Or has everyone moved on and am I merely caught up in a wave of nostalgia?
Though the use of it for rpgs, action or adventure games have been practically obsolesced by modern 3d rendering technologies, I think this current gen of consoles is the last cycle in which pre-rendered backgrounds and elements would still be viable. Even in the best-looking games nowadays, you'll find at least one or two stretched, blurred, or generally low-res textures somewhere, in a nook or cranny that the developer hadn't intended you to see. That's been the compromise of allowing complete freedom to observe your surroundings closely, with a controllable camera.
That's always been what drew me to pre-rendered/pre-drawn backgrounds in the 90's up to the early 2000's. Aside from the fact that games during that era were limited by low-res texture and low-poly assets, there was an artistry to pre-rendered backgrounds. I'm not saying that the work on polygonal environments didn't require a similar amount of artistic talent and effort, but a lot of pre-rendered locales had a painterly quality, some were pleasing because they sat in this nebulous space between realism and surrealism. It also helped that having the camera locked at certain angles gave each scene a filmic quality (probably a bad buzzword to use, but it applies). Granted, a lot of games did this with fully 3d backgrounds. Dino Crisis, RE: CV, God of War series, etc etc, but they never had the same effect on me.
It could be my lingering affection for many of games that used pre-rendered environments. If these games were remade today in full 3d, they'd probably look better than they had before. Or maybe it's just my appreciation of color and art design and the density of 'things' in a prepared scene.
One of the few modern full-3d games that has this similar effect on me is Trine 2:
Death blow to nostalgia: It's tough playing games with pre-rendered environments nowadays because they don't scale well at all to higher resolutions.
Though the use of it for rpgs, action or adventure games have been practically obsolesced by modern 3d rendering technologies, I think this current gen of consoles is the last cycle in which pre-rendered backgrounds and elements would still be viable. Even in the best-looking games nowadays, you'll find at least one or two stretched, blurred, or generally low-res textures somewhere, in a nook or cranny that the developer hadn't intended you to see. That's been the compromise of allowing complete freedom to observe your surroundings closely, with a controllable camera.
That's always been what drew me to pre-rendered/pre-drawn backgrounds in the 90's up to the early 2000's. Aside from the fact that games during that era were limited by low-res texture and low-poly assets, there was an artistry to pre-rendered backgrounds. I'm not saying that the work on polygonal environments didn't require a similar amount of artistic talent and effort, but a lot of pre-rendered locales had a painterly quality, some were pleasing because they sat in this nebulous space between realism and surrealism. It also helped that having the camera locked at certain angles gave each scene a filmic quality (probably a bad buzzword to use, but it applies). Granted, a lot of games did this with fully 3d backgrounds. Dino Crisis, RE: CV, God of War series, etc etc, but they never had the same effect on me.
RE Remake was a revelation to me.
It could be my lingering affection for many of games that used pre-rendered environments. If these games were remade today in full 3d, they'd probably look better than they had before. Or maybe it's just my appreciation of color and art design and the density of 'things' in a prepared scene.
One of the few modern full-3d games that has this similar effect on me is Trine 2:
Death blow to nostalgia: It's tough playing games with pre-rendered environments nowadays because they don't scale well at all to higher resolutions.
