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[Chronospherics]

This is from LoZ Minish Cap, I like the artstyle much more than the DS games.

I feel that Flagship made the best LoZ games (Minish Cap, Seasons, Ages), most people would probably disagree though. That's okay.

 

[ShroudOfFate]

FF7. The characters are low poly but charming as hell. And the atmosphere created by the pre-rendered backgrounds is unmatched to this day.

 

[Vilix]

Bingo.

Oh, and Outrun 2's graphics are still very nice.

 

[pnutboy]

I cannot believe that this game came out in 2001. Incredible.

 

[Yukinari]

Surprised nobody posted Oddworld yet.

The PS1 originals put New N Tasty to shame. The artists put so much love into this game its not even funny.

 

[Unmoses]

Really hard to find a decent screenshot, but Bladerunner from 1997 (I believe?).

I still have the jewel case somewhere.. loved this game!

I loved all the looking glass games. SS, UW1, UW2, TN..

 

[NipplesAndToes23]

This thread is a joy to watch, especially after Thanksgiving.

 

[Zoloft Sonic]

SNK's house-style, never really duplicated since. We see plenty of pixel art, but SNK gave us The Giant Sprite.

Though some Capcom CPS2 games came close to replicating the feel IMO.

 

[CharminUltra]

FF7. The characters are low poly but charming as hell. And the atmosphere created by the pre-rendered backgrounds is unmatched to this day.

Always love it when these gifs pop up. Great atmosphere.

 

[Nerrel]

Super Metroid still looks incredible. Time only makes me appreciate how advanced the pxel art was more and more; like the way Samus' night vision visor glows in dark rooms, or the droplets that kick up with her footsteps in damp areas, or the piles of droppings left by the shriekbats I posted above. There are so many incredible details for a 16-bit game.


I think Resident Evil 4 also deserves a lot of credit. It's textures can be a complete mess at times, but somehow it still looks great (emulated shots):

 

[Veins]

This is from LoZ Minish Cap, I like the artstyle much more than the DS games.

I feel that Flagship made the best LoZ games (Minish Cap, Seasons, Ages), most people would probably disagree though. That's okay.

Wow this looks awesome.

My vote goes to Ridge Racer Type 4. The style is just amazing and it still looks great. I only played it briefly when it was new but played it extensively last year on my vita and I still appreciated the graphics.

 

[kewlbot]

Killer7 perhaps?

 

[Ol No Bones]

Phantom Dust on original Xbox.

 

[Pro from Dover]

Killer7 perhaps?

Styling.

 

[Violet_0]

I don't think Outcast was mentioned yet. One of the pioneers of voxel graphics in gaming, offering a large open world to explore, Outcast looked marvelous at times back in 1999, the landscape in particular

those water effects

it's also a great and underrated game that's been nearly forgotten. And dat soundtrack. Still waiting for the sequel, many years later ...

]http://38.media.tumblr.com/2bc953282ba67ae0b638e091484505a5/tumblr_nu0b23YmPK1tdjgz4o1_r2_1280.gif

SaGa Frontier 2

did they use pixel sprite characters on hand-drawn backgrounds? I googled some images and I dig the style of the game

 

[Dizzy-4U]

Slap Happy Rhythm Busters (PSX)

I think it was the first time I saw cell shaded graphics. It's on the japanese PSN if anyone is interested.

 

[Cuban Legend]

The very underrated exclusive, Breakdown(2004) for the Xbox. It's a mix between Godhand and Mirror's Edge.



You drink sodas and eat burgers as well as energy bars to replenish your health, what more do you want?

i remember buying this game after seeing a partial playthrough of it. It is amazing, gameplay wise especially. I never did finish it though...

 

[Rathorial]

Late 90s Isometric CRPGs, and certain RTSs do it for me:

Icewind Dale

Planescape Torment:

Company of Heroes (amazing for 2006)

Rise of Nations: Rise of Legends (underrated, and also amazing for 2006)

 

[Tizoc]

All that yellow in RR Type 4 is odd TBH
But yeah that game looks good.
Sadly the Vita's small scree doesn't do it much justice D; I mean it still looks good, but if the screen were twice as big it'd look nicer.

 

[woen]

Pokémon games from GBA/DS eras. It aged very well on the consoles themselves, and aged even better with emulators that run the games at HD resolutions.

Red Dead Redemption is 5 years 1/2 and still looks great on 720p console. It's a shame it never had a PC release, those models would look amazing on 1080p or more resolutions.

The first Assassin's Creed (2007) also aged pretty well. Better than the first two Ezio games (2009,2010) at least I believe.

 

[HTupolev]

Bungie did a great job visually with Halo 3 but I seem to remember critics bashing it in this regard?

It's got some chunky geometry, it's low-res, and in terms of human characters and animation it simply isn't that sophisticated. In several major ways it didn't make a very punchy generational leap. On the flip side, significant aspects of the lighting model were practically a generation ahead of their time, and help the game achieve a lively, crisp, colorful sheen.

It's always been polarizing.

Halo CE.

(I'd also appreciate a .gif of the particle collisions if anyone can find one)

This is from 2001.

Particle collisions?

 

[HueyFreeman]

I would probably argue they rogue leaders are still, two generations later, not dated.

 

[blame space]

Viewtiful Joe still looks amazing to me.

Why isn't this downloadable somewhere

 

[Nick]

The xbox version of this game was terrible. The damn ps2 version is nearly perfect though.

The HD collection on Ps3 is flawless, though. Bluepoint is so amazing.

 

[PayOffWizard]

Grim Fandango - 1998

 

[NakedJedi]

Final Fantasy VIII

 

[Lux R7]

 

[Melchiah]

Silent Hill 3 on PS2 for sure!

This gets my vote as well.

 

[velociraptor]

Quake 3 still looks damn good for a 1999 game. In fact, it looks fucking amazing for a game of that era.

 

[REDSLATE]

The very underrated exclusive, Breakdown(2004) for the Xbox. It's a mix between Godhand and Mirror's Edge.



You drink sodas and eat burgers as well as energy bars to replenish your health, what more do you want?

Juice, man, JUICE.

But yeah, the game makes some pretty simple textures look great and uses particles to good effect. Only takes up 2 GB on disc.

Mirror's Edge owes a lot to this game.

 

[Triggerhappytel]

Vagrant Story

Such a gorgeous game. I love the art style, and in particular the character models and designs.

auto modellista

Wow, that looks great. Is that really taken from a PS2, or a bullshot?

I keep posting the same Ridge Racer Type 4 gifs every time a similar thread pops up, man it just looks so fucking great to this day. It just has a timeless aesthetic.

Yeah, the style in RRT4 is wonderful. This reminds me, I bought it a while ago on Vita but have barely played it.

Halo CE.

(I'd also appreciate a .gif of the particle collisions if anyone can find one)

This is from 2001.

Yeah, landing on Halo and just checking out the visuals and the scale is still one of my fondest memories in gaming.

Final Fantasy 9 - PS1.

The art backgrounds in that game still amaze me. For a PS1 game it was a spectacle and truly still is.

Yeah, that was a severely gorgeous game and you could tell it was pushing the PS1 to breaking point.

Black (2005)

Visually stunning shooter on PS2, spectacle still holds up today.

Criterion were the gods of PS2 visuals.

I cannot believe that this game came out in 2001. Incredible.

Goddamn, that's gorgeous. Why don't we have arcade flight sims like this any more?!

 

[Tambini]

Rayman 1 and 2

 

[MissChief]

I still love the way MDK 1 looks

 

[UnrealEck]

Halo was a good example.
Crysis from 2007 maxed out is another obvious example.

I also like the look of a lot of 90s arcades. Sega's stuff looked good. Quite well animated and fluid too.

 

[RealityCheque]

I didn't spot any Wind Waker yet?!

 

[Death Metalist]

I really wanted to play this game as a kid simply because you could see your body when you look down.

I still think it holds up today if only because it does things that no other FPS game does. For example you could do a flying kick, at some point the game kind of becomes like a fighting game with the amounts of things you could do, if I remember correctly you could do backflips as well or slide and then transition into an uppercut, you could even throw electric balls.

Also, no HUD at all times but you had unique ways of knowing things like checking your clip for how much ammo it has if I'm not mistaken and also all the cutscenes in the game are done from the main character's perspective. I don't remember the story all that much but I remember it turning into a pretty insane thing by the end that involves time travel lol.

i remember buying this game after seeing a partial playthrough of it. It is amazing, gameplay wise especially. I never did finish it though...

Juice, man, JUICE.

But yeah, the game makes some pretty simple textures look great and uses particles to good effect. Only takes up 2 GB on disc.

Mirror's Edge owes a lot to this game.

It's been a while since I have played it. Seeing it again now makes me want to go play it again because it's a shame we haven't seen anything close to that in terms of gameplay until ME released and even then it wasn't as insane as Breakdown.

 

[Gurish]

MGS2's tanker level is so impressive, the rain looks better than most games today, best looking game ever for its time.

 

[cireza]

Pixel-art 2D : the thread.
Story of Thor 2 has my favorite pixel art graphics.

Putting 2D aside, I would say :
Ikaruga on Dreamcast is still amazing.
Radiant Silvergun on Saturn is also great.
Quake 3 on Dreamcast also looks very good (in single player).
Soul Calibur (Dreamcast again).

Dreamcast had a very clean/sharp picture, great colors, which helps a lot.

Wind Waker and Resident Evil 4 on GC.

 

[Elitro]

The best game of all time, obviously has timeless good visuals.

 

[GeordieMark]

Gods on the Amiga.

The Bitmap Brothers always made games with a nice looking aesthetic. Gods was a great game and looked fantastic for the time.

 

[RoadHazard]

The last time I saw a game a felt like I was in a new generation visually. Not sure if this could ever be topped.

Yep, nothing has blown me away like Rogue Leader (well, maybe SM64). I mean, leaping from blocky, muddy N64 visuals to THAT! Damn. And it still looks great, barring the resolution.

 

[litelite_]

Guild Wars has some of the best low-poly stuff ever.

 

[dark10x]

Star fox snes immediately comes to mind. Virtua racing also looks charming.

Star Fox is ruined by the insanely low frame-rate. Seeing those super low poly visuals at a slightly higher resolution at 60fps would still be awesome, though.

Ehhhh, they've definitely aged. Played it a bit recently on 360 with the remake.

It still looks good for its time. But my memory ofnit was way better than the reality

In this case, I actually think dropping the resolution down helps. Playing on a real PS2 using a CRT helps the visuals here resulting in some impressive, semi-realistic looking moments. The HD versions on a modern display spoil some of this as it becomes much easier to pick apart the details.

 

[Coreda]

This is pretty much gonna be Wind Waker: The Thread

I didn't spot any Wind Waker yet?!

Wind Waker hasn't really dated, which is likely why it isn't a recurring example. Still looks great to this day.

 

[0.1.1.2.3.5.8.13.21.34.55]

 

[MemoryHumanity]

I remember showing Rogue Squadron to my brainwashed Sony fanboy friends at the time. They legit argued with me that Battlefront looked "miles better."

 

[Oregano]

Star Fox is ruined by the insanely low frame-rate. Seeing those super low poly visuals at a slightly higher resolution at 60fps would still be awesome, though.


In this case, I actually think dropping the resolution down helps. Playing on a real PS2 using a CRT helps the visuals here resulting in some impressive, semi-realistic looking moments. The HD versions on a modern display spoil some of this as it becomes much easier to pick apart the details.

I would give damn good money for a 3D Classics version of Star Fox.

 

[orava]

Quake2. Well ok, this shot has a hint of ca and aa added.

 

[Sinatar]

Did this game always look so good, or is this a particularly flattering screen?

It's a PR bullshot. There is no anti-aliasing on the actual game, but it still looks very good for the system it's on.

 

[Duggie_Brown]

This! Also as a comparison, this game puts Star Fox Zero to shame graphically. Factor Five were wizards on the Gamecube and this is still my favourite Star Wars game, awesome. Imagine this game with VR...