Artistic Styles

L3 Game Design

Unit 78: Digital Graphics For Computer Games

Artistic Styles

Photo Realism

Photo realism is basically where the game's graphics are designed so well that they look realistic as if you have just taken a video on a high end recorder.  Some example of games that use this are Battlefield, Last of us and Uncharted. These games do this because it makes the player more immersed and sucked into the game play, it makes the player more involved into the story line. Last of us only has a campaign so you cant play multiplayer what so ever, so they focused on photo-realism hugely to make sure that their campaign is as good as possible.

Abstract

Abstract is practically the complete opposite of photo-realism as it does not try be real at all, it uses a lot of shapes and lines that doesn't really resemble anything really. The abstract art does not resemble anything as it just tries to paint an image in your head using anything. Many video games use this to make the game stand out with very bright colours and many shapes. Games that use this would be Tetris,geometry dash and geometry wars. These games use this art style because they try and make the game as fun as possible without putting any major detail into it.

Cell Shading

Cell shading is basically the shadow of the character or the environment within the game. It gives of a comic book like feel with the bright colours it uses and goes well with the theme they are trying to create. In fact it was actually used for animation. Mostly games that use this are going for a comic book feel with the game. Games that use this effect would be Legend of Zelda, Pokemon games and Dragon ball Z. 

Exaggeration

Exaggeration is usually used in a lot of Anime games and isn't supposed to be taken seriously due to how much they exaggerate how the character looks. This is mainly used in Anime because they always make there characters have big features such as eyes, they do not try make the characters look realistic at all and make them look more cartoon. Games that use this sort of art style would be Final Fantasy 7, Fifa street 3 and Dragon ball Z.

pixel

Pixel is used in a lot of games, usually all the games that use the art style pixel are 2D. usually these games are not very realistic at all and are very campaign based. Pixel games are usually games where you just run through levels and only have to use a couple of buttons and come up against bosses.

Games that use this would be Terraria, Hotline miami and Rogue legacy. these games are very surreal and retro which is why using the art style pixel excels in these types of games.

Film Noir

Film Noir is quite a popular art style used in several games. This style uses things such as lights and shadows to portray how a character is within the game as well as create an atmosphere. Film noir usually makes it so that if the character is wearing black then they are a bad guy within the game and if there wearing white it means they are a good guy. Also when one of the characters look into a mirror or a window and see their reflection usually they would use a shadow to cover up half their face showing that they are two-faced. Games that use this would be Wolf among us, L.A Noire and Max Payne. They use this design extremely well because it helps portray the characters within the games whilst creating an intense atmosphere.

FIFA FRANCHISE

Fifa Franchise

FIFA is a football game series that was first developed in 1993 and was called FIFA'94.

FIFA is made by a very big company called EA. They create many other successful sport games

such as madden, NBA and multiple golf games. They also make games such as Battlefield,

Mirrors edge and need for speed. 

FIFA has developed since 1993 majorly. The majority of the development is content based.

Such as how they have incorporated more and more teams each year from different countries. 

The most recent FIFA is FIFA'16 which has added female footballers into the game so now 

instead of just having the male teams such as Manchester united etc. You can now play with 

females, but you can only play as 12 national teams.

EA bring out a new FIFA every year, at the start of the new football season. FIFA 17 will soon be 

out and in that they have added managers that you can visually see, because on previous games

you could pick your manager design such as facial shape, suit or tracksuit etc. but you could never see them in game. Also they have added a new system of shooting and taking set piece's to previous titles.

FIFA in my opinion is one of the best games out there. Even though many people prefer other games such as Pro evolution soccer. In my opinion FIFA have a much better look to it, such as graphics wise and the game seems to play alot smoother, to me anyway. FIFA also have many excellent features to the game, such as a player career mode or even a manager career mode. Also they have a mode where you can play with your friends called pro clubs, and a mode called Ultimate Team where you create the very best team you possibly can.

The journey. The journey is a new game mode exclusive to FIFA'17. This mode will let you play as your own virtual pro and make designs based on how you feel. You can only play as one character in the journey, unfortunately you cannot create your own pro because you have to play as a pre-made player called Alex Hunter but you can pick any team you want as long as they are in the Premier League. Alex hunter is essentially a promising youngster who is trying to get his first major break into the first team. You play along side a life long friend called Gareth Walker, he is your friend but may turn into a rival as you are both competing for a spot in the same team. 

FIFA contains two types of career mode currently and a third mode coming in FIFA'17. The game mode that are currently in the game are a manager career and a pro career. These are two very different careers. A manager career is where you pick any team you want to be in charge of, buy and sell players, negotiate wages. Where as when you are doing a pro career mode you only choose the club you start with.

Fifa usually gets mostly positive reviews. The most recent title FIFA'16 got a review of a 7.8/10 from IGN and a 82% from Metacritic. Which are good reviews considering these are very trusted websites for game reviews as they put a rating on every single game out there. But compared to the previous game FIFA'15 there ratings have dropped slightly. Because last year they got a 8.3/10 from IGN and the same Metacritic review which shows there game hasn't improved at all but actually decreased in quality.

The rival game to FIFA is Pro evolution soccer also referred to commonly as PES. PES is also another football game series, but is not as big as FIFA even though their reviews are very good and suggest that the game is actually better than FIFA. 

Ethics

Ethics: Impact of computer games on society

Concerns such as excess playing time 

There are a lot of effects of playing video games excessively. some of those being health related and some of them being social complications.A lot of concerns about playing video games a lot is mostly health related. One of the major problems about playing video games too much is that you can become overweight due to the fact you are not going out as often as well as having a bad sleeping schedule and becoming sleep deprived. As well as you could get carpal tunnel syndrome in your hand which is practically pins and needles. Also the mental problems gaming addiction would create are things such as social insecurities where you are not able to communicate to people in person very well. As well as you would suffer from migraines more often and your diet would suffer because you would want to eat fast foods only.

Social Isolation

A lot of people suffer from social isolation. More people than you actually would think, this has a huge contribution from an excess amount of gaming. Gaming excessively creates a sort of safe haven where you can do practically what you want and say what you want freely. But due to this many people suffer from isolation because they do not know or want to talk to people in person or even go outside of their comfort zone which is within the confinement of their games. Even though they are talking to people online they are very socially insecure due to the lack of real life communication they get. Even if they are talking to their friends online they can be classed as isolated because they never talk to people outside of their game.

Cost

The cost of being addicted to gaming can be a crazy amount that you wouldn't think possible. This is because many games now have expansion packs, extra weapons or just in game currency that many people get caught up in and addicted to. Games like Counter Strike Global Offensive (CSGO) have a way of getting a lot of members to pay a lot of money, because they have these in game "keys" that open these "crates" that you can get a lot of "skins" from. People get addicted to the rush and the thrill of the chance of getting that one good item even though it is extremely rare, many people still gamble and like the excitement behind it. Also people do it because the "skins" they get out of the crates can be sold on a online market for a lot of money which increases the amount of excitement behind getting a good "skin".

Separation from reality