***UPDATED AFTER 2 YEARS !!!*** The sad story of my start as Android/iOS game developer

My 2c on the whole graphic design thing...

I used to be a bit more in @GarBenjamin's camp. I didn't really understand UX and I sort of wrote it off as "good graphics" or "good graphic design"...

After really digging into a project in depth for a long time, I've learned that this somewhat dismissive attitude is dead wrong. I used to think that I was actually ok at UX design - man was I wrong.

Design, UX, Art, the controls, the game's design is all communication. The way you communicate with a player is much deeper than a lot of us more code oriented people may want to believe. I've started to level up my general communication skills, they're still not great, but it's improved absolutely every aspect of the game, all the way down to the code.

Games at core are very much about communication, and in a largely visual medium, the importance of good visual communication cannot be overstated. It's how you frame the player's perception of the game (and even your own).

 

Here's some tips that go with that:

• Try; Improve; Repeat - until too good to ignore. (Gigi, Steve Martin, Cal Newport, Dr. Ericsson)
• Just DO IT (Shia Labeouf)
• "The most important thing you can do is ... DO A LOT OF WORK" (Ira Glass)

Gigi

 

Where's the link? Kudos - fantastic work - well done! Now, share the link, so we can support you!
Gigi

 

I don't disagree with you at all.

I may not personally require good graphics to play a game but I know many people do.

It seems like I am saying the same thing over and over. I do see the value in the graphics. I also see the value in the gameplay. A lot of people weight the graphics over gameplay. I weight the gameplay over the graphics. That doesn't mean I don't like graphics it just means I'd play a great game with crappy graphics over a crappy game with fantastic graphics.

We have pretty much beat the graphics thing to death. That's why I suggested one of the graphics designers choose a game that has less than 1,000 downloads and has good graphics design so we can move the discussion along to other things. Unless the point is the graphics designers think every game with less than 1,000 downloads (talking free on Android because stats are obvious there) has terrible graphics design.

 

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=415505676

The release has been a little delayed, I had to gut half the game and rewrite it. The previous iteration just wasn't fun. This iteration is really, really promising. Hopefully, I've learned enough from my previous mistakes to finally live up to the trailer

Not trying to hijack the thread or self promote - but Gigi asked !

 

Did you know the avg lifespan of someone in the games industry is 5 years? That means, the vast majority of the people in this thread won't be here in a few years. Which, if I go back 5 years, to when I started posting on these forums, I can certainly say that's true of the people who were posting then. I've seen the crazyness first hand, watched many friends leave, and have personally been impacted by sweeping layoffs. It's hard to form a union with a continually greening work force.

Apologies for the downer note. Carry on .

Gigi

 

I know it's been beaten to death and all, and I'm not trying to criticize but it's not about "graphics" - it's about communication, really.

This is one of my all time favorite games ever:

Spoiler

This is Dominions 3, one of the bestest games ever made. The graphics are terrible, but the design of the game is really excellent. The way the ideas are presented is captivating. It communicates with the player very cleanly and it presents itself and what it is clearly.

The graphic design itself may not be stellar, but the UX design is actually very, very sound. The choices are always made to highlight clarity wherever possible and the information is presented in a direct, easy to digest fashion (considering the massive scope of the game).

I used to look at Dom3 and think "man this game has terrible ui" - now I've learned to have much more respect for what they did and the choices they made. But I'm just now starting to really understand these things, my opinion even 6 months ago might have been very different.

In OP's post, he is using a bunch of additional effects - some kind of blur, strange particle effects, etc. These are distractions from the games design. He probably thought they made the game 'look better' with 'better graphics' but they actually end up muddying the impression the user has.

 

May I provide some feedback? The video looks great - you've got some great promise there! Kudos and well done. And, I think it can be even stronger if you have an artist take a pass with contrast. The game's color palette is mostly brown on brown. Sometimes, I could barely make out the attacker. Same is true for the menus - browns, reddish-browns, and brownish-greens. Stronger, brighter contrast will make the final visuals more appealing. Which will lead to more sales.

Gigi

 

@frosted
No problem. That is exactly how I view graphics in games: communication. The sounds and graphics provide the means for the game to communicate with the player. They can also help to establish mood. No disagreement there.

 

Looks interesting, congrats on Greenlight I think trailer should show a bit more about the game.

 

This is an odd statement. Not a single person here has once said graphics are the only thing that matters, or even the main thing that matters. In fact, this entire time people have been emphasizing that graphics are but one part of a whole, just as important as the other parts.

Literally the only person in the thread who seems to be stuck on the idea that graphics quality is the single most important thing in a game is you. You've chosen to continue arguing against that idea when no one in the thread has proposed it. Please, go back through the thread and you'll see that you are arguing against an imaginary foe.

Graphics and visual design are two parts of the equation, just as important as the other parts. Not sure how you got in your head that anyone is saying anything differently.

 

@Ony The reason I said that is because it seems to be the only thing that people keep posting about. Each new comment seems to go back over something graphics related from earlier in the discussion.

I suggested someone choosing a game that has good graphics design so it would not be a consideration in the hope that maybe we could look at other factors. I don't know if people just do not see those posts or are just choosing to ignore them. lol

 

Pretty sure people keep posting about it because you keep making it the focus of the thread. Even your challenge\experiment to find a game with good graphics to somehow "prove" something about it keeps drawing everyone back to graphics talk. It's clear that you personally don't think visuals are the only thing that matter, and no one else here does either. Not sure why you keep wanting everyone to do your experiment.

 

I think a lot of the factors have been discussed in some depth. A few people have even offered some outlines of the discussion and key points at this stage. I personally have taken a lot away from this one, and it will be influencing the way I behave when it comes to developing and releasing my next game.

I think this has been a fantastic thread and we have avoided it becoming a "classic" discussion so far. If OP reads through this entire thread and takes everything into consideration, combining it with his ability to make fun little games that people rate highly, he will do much better.

 

Okay. Sounds good.

 

Email is a poor vehicle for communication. Forums suffer from the same problem - loss of nuance, subtlety, and emphasis.

For my part, I used to think graphics were not that important. In fact, I used to say so, in presentations, at major venues. Slowly, over time, I have learned that a more correct expression might be: "High-fidelity is not required, while an effective art style is."

All games should look closely at colors, contrast, and spatial balance. Even with great gameplay, ignoring these subtle nuances can break a product.

Gigi

 

Well the OPs lack of further engagement might be a clue as to the general exaggeration of his motives and claims and his actual interest in legitimately creating an original game.

That said, the look & listen of a boring game can turn it from a bore to a relaxing, visually and aurally interesting game. Not every game needs to have you at the edge of your seat. There are people that watch videos of fireplaces and burbling brooks to relax so there is room in gaming to relax to and probably a bigger audience that is being ignored in favor of the usual violent themes.

 

We go over and over this sort of thing like it's some mystical script to be transcribed from the beginning of time. It's pretty simple, make sure it looks good and it's fun to play. Then were not cutting out any portion of the market are we?

Whilst the road to the path of enlightenment is not easy grasshopper the end goal is a good all round product. If you can't achieve that (for whatever reason) scale it down but keep it balanced.

There's more and more people (hobbyists, one man bands, teams) making excellent games that tick every checkbox, there are no excuses anymore which is a blessing and a curse.

 

Do modern pixel art games such as Terraria count?

 

I didn't really think Terreria was all that ugly or all that retro. More like 16/32 bit era graphics.

And it has loads of features like network play, character customization, dynamic terrain, persistent world, building, crafting... it's a pretty hefty game with a lot of content. Hardly a small scope throwback game.

If you want some bad looking games you want to go back to a time when low quality games were flooding the market before the last video game crash. I never lived through those dark times, but you can google them.

 

... and you can get it somewhere where people will see it. That's the bit where media attention can help, but you're absolutely right, it's not the only way.

Also, thanks for sharing stats.

 

How much of that was available at launch? Terraria is over four years old. It has evolved considerably since release.

 

The things listed? All of them, I'm pretty sure. They were the whole point. They've probably been expanded and refined over the years, but the fundamentals were all there from the start.

 

I think that if you actually go back and play older games the thing you'll notice isn't that the graphics are dated (if the art style is solid and consistent that's fine)... the thing you'll really notice is that the UX is dated. Especially in stuff like RPGs or Strategy games that are ui heavy, if you way back to the old days the ux is often really a nightmare to use by todays standards.

 

Probably was amazing at the time... I think the colors are meh.

Here's an older game that looks better:



White on black = forever classic



At first glance... I was confused why Seiklus had gained so much popularity 10 years ago. You can note the lack of detail, the absence of color except blue, gray, silver, white and the pale color of the moon. But take a look at the details of the outlines... then look at the overall composition of the scene. This is almost movie-like. It's also telling a story. I still didn't quite get it... but I started to see it's appeal.



I was even more underwhelmed by scenes like this. Again, I gave it a chance... I didn't like the stems on the plants or the jittery lines. But then the minimalism started to get to me.The plants are between 3 and 5 pixels thick, max... that "jitter" is just the bare minimum necessary to show plants aren't straight lines. The shadowing isn't good on the leaves. Some of the other color should have been left flat imho... but the grass is a lovely green and I like how it feels like it has texture at the top... And again, the size of the character to the scene, the wideness of it, the amount of sky we see... it gives it a cinematic feel.

This game borders on bad graphics, but it does enough things right and indeed some things better than games with more realistic graphics, which still blows my mind.

Here's a game that similarly oscillated between utter crap and mind-blowing awesomeness:



First off... your main character is bucktoothed. All the characters look like they're imitating T-Rexes with their hands. And that shade of purple of the bad guys outfits..... but look at the overall scene. A fight near the sea. Cars and bikes parked. Most of the colors work. Overall, it works. This game was one of my favorites, even though some parts were worse than others.

 

Bad retro graphics are not the same thing as pixel art. And what separates bad retro art from good pixel art is often a lack of artistic vision. They made grass green and water blue, and everything looks like what it's supposed to look like. Cause, you know... realism always looks better. -_-



What most people would have colored this like:



...suddenly it looks amateurish. Even though grass is green and trees are brown and stone is gray. People aren't rose-colored blobs. I don't know about you, but the game's official palette really conveys a dark and eerie mood...



These are four shades of red. They're not heavily saturated, which gives them a muted, somber appearance. And the black background isn't even black, it's just a deeper shade of red. Which just adds to the theme that everything is dulled, everything is moody. Working in a single color seems like it would make no sense, but some of the best looking games out there have used this different shades of a single color approach to great effect:



One of the best games of all time... and a good part of the game is green faces talking. And that was one of my favorite parts.

If you're not convinced, here's a low budget cult classic that basically most of the movie was blue for no particular reason other than to enhance the mood:



This "single color" trick can honestly turn graphical disasters into masterpieces, way more often than it would seem is even possible. It can hide serious issues and distract from other shortcomings. You can see its power in grayscale and sepia photographs. In the most recent Mad Max movie, the director actually prefers the black and white version of his film to the theatrical release.

It's just an endless subject to explore.

But a huge takeaway from what you see in good game graphics vs. bad game graphics is simply this:

If you're not sure you know what you're doing... do less.

 

I see we are still trucking along on the graphics thing. lol

@anselmo.fresquez good stuff. I have thought about making some things in that GameBoy 4 color style. There was recently a compo for such games.

There are (or at least were) plenty of games out there that have a good following and look pretty much like your first example game. Admittedly, I haven't been that active in checking out games beyond Kongregate the past several months. I used to play some lonewolf created simple rpgs that had programmer art. These kind of things basically get a sort of "cult following" by a group of diehard fans. Not mainstream so you're looking at maybe 10,000 players or so I'd guess.

Since you are analyzing games graphics I have a couple games for you to give your input on. These are more mainstream than Seiklus and should be more recognizable to people I think:






How do these look to an artist?

The reason I ask is these are just two quick examples of games that show up in lists and debates of great popular games that have bad graphics.

I think the second looks very good. The first has a sort of cluttered look to me. Never played either of them but I hear they both were / are popular.

Would you consider these to be good graphic designs / art styles to strive for? At a minimum.

 

River Raid... one of my favorite games of all time. My Dad brought it home, I popped it into the Atari, and I was hooked. That cartridge got worn out, I can assure you.

 

I remember that. Was very simple as nearly all were back then but it was fun. Someone on the forums here did a remake last year.

 

To me, hotline always looked vibrant and pulpy. Like some quentin terrantino thing. To me, it evokes Grand Theft Auto. The pixel art style is more on the realistic side, I think it establishes a gritty, "this is a real life crime drama" setting but doesn't attempt to be so realistic that it breaks the limitations of what can be done with a clean pixel art style... for example, there's no real depth and shading. This is smart because the game can't do real time shadows, it's a 2D game maker game. So they don't even attempt that level of realism. The bright colors fit the whole Miami vibe. The character art takes me back to Nes days, games Cabal and reminds me of the original MGS.

Binding of Isaac goes in an entirely different direction. It uses the gross-out/cute style famously used by artists like Dan Paladin and the cartoon Invader Zim. This is similar to Super Meatboy's style. It also does what many games have done very successfully... it evokes Legend of Zelda. Look at the hearts and that top-down perspective. Look at the store with the prices below the items. The actual coloring and all of that is just very well done. That picture has lots of dark earthy tones, grungy details give it a dungeon feel.

In both cases, the artists have paid homage to the past and added their own unique touch while adhering to their chosen visual themes.

 

I think you need to become the official game historian or something...

 

This thread keeps veering into "but wait, this one looks bad!" territory, when really there's not much more to say about graphics. We can go in circles all day.

The main takeaway about graphics should simply be that they are a delicious part of this nutritious breakfast.

 

My memories of old games are more like this...

Also, by looking at the game... River Raid? I have absolutely no idea what the gameplay style could possibly be.

 

@anselmo.fresquez thanks for the input. I like the term you chose for the Miami one. Gritty is exactly how it comes across to me too. I don't think it looks bad just it looks far closer to the kind of stuff programmers churn out than the clean lines and color composition used by artists. Just my view you may not agree. The other I think a different color theme would be better. I imagine this one was chosen to best illustrate "poopy graphics" in the debates. lol

@Ony that is true this stuff can be (and is) debated forever. Literally. In fact I remember these same debates in school when I was a kid. lol It is also an interesting discussion. I don't think any person should be put off from getting into game dev just because they are not very artistically inclined. And stuff like @anselmo.fresquez was showing helps to set a baseline target for them to strive for. That's why I threw out the other two for his opinion. It gives all of the people who are not artists something to strive for.

For me I just use whatever I can knock out super quick and call it good. lol However that is just because it would take me hours and hours and hours of time focused on graphics to make a game look good. Not very good. Certainly not superb. Just good. So I'd just pay an artist to do it for me. Not everyone can do that though so I, at least, think it is helpful to show some examples of a baseline they can strive to reach.

 

Well I think a lot of people could achieve something like Don't Look Back. Then Seiklus takes more work. Of all the 2D games shown, the one that you most need an artist for is Binding of Isaac. The more freehand the art becomes, the more true that is. If you can use more simple geometric shapes then it's easier. Like in Minecraft, it took some rather basic pixel art skills, but a good knowledge of color, form and light. He used geometry to express the size and shape of his creations and skinned them with cute faces and used opengl for the rest.

I have seen lots of good vector art before. You can open up a vector art program and take a rectangle, and then just start dragging on points until you get somewhere near what you want, experiment with that. You might just come on a design you like. Like the frisky bird icon in the OP's topic, I like that little guy. I like the first game's blue shapes also. Reminds me of Tron. A lot of people agreed use some different colors. Solid colors with a bloom filter look fabulous... and the bloom filter is completely free to use, just import Standard Assets > Image Effects.

There's so many ways to make graphics and enhance your presentation other than sitting down and trying to freehand it like some kind of a wizard. Just takes a little experimentation. I know that lots of people don't feel confident about their artistic ability, but don't have the cash to hire some pro artist... that's why I'm trying to offer simple suggestions that I think anybody could use to help them. Like don't choose a complicated style. Like focus on using a small number of colors. Like avoid drawing outlines on your artwork if you can avoid it, just use flat colors. Or just avoid drawing entirely and use vector programs to generate shapes.

I'd like to talk more about music and sound effects but they are a mystery to me. Thankfully, there are a lot of sound guys out there. I mean, a lot. I went to an indie game meetup and I would say 2/3 people I met were audio guys. If I knew more about making music I'd definitely share that info. I know you can generate some simple sound effects with BFXR if you have lots of free time to experiment.

 

A lot of audio and sound girls, too. Just sayin'.

 

Hotlines visual style is almost entirely based on it's post effects... honestly I found hotline to be kind of annoying and not a particularly good game. I think it's success is sort of based on it's kickstarter background which must have also included some very well connected people. It was somehow surrounded by "art house" street cred which I don't really think it deserved.

I also think you might be going a bit far back in terms of pixel art games, if you look at the nintendo era instead of the atari era you will probably find far better examples. Look at Super Mario Brothers, Zelda, Megaman as good examples.

Nintendo was a pretty revolutionary company at the time, their early games were just better than anything else at the time. The fluid control, the solid artistic elements, the overall game design was just revolutionary.

 

Over here it was popular as it had issues getting rated for release. That sort of controversy always helps with cred with a certain demographic

 

I just know about it from lot of people who have played it. It's one that gets mentioned a lot. And I've seen a lot of let's plays posted on YouTube. It seems to be a pretty violent, fast-paced game from what I've seen. I know nothing of it's origin or story.

I'm curious how you arrive at your conclusion that it doesn't owe its success to much more than connected people and kickstarter?

 

I don't think the first one did - the sequel had a thing with sexual assault that did get coverage - but I don't think the original had any problems with release...

The reason I think it's success and reputation is based on something else is that... it's just really not very violent. It's constantly being cited for its 'brutal violence' but its just really not a stand out in that regard really. There are tons of games in tons of genres that are way more violent (and more visceral) - and I'm really at a loss for why it's considered to be a particularly 'violent' game.

 

Well as a person who doesn't play a lot of modern violent games, I see a guy run into a building and start explodifying everybody. It's pretty graphic if you think of this as a real story. Like... who does that? I agree, if you're playing like Ninja Gaiden and then you come over here and play Hotline you're probably unimpressed. But if you're a casual or semi-casual gamer, suddenly you're like... what the heck, this is crazy... because you were playing Cave Story or Minecraft last.

I would imagine that group of people are more vocal as well, as opposed to the core gamer who doesn't seem to care about much outside the cutting edge realm, anyhow.

That's my guess on how it maintains that reputation.

As far as gameplay, it's similar to Super Meat Boy in that you start a level, you explode, repeat. The speed at which you can move around is almost comical. And from what I have seen it looks like you're basically a hitman, or a cleaner. So there's a little mob feel to it. Which is always fun.

It's about as violent as I can see a game being without crossing over into the realm of actually being somewhat disturbing, or to where I would worry what people would think of me if they saw me playing this game. It manages, in part due to the pixel art and the white suits and the general silliness it retains... to come across as you see it, not that violent.

In my perception.

 

Reviews I have read in the past, like the one linked below, tend to point towards the game being so heavily focused on atmosphere and minimalism. The game is basically all about exploration and progress through it. I loved it.

http://www.necessarygames.com/revie...ndows-atmospheric-fantasy-singleplayer-casual

 

That's interesting... because I noticed after my post, but I wished I would have mentioned it, that such a large part of the screen was dedicated to just the atmosphere and open space around your character. It's like the focus is on where you are more than what you are doing. It has a utility, it draws your eye away from your relatively simple little guy and to the world around you. It makes you feel small.

Which is exactly what that guy basically touched on in that article, it recreates the feeling of being a kid and exploring.

Funny that's what Legend of Zelda was all about.

From Game Over: Press Start to Continue: The Maturing of Mario, on pages 51 & 52

 

I also find all the greenlight stats very interesting, anyone else got any of their own?

 

Shia? seriously? Go home Gigi. youre drunk.

EDIT: Interesting (ish) fact - ok its not interesting at all... Shia was two years old when Nike coined the phrase... just do it.

 

I don't think you could make any money as a indie dev on GPlay anymore unless you are a major studio or are incredibly lottery-style lucky.

I made the decision to make a game about a year ago even though I read all over the place stories just like OPs story. But I quit reading them and kept working at my game. Now it's almost two months since my release and I've got 21 downloads. LOL! The user acquisition is pathetic, practically no one sees my game profile page so there are no downloads.

What's more pathetic is games much worse than mine have significantly more downloads. It's a disappointment for me.

Here's my game if you want to see what I'm talking about :

 

Submitting a game to the app store is like applying for a job that everyone in the world is qualified to do, and everyone in the world has also applied.

 

That's because how your game looks and plays and basically everything about your game in general really doesn't matter nearly as much as most people think it does.

It's all about having a good solid network set up to gain the exposure you need. If you had published this game a few years ago it is quite likely it could have been quite successful. Again that has nothing to do with the quality of your game. It is simply because your game would have been seen way more often. And there would have been less alternatives for gamers to choose.

So there are two parts there. The first is getting your game seen in the first place. I think people see publishing their games on app stores as them marketing their game. Like just doing that is all that is needed. Again, a few years or so ago it probably was all that you needed to get enough exposure to make some decent money.

Publishing your game is just providing an easy / standard way for gamers to get your game. That is all it is. Just a distribution channel. I think most people miss this part which is why we see so many people making games releasing them and wondering why they have few downloads.

It doesn't matter how your game looks. It doesn't matter how your game plays. What matters is how you are presenting it and how you are building interest in it.

Personally, I think your game looks great and it looks like it plays well (for a mobile game). It could certainly achieve some success even now. You just need to figure out how to do that. How do you get people to go to this distribution channel and get your game. That is your #1 job if you are an Indie developer focusing on making money. A lot of people think their job is to make games and release them. That is only a part and in reality a much smaller part as far as achieving success is concerned. Unless you happen to be one of the very few lucky ones. Right time. Right place. Blue moon.

 

i had this LCD moniter that after it went to power saving mode it would show a box hitting the edges of the screen and bumping off. Background was total black and box was a Square consisting 3 blocks of RGB.

One day i spent about 15 minutes looking at it just to see if it would hit the exact corner. Sometimes it would go towards the upper left corner but would miss by a cm. I showed it to few other people and everyone spent almost the same time watching it.

Never hit the corner. lol

 

Your game looks really good but Galaga and Galaxium (sic) and such are old news even if you've updated the graphics and play to be somewhat more modern.

The consistently successful game app makers either have their own IP and lots of money (Disney) or they buy IP and have lots of money (Zynga buying Looney Tunes). I've not really seen anything new game play wise from any of them so you technically can't say they're that good at it. Not when you can put a Disney character on a sticker that does absolutely nothing and make a fortune off it. Lol, much more that game makers are making for their efforts. People, we are in the wrong line of work. :-O

There is a reason folks often ask in these forums can they legally use such & such IP in a game. The answer is always no. Failing that they rely on shock value to get their publicity but hello, how many zombie games are you competing against?

That's what Rovio knows and is trying to turn Angry Birds into. I have to admit I played not even one turn of Angry Birds of any version before I finally tried Angry Birds 2 and as I thought it's just a dumbed down version of Crayon Physics. I'd still rather play Crayon Physics. What I did like about Angry Birds 2 is the opening music and the opening animation the 1st time you play the game. The actual game itself holds no interest in my playing it again.

You need 2 things (well really 3, but if you had those advertising dollars to blow you'd not be complaining):

1. A game that is new in it's approach to game play and good.
2. If the game has characters then you need to take time and make the characters original enough such that they become your own IP. That means you need to become good at modeling or have a big budget to model.

That said, don't be disappointed. I have less than 50 downloads total too but I know the game is good. I'm getting my feet wet on the basics of how to put together a fun game, and later as I become better at this I can deign my own IP and try to come up with an original game play style that is fun. Until then I won't waste a dime on advertising. That's not saying I don't advertise because my game is no good, that's saying the these ad business networks feast on our aspirations by selling us advertising that ultimately isn't going to be seen by enough people to be effective.

I think the number one game write now is Game of War and when I play Looney Tunes Dash, Game of War accounts for 9 of every 10 ads they try to get me to view. Of course I can see well enough from the ad teasers Game of War is the same old, same old, and it has no game play merit to make it #1 over so many other better games. May as well be serving a plate of dry spaghetti.

As you see the folks that did Game of War had to spend a fortune on advertising while Rovio didn't.

Really for all the game makers that say gaming is their passion how many regularly a checking out the app store and looking for new games with new gaming style vs being a fan-boy of a game genre say, COD and sticking to the COD genre very much Disneyesque-like. Where is the room for growth in that mentality?