TheRedSnifit
Member
Took some screens of Metal Slug X:
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2D games with an artstyle you really enjoy (600 baud warning)
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capylikesgames
Banned
Kirby's Epic Yarn. Surprised it hasn't been posted yet! It does so much with the arts and crafts aesthetic.
nailbombxx
Member
Kirby's Epic Yarn. Surprised it hasn't been posted yet! It does so much with the arts and crafts aesthetic.
Would this be more like 2.5D?
capylikesgames
Banned
There's never a shift in perspective, so I've always assumed it was meant to be interpreted as a flat image. It just happens to take advantage of a lot of modern rendering techniques.
TetraGenesis
Member
Slain
What the fuck is this game???
I know it's Slain. I just know nothing about it and I'm blown away.
I've always loved the art style that they Nintendo had for Super Mario All Stars. Particularly SMB3:
Though, surprisingly SMB2 was probably in many ways, more detailed, interestingly enough:
The Mario series in general has always had an art style that I've admired for years based on the fact that it combines practical, simple flat colors and shapes with more complex, creative ones. In that sense, I don't think anyone does a better job.
Though, surprisingly SMB2 was probably in many ways, more detailed, interestingly enough:
The Mario series in general has always had an art style that I've admired for years based on the fact that it combines practical, simple flat colors and shapes with more complex, creative ones. In that sense, I don't think anyone does a better job.
There's one thing that I've been wondering about for a while now. Your screenshots, like virtually all Metal Slug media out there appear to have some kind of interpolation filter applied to them. Even mame screenshots taken in the original resolution look like they have it. It's so prevalent that when I turn it off in ports/emulators that allow you to do so, the result actually looks "wrong" to me, which is the polar opposite of what my preferences usually are with regard to pixel art.Took some screens of Metal Slug X:
My question is, does anybody know if this was the original intended look for Metal Slug? It's so universally prevalent that I'm starting to wonder if it was, even though it would be really weird for a game from that time period to apply filtering to itself.
TheRedSnifit
Member
The original game would have been "filtered" by being displayed on a blurry, low-res CRT screen. The game looks "wrong" when you turn filters off because you're not seeing the game the way it was intended to be seen.
Raging Spaniard
If they are Dutch, upright and breathing they are more racist than your favorite player
My guess, from playing emulators, is that the native res on these images is so small that anything in a decent resolution by todays standards gets blown up pretty badly
That doesn't account for every single screenshot, gif and video of the game on the internet having what appears to be that exact same, somewhat idiosyncratic style of filtering applied to it. It's the "default" for Metal Slug, where for just about any other old game, "raw" screenshots are what you expect to find unless somebody has gone out of their way to apply a filter to it.
Case in point: literally every single other screenshot or gif of an old pixel art game in this thread.
Raging Spaniard
If they are Dutch, upright and breathing they are more racist than your favorite player
For my money, even if some examples here I appreciate art wise, I like artstyles that are tied to games I love.
Chrono Trigger
2nd Impact (better backgrounds, imo)
Muramasa
Legend of Mana
-6.jpg)
Out of this World
ISS Deluxe
arg, so many more! Id be here all day
Chrono Trigger
2nd Impact (better backgrounds, imo)
Muramasa
Legend of Mana
Out of this World
ISS Deluxe
arg, so many more! Id be here all day
purpleturtle
Neo Member
I liked the bigger, more cartoon look of games like
Mega Man Power Battle
Chiki Chiki Boys
3 Wonders
-6.jpg)
Spin Master
Twinkle Star Sprites
Twinbee Yahho!
Mega Man Power Battle
Chiki Chiki Boys
3 Wonders
Spin Master
Twinkle Star Sprites
Twinbee Yahho!
-3.jpg)
-6.jpg)
Valkyrie Profile by tri-ace
Why oh why do they refuse to release this game digitally? I have great memories of picking this up upon its PSP release just before I moved to Korea in 2006. I'll always remember my first summer in Seoul playing that game in my apartment (I can just hear that depressing music in my head). I no longer own a UMD-capable PSP, or any other way of legitimately playing the game, but it remains one of my favorite RPGs and I'd love to have it in my collection again.
Risk Breaker
Member
No Patapon yet guys? 
Papers Please
Not only does it look fittingly depressing. But I like how the screen is split between a wide shot of your booth's location (top), first person shots of the person in front of you (bottom left) and your desk (bottom right). More games should play with player's views (in a meaningful manner).
The Curse of Monkey Island
Looks like a cartoon. Needs an upscaled remake/remaster.
Not only does it look fittingly depressing. But I like how the screen is split between a wide shot of your booth's location (top), first person shots of the person in front of you (bottom left) and your desk (bottom right). More games should play with player's views (in a meaningful manner).
The Curse of Monkey Island
Looks like a cartoon. Needs an upscaled remake/remaster.
Android18a
Member
Curse of Monkey Island. Updated the character designs really nicely, and it looked like a Saturday morning cartoon come to life! I preferred this to the look of stuff like Full Throttle or Lucasart's early 3D stuff like Grim Fandango.
Weltall Zero
Member
itsbeautiful.jpg
Subbing so hard.
Edit:
I was wondering the exact same thing so I did a bit of research. Unfortunately it seems it hasn't released yet, although it was announced back in 2015, hopefully it didn't get stuck in development limbo. It's from the devs of Intrusion 2, which is itself a pretty good and visually impressive game, so let me take advantage of this fact to post some images appropriate to this thread.
Subbing so hard.
Edit:
I was wondering the exact same thing so I did a bit of research. Unfortunately it seems it hasn't released yet, although it was announced back in 2015, hopefully it didn't get stuck in development limbo. It's from the devs of Intrusion 2, which is itself a pretty good and visually impressive game, so let me take advantage of this fact to post some images appropriate to this thread.
electroaffe
Member
Severed
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capylikesgames
Banned
It's really easy to miss, but this is actually a 3D game with some fantastic shader effects. One of the devs had an interesting talk about it at GDC a while back.Guilty Gear Xrd
Basically, contrast to every other Yoshi platformer, excluding Wooly World. Even the DS one was weak at imitating the artstyle of the original imo.
Golden Sun / GS: The Lost Age
Besides combat, both original Golden Sun and The Lost Age still look great.I just really like how they did colors and shading.
Let us not forget the GOAT, Ragnarok.
AKingNamedPaul
I am Homie
I've bought two games due entirely to what I saw in this thread.
on a bit of a tangent, you know what pisses me off? Games where the cover art is incredible and then the actual in-game art is not comparable at all. Cave story for example.
on a bit of a tangent, you know what pisses me off? Games where the cover art is incredible and then the actual in-game art is not comparable at all. Cave story for example.
momshotdad
Member
I cannot wait to play Cuphead
I'm getting this without ever seeing it before this thread. Looks amazing!! (wish it were in the Switch!!) Props for posting it.
Random NEOGEO'S beat'em up backgrounds
These are sooooo good.
LoneTraveler
Member
I've always felt this game was extremely underrated. Love the artstyle in it, almost feels like you're playing a children's book.
Neverthelesser
Member
The Last Night by Odd Tales (not yet released):
Although, technically, it's a 2.5D world, since they're just placing 2D assets in a 3D environment that you observe at fixed angles:
Although, technically, it's a 2.5D world, since they're just placing 2D assets in a 3D environment that you observe at fixed angles:
Nonetheless, it's still stunning and I am a sucker for cyberpunk aesthetics...
Advance Wars
Fire Emblem
SaGa Frontier 2
PoPoLoCrois
Fire Emblem
SaGa Frontier 2
SaGa Frontier 2 had an excellent sprite + watercolor background combo that IMO works better than Legend of Mana's, which came later.
PoPoLoCrois
PoPoLoCrois Monogatari (PS1) is freaking beautiful.
I used to longingly gaze upon images of PoPoLoCrois in GameFan when I was a kid. Never played it, but it still looks great to me.
Donkey Kong Country 2:
All the Donkey Kong games fit this mold really, but I have a fondness for the second's art the most because of that patented Rare use of black shadows, mist, nightfall, and other obfuscating lighting to contrast the bright colors of the characters and other environmental objects. It always gave their games a mystical or mysterious atmosphere, like there was an ancient history there, or some real danger lurking around every corner. They felt really tangible.
It's one of the things that I don't prefer about Retro's titles or even most platformers that have survived to this point, because the lighting has just shot up in saturation and color to where that kind of grit and feeling of something lurking is just gone now. C'est la vie.
_(En,Fr)-7.jpg)
All the Donkey Kong games fit this mold really, but I have a fondness for the second's art the most because of that patented Rare use of black shadows, mist, nightfall, and other obfuscating lighting to contrast the bright colors of the characters and other environmental objects. It always gave their games a mystical or mysterious atmosphere, like there was an ancient history there, or some real danger lurking around every corner. They felt really tangible.
It's one of the things that I don't prefer about Retro's titles or even most platformers that have survived to this point, because the lighting has just shot up in saturation and color to where that kind of grit and feeling of something lurking is just gone now. C'est la vie.
It looks more like this.
or
Which look even better if you zoom out to a more accurate size.
AcademicSaucer
Member
There was an Alice in wonderland game on DS that had a fantastic artstyle.
