I think screenshots and the trailer are not a very good representation of the game's graphics. Watch this E3 stage demo video linked below, it shows a lot of gameplay footage and it looks quite good to me. Granted, it's not Crysis 2, but this is an adventure game, you don't need to get all that fancy.
GUYBRUSH'S CHEEKS!!! IT DISTURBS ME WHEN HE TALKS!!!
Other than that, art style look awesome. Hey, it wouldn't be the first time for me to look at a new Guybrush and say "Who the hell is that?!", and then finding myself fully comfortable with him a few seconds later. Yes, this includes EMI.
I'm pretty sure those aren't cel-shaded 3D models, pre-rendered or not. I think what they did is render them as 3D models and then "traced" and painted them by hand. That's occasionally done for the sake of smoothness and consistency, but it usually results in the uncanny sort of look you see here.
They don't look like 3D models to me. Particularly Elaine, that's completely hand drawn. That particular image of Guybrush does admittedly look 3D, but all the others don't.
This thread has really made me sit up and wonder whats wrong with my value system.
I read about the return of MI, was happy, watched the trailer, was happier, pre-ordered, was even happier still.
I never once questioned the graphics, I only hoped that it would be funny.
Oh, and the 'lets make it attractive for the kids' thinking? Well.. to be honest adventure games that make you actually think are very out of fashion in general right now in general. No matter how pretty you make them they will be niche, so I think it's usually a wasted effort in the main. Probably best to focus limited dev resources on script etc to appeal to the niche.
MI has become a cult classic over the years due to word of mouth. People saying to their friends, and their friend's friends, that it's the funniest game they have ever played. I have never heard anyone say, 'man, you gotta play this game, it looks great, it will blow you away'. Ever. The looks in MI have always been functional. Full of character, stylisticlly charming, but functional. This new game looks to be the same.
The only way you could make MI attractive to the current generation of lazy arsed Pay to Achieve 'gamers' would be to make it so a 5 year old could solve it or allow them to buy their way through the game via MTs, but I guess thats a different thread for a different day
They look more like pre-rendered 3D models (which would explain why they look so stiff when they walk) that were touched up by hand/digitally afterwards.
(I'm going to have my say on this topic, I'll be quick, and it'll go like this...)
*twitch.*
To paraphrase the venerable Homer Simpson; "Must educate anonymous Internet schmoe, wheeeeeee!"
*ahem.*
So, no, Tales of Monkey Island probably doesn't have anistropic filtering, motion blur, environment mapping, high dynamic range, lens flares, depth of field, an advanced particle system, an advanced physics system which allows for realistic movement in environment objects and cloth, mimap--uwaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAaaaaAAAaaaaaAAAAAAAAAA!
Sorry, I got sucked into a vortex of the concerns of graphics in modern games, and many of them do concern themselves with all those things and more. In fact, I too am a graphics wh--wait, I'm not allowed to say that, am I? Ah, I too am a graphics activist, but I realise there's more to graphics than just the technological aspect of things.
This is why I support Telltales approach of doing the game in 3D in the first place, but I find that many fans of graphics are very two dimensional, and their conversations go like this (read with Monty Python inflections): "It's got no mipmappin'!", "Whaarrt?! No mipmappin'?!" And so on.
But there's so much more to games that I feel is generally ignored, a game can be technically perfect but it can have a totally crap animation system. Recent games have been learning from this, for example, I was particularly pleased at how many well animated ways I could wreak havoc in Prototype (whipfisting *gigglesnerk*), along with all the technologically advanced bits. But some games have crap animation, and that's ignored.
Oblivion is a fine example of crap animation, whenever I see that game in motion I cringe; whether it's monsters, the hyperactive physics system that has things leaping off tables and a mile into the air whenever one gently nudges something, the Horses (oh Gods, the Horses), the combat, the swimming, the...ANYTHING, someone hire those guys proper animators, for the love of all that's cinematic and decent! DO IT NAO!
...but I digress.
The point is though that animation is the centrepoint of a cinematic experience, and what is Tales of Monkey Island? After a fashion, it's a cinematic experience, a comedic one, but still. Actually, one of the things I really hated about Curse of Monkey Island was how generally un-emotive it all was, except for the cutscenes, it didn't feel well animated at all, so 2D can suffer this problem as much as 3D.
And 3D does portray the best cinematic experience through such animations, so there's no excuse for not doing it properly in 3D, yet you'd be surprised how many games screw this up, and how many graphics...activists fail to notice!
Look up some CGI animated shorts, some of those that have been Oscar nominated and winning, a lot of them don't look that much better than Tales, they don't have a really very technologically advanced look at all, but what they do excel at is animation, and that's what matters.
Now the adventure gaming medium has always been home to cinematic experiences, from Monkey Island to Broken Sword, and that's what we should expect from an adventure game. Providing it has that, it doesn't matter that it's not technologically advanced. The only way Telltale could fail me is if they suffered a critical animation fail, like Oblivion or CMI. But to be honest, from the looks of the videos and the screenshots I've seen, they haven't.
Considering the type of game this is, what Telltale are doing is frankly the best we could hope for. Would anistropic filtering, motion blur, environment mapping, high dynamic range, lens flares, depth of fi--eeeaAAAaaaAAAAAAaaAAAA! Sorry. Anyway... would an incredibly advanced graphics system really add to the game, at all?
In my opinion: Not in the least, not even marginally.
So I say we let Telltale do what they do best.
(Also, Crysis had fairly 'orrible animation, too! /flee)
Looks like I was wrong about SE Guybrush. From the Monkey Island faebook page:
Dela says: The main cast (Guybrush, Elaine, and LeChuck) were modeled in 3D, rendered in 2D flipbook style to accomodate the huge number of animations. Those renders were then matched 1:1 to the original frames. All the secondary characters were hand-drawn 2D pieces of art.
Ah, so I was right when I thought "The remake is a bit TOO faithful to the original. The animations look stiff like the original, which is fine for an 80s game but less so for a 2009 game."
I'm sure if they thought it was going to make a ton of money they would have spent a little more time animating it more fluidly... But I'm sure LA is looking at this at a small project that they do not expect to be a big seller, or it would have gotten a physical release instead of a digital one.
Ah, so I was right when I thought "The remake is a bit TOO faithful to the original. The animations look stiff like the original, which is fine for an 80s game but less so for a 2009 game."
That's a result of the 1:1 frame matching, yeah.
A few other quotes on the topic of SE art direction, for those of you without facebook:
Craig Derrick: We first set out to simply update the classic game into HD, and that meant replacing each frame directly, similar to Street Fighter 2 HD.
Jeff Says: We had a very small team and short deadline to complete the game. We also had to make specific decisions regarding animation - we added some frames of animation to Guybrush's walking, ... Read Morefor example. But with only a handful of talented artists, going beyond the 3,000 frames of animation was tough.
Dela: We would have loved to have added additional frames of animation. Continuity was important as well - if Guybrush had a considerable amount of animation added, then we must do that for all the characters/animals/ships/etc or there would have been a visual juxtaposition we wouldn't have liked.
The original code prevented us from adding multiple frames of facial expressions, so we chose an expression of 'wonderment' (perhaps innocence?) and 'awe'. In the original game he always had that wide-eyed look as well, so we had to stay true to that. I'd be pretty astonished if I could win a sword fight simply with words.
Dela says: Guybrush and Lechuck had the most iterations. We might have some of the concepts at Comic-Con .
In exploring these characters we went multiple directions, from stylized to realistic, trying to capture their essence while taking into account the original design. That in itself was a challenge since each character had changed visually ... Read Moreso much in the previous games.
Jeff Says: The characters had to fit the scale of the original game since we were running the SCUMM engine underneath it all. In order for them to actually register and fit within the world and the gameplay we had to watch their size.
Craig: In the original game, the close-ups went for a very ultra-realistic tone, but the rest of the game was very much a whimsical take on pirate life. Ron Gilbert himself said that switching between the two always felt jarring, so we did our best to create that continuity we were talking about.
Dela:Overall, character design in the game is a huge challenge. We had to design to the correct height and silhouettes of the old characters, most of which were 3.5 heads high. Most people are 6-7 heads high. When that is compressed characters tend to look like Hobbits. And Guybrush isn't a Hobbit.
Walking that fine line with the art that allowed the characters to look appealing while also being functional within the game is quite a fun time!... Read More
The cutscenes I was involved with (pirates in the SCUMM bar, for example) didn't require us to match the size of the original exactly, so they look a bit more stylized. Also, I'm sorry I didn't make Cobb ugly enough.
Jeff: We wanted to compliment the original and we felt the best way to do that is to give it the hand-painted feeling of an illustrated childrens book. Monkey 3 has a very specific style - almost like a Don Bluth production.We took elements from CMI and it was certainly an inspiration as we moved forward.
In fact, when you play the Special ... Read MoreEdition on the HD television, you'll see some of the same signature stylings that you would have seen in wood patterns and clouds.
SOMI itself was very rich in color, so by painting the environments it was a contemporary homage to the original. CMI is more 'loose-line-based in style. I'm a huge fan of CMI as well, so it was great to be able to look to that as we worked.
Comments
It really looks nice, that the enviroments have a bit more stuff in them, and that there is stuff going on, things moving, and such
the trailer isnt the best, doesnt quite do the game fully justice i can see here.
That's not 3d. Not even a little bit.
Other than that, art style look awesome. Hey, it wouldn't be the first time for me to look at a new Guybrush and say "Who the hell is that?!", and then finding myself fully comfortable with him a few seconds later. Yes, this includes EMI.
np: Jackie Leven - Poortoun (The Haunted Year: Winter - Men In Prison)
The backgrounds in MI4 were pre-rendered and people still call it 3D. I guess it depends on your personal definition.
EDIT: I wasn't saying everything in the game was 3D, just that the characters were.
I read about the return of MI, was happy, watched the trailer, was happier, pre-ordered, was even happier still.
I never once questioned the graphics, I only hoped that it would be funny.
Oh, and the 'lets make it attractive for the kids' thinking? Well.. to be honest adventure games that make you actually think are very out of fashion in general right now in general. No matter how pretty you make them they will be niche, so I think it's usually a wasted effort in the main. Probably best to focus limited dev resources on script etc to appeal to the niche.
MI has become a cult classic over the years due to word of mouth. People saying to their friends, and their friend's friends, that it's the funniest game they have ever played. I have never heard anyone say, 'man, you gotta play this game, it looks great, it will blow you away'. Ever. The looks in MI have always been functional. Full of character, stylisticlly charming, but functional. This new game looks to be the same.
The only way you could make MI attractive to the current generation of lazy arsed Pay to Achieve 'gamers' would be to make it so a 5 year old could solve it or allow them to buy their way through the game via MTs, but I guess thats a different thread for a different day
Title screen
woah woah woah..... we have depth of field
That's a result of the 1:1 frame matching, yeah.
A few other quotes on the topic of SE art direction, for those of you without facebook: