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Persona, Star Ocean, And Final Fantasy Developers Discuss The Trend Of Remaking Classic RPGs

BlackTron

Member
I'm finding out as more and more of these projects are greenlit, my imagination did a LOT of favors for these games, in both how scenes play out and what things looked like, and the quality of the story writing.

I'm not sure I honestly want more classic JRPGs to be remade, they seem to only be able to disappoint me.

TBH, when I see the comparison pic off FF7's iconic cover pose old and new, I feel more looking at the old one. Because realism, his pants have to be made smaller, but the sword still makes perfect sense...it was better when there was just a smokescreen of silly gaminess over everything.
 

Oberstein

Member
How can anyone look at this and say its ugly? I looove this visual style so much.

giphy.gif


Sogood.gif
 

Comandr

Member
No. HD-2D is an ugly, lazy and inconsistent mess

We need more of this:



Mister Wolf Mister Wolf
I *know* that's what Squeenix refers as "HD-2D".
What I meant to say is that there's nothing "HD" about it.
Bravely Default has high resolution art (i.e. not pixel art) and would make more sense to use the "HD" terminology for that type of game instead.


There's nothing properly blended, Mister Wolf Mister Wolf
Not to mention all those tiling textures on the ground, overuse of depth of field, photorealistic lighting on 3D environments but sprites have cartoon shading, high resolution UI & text that do not match the sprites' resolutions, and on and on.

It's a mess Mister Wolf Mister Wolf , I don't understand how can people see beauty in that Mister Wolf Mister Wolf
People are blinded by nostalgia, and are desperatly craving for good JRPGs again, like those of the SNES/PS1 era.

But this is not it.
This is focusing on the superficial to cheapen development costs.
All those "HD-2D" games do is reward Squeenix for embracing mediocrity and getting rich along the way.

I want you to see the LIGHT Mister Wolf Mister Wolf !!

spongebob squarepants vampire GIF
Hi. I just came to say that I completely agree with S SlimeGooGoo . I think a modern pixel art game like Sea of Stars or Eastward can be really beautiful. I also think there's merit in the chunky polygonal look of the DQ5 PS2 game. I think a modern version of that look could be really good.

The blending of these two styles seems like the worst of both worlds. I genuinely hated the look of SO2R, despite the fact that it's one of my favorite games of all time. Slime hit the nail on the head with the awkward modern camera effects and advanced lighting that doesn't blend at ALL with the sprites or environment. Why are the fucking sprites shaded like that? I hate it. Just make them chunky 3D models that match the world.

77c2e52d2cd0f75148cbadde29d34e4a.jpg


Look at this fucking scene. There is so much bloom applied to the huge, low pixel count sprites they just look like a mess, and they contrast so terribly against the detailed environment. This could have been completely resolved if they used models instead.

Orrr look at this scene:

hear-claudes-english-voice-acting-in-star-ocean-the-second-story-r-teaser.jpeg


Claude has both highlights and shadows cast across his sprite, and then he's standing in front of a yellow green scene. This makes his sprite actually very difficult to clearly see.

423FFvm.png


This is a rough approximation of how Tri-Ace originally intended for this scene to look, and it still looks gorgeous.

p3NoMts.png


The character sprites look great, the portraits pop. Everything was meticulously designed to appear beautiful on a CRT. There was a very specific intention to how all of the artwork was created in the 1990s with CRT considerations.

I love pixel art games. But you can't just take that and throw a bunch of shit on top of it and blast the resolution to 4k and call it "HD-2D;" it looks like shit.

Slime's example with Bravely Default's backgrounds was a great one. THAT is what I consider "HD-2D." Actual high definition 2D artwork. It's funny, now that I think about it- it's the exact opposite of most HD-2D examples. Sprites on 3D vs 3D on flat HD artwork.

I just think the latter works far better than the former.
 

Mister Wolf

Member
Hi. I just came to say that I completely agree with S SlimeGooGoo . I think a modern pixel art game like Sea of Stars or Eastward can be really beautiful. I also think there's merit in the chunky polygonal look of the DQ5 PS2 game. I think a modern version of that look could be really good.

The blending of these two styles seems like the worst of both worlds. I genuinely hated the look of SO2R, despite the fact that it's one of my favorite games of all time. Slime hit the nail on the head with the awkward modern camera effects and advanced lighting that doesn't blend at ALL with the sprites or environment. Why are the fucking sprites shaded like that? I hate it. Just make them chunky 3D models that match the world.

77c2e52d2cd0f75148cbadde29d34e4a.jpg


Look at this fucking scene. There is so much bloom applied to the huge, low pixel count sprites they just look like a mess, and they contrast so terribly against the detailed environment. This could have been completely resolved if they used models instead.

Orrr look at this scene:

hear-claudes-english-voice-acting-in-star-ocean-the-second-story-r-teaser.jpeg


Claude has both highlights and shadows cast across his sprite, and then he's standing in front of a yellow green scene. This makes his sprite actually very difficult to clearly see.

423FFvm.png


This is a rough approximation of how Tri-Ace originally intended for this scene to look, and it still looks gorgeous.

p3NoMts.png


The character sprites look great, the portraits pop. Everything was meticulously designed to appear beautiful on a CRT. There was a very specific intention to how all of the artwork was created in the 1990s with CRT considerations.

I love pixel art games. But you can't just take that and throw a bunch of shit on top of it and blast the resolution to 4k and call it "HD-2D;" it looks like shit.

Slime's example with Bravely Default's backgrounds was a great one. THAT is what I consider "HD-2D." Actual high definition 2D artwork. It's funny, now that I think about it- it's the exact opposite of most HD-2D examples. Sprites on 3D vs 3D on flat HD artwork.

I just think the latter works far better than the former.

So Octopath Traveler 2 looks bad to you as well?

 
Last edited:

Comandr

Member
So Octopath Traveler 2 looks bad to you as well?


Yeap. Particularly in battles. Look around the 9:30 mark. Hyper strong vignette effect obscuring both allies and enemies towards the edge of the screen. Bloom applied to various sprites erasing fine detail, then you have the modern super sharp 3D particles that conflict with the design language of the sprites themselves. The HD hud also looks out of place against the pixel world.

You have two conflicting design ideologies here and it just looks a mess. I just think the fundamental concept is a flawed one.
 

MagiusNecros

Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
Character sprites clash with the beautiful backdrops Octopath has. Not in a good way. Otherwise artistically the games are beautiful.

Gameplay and music are great so I'm not bothered too much. In most RPGs if the story is decent, the gameplay engaging and the music hype I don't care too much about artistic presentation too much.
 
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