godsmen and other factions. But im not sure normies can care understand.

So from a business perspective I think we see less of this niche and more sword and stone dungeon.

>>720091868
This

>>720078685
man modern concept sucks so much ass.

>>720092950
concept art*

>>720091739
Well you're wrong because the financial institutions say DEI must be included in games or you don't get a low interest rate on your loans. Payroll needs the loans to pay staff until the game sells, which means they are financially incentivized to accept the DEI. So you demonstrate that you are rather ignorant in your understanding of the issue by placing blame on a subset that only sometimes exists.

>>720093098
You stated they are using money to push DEI.
A businessman would push DEI to make money if he thought it would work.

So by your own example you have shown I am correct.
I am sure that was not your intention but thanks.

Blowhard got put in his place.

>>720093356
That's way outside of just gaming industry scope
You are saying that the world should be run by businessmen who only want money for the sake of money
Too bad the world is run by mad scientists doing social experiments on a scale of continents that already have all the money
So if tiny little businessmen that run gaming industry want to maximize their profits they have no choice but to participate in the social experiments of people lending them money

>>720092115
>vecna to go where no god has gone before
>"i'm not owned, you might think so but i am incredibly chill right now"

>>720094008
How do Asian studios do it then?
You are making my point everytime you make the distinction between the social engineers and businessmen. The wave of firings shows the businessmen are retaking power.
Stay down.

>>720074771 (OP)
Games don't have creative liberty anymore. Gaming companies have to do whatever their investors want them to do, and they always want a clone of whatever slop is popular at the time. That's why most games released in the last decade are clones of Dark Souls, Fortnite, Skyrim, Minecraft etc or a remake of a game that was very popular 20 years ago.
Indie slop doesn't have these shackles, but most indie devs are lazy and unambitious.

>>720077084
I love lba so much it's unreal

>>720074771 (OP)
With WotC finally touching Dark Sun again I would love to get another RPG in the setting.

>>720096051
>With WotC finally touching Dark Sun again
oh no

>>720096051
Do you really trust WotC as they are now to do anything good with it, anon?

>>720096213
>>720096519
I'm not looking to breed Mul Slaves myself or something. I just love a setting with Ancient godlike dragon Sorceror-Kings and Eco-Terrorism with truly dangerous yet tempting magic power.

official art

>>720074771 (OP)
No one reads anymore. It's the reason behind most things "lost" from modern art that people complain about. Reading is how you practice your imagination. If you don't read your imagination is stunted compared to those who do read

>>720077946
this
nu-devs lack an inner monologue and thus creativity. also they're trend-chasing corporate whores.
Evil can not create, only corrupt (and rehash)