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[gelf]

Emulated gifs of PS1/Saturn games. was the point I was making.

On saturn emulation. Most Saturn pics you can find are usually more genuine then PS1 shots as the most used and compatible emulator for Saturn SSF doesn't allow any upscaling at all. The alternative emu Yabause is buggy or incompatible with a lot of games especially in the OpenGL needed to render at higher res. But anyway I don't think upscaled and cleaned up screenshots matter for what this thread is about though. Also the Virtua Fighter 2 gif in the OP looks like the arcade version to me.

One game I can get running in OpenGL in Yabause though is Panzer Dragoon Zwei. So I offer my own bullshots of low poly Saturn goodness.

 

[More_Badass]

Ashen seems incredible, and some other modern low poly games. I'm just bored with the plein flat look ala Faceted Flight (which looks super good) cause this aesthetic is already the big overdone fad lol.

Here's a few more modern ones

Before

Into This Wylde Abyss

Sky Rogue

 

[vivin]

Woah,

I stumbled upon this thread, because im an obvious fan of low poly art styles, wasnt expecting anyone talking about Ashen haha. Im glad the style is resonating with other fans of the low poly style.

The interesting thing is, Ashen isnt true "low poly" as I use quite high poly counts on the models, as most of the details are captured in the geo, and dont rely on textures such as normal maps. In that sense, ashen is a bit of a hybrid/love child of both low poly and high poly styles

 

[More_Badass]

Woah,

I stumbled upon this thread, because im an obvious fan of low poly art styles, wasnt expecting anyone talking about Ashen haha. Im glad the style is resonating with other fans of the low poly style.

The interesting thing is, Ashen isnt true "low poly" as I use quite high poly counts on the models, as most of the details are captured in the geo, and dont rely on textures such as normal maps. In that sense, ashen is a bit of a hybrid/love child of both low poly and high poly styles

How's development going? You guys were quiet for a while, glad to see some more recent screenshots and footage on Twitter and the site.

 

[Mufausa The 3rd]

This game right here. Man was it fun

 

[Mufausa The 3rd]

Also any Sega Model 2/3 games look amazing as well.

 

[Enter the Dragon Punch]

I don't know if World of Warcraft really applies that well here, but...

Some of the environments are absolutely gorgeous. Took this now on an area that's pretty much not been updated

 

[gafneo]

I love old 3d art the most.

http://www.unseen64.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/castle3.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27rlRZ9DqyA

 

[gafneo]

http://gamesdbase.com/Media/SYSTEM/Sega_Model_2/Snap/Thumb/Thumb_Top_Skater_-_1997_-_Sega.jpg

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

You know, one interesting result of having a very low poly art style is that you should be able to afford proper geometric shadow cones for every object in the scene, for multiple light sources too.

I wonder if there's anything recent out there that has tried this.

 

[vivin]

How's development going? You guys were quiet for a while, glad to see some more recent screenshots and footage on Twitter and the site.

We went quiet for a few months as we investigated/ported the game over to UE4 so there wasnt much new to show haha. We hope to have something kinda cool to be showing off in the near future

Back on topic, Im always impressed how much people can pull off with very small poly/texture budgets. This is one of my favs from years back(not from a specific game, just game fan art)

 

[Slamtastic]

Fatal Fury Wild Ambition

 

[Qblivion]

This thread needs more Xenogears.

 

[lazygecko]

The lack of bilinear texture filtering kills this aesthetic for me. I loved both the PS1 and the Saturn but it was an ugly time, especially as a gamer with a PC/3D accelerator, and coming from the lovely 16 bit 2D hand-crafted feel to the dead pre-rendered backgrounds, blurry low-res textures, pixel crawl of the PS1 and Saturn, etc., I would not say that it was a beautiful time.

Console 3D gaming impressed me with the Dreamcast. Most games were still low-poly but had much better textures and texture filtering.

Filtering depends entirely on the nature of the textures. Textures that were specifically created at low resolutions like 64x64 and then tiled a lot I find tend to scale up really well with nearest neighbor. Metal Gear Solid was brought up earlier but I find this also applies to plenty of mid 90s games like Quake. I think it's mostly due to a lot of the textures relying on one pixel wide lines and dots to define detail, and I find this to be diminished a great deal when filtered.

 

[oneida]

I made these!
since the topic of emulators is being discussed, I'll note that the VFRemix gif was made from the original hardware and the VF2 gif was made using a Model 2 emulator. So that's the arcade version. It's just a really good looking game.

Also that Akira combo is bad but I wanted to show off his one frame knee

 

[missile]

Filtering depends entirely on the nature of the textures. Textures that were specifically created at low resolutions like 64x64 and then tiled a lot I find tend to scale up really well with nearest neighbor. Metal Gear Solid was brought up earlier but I find this also applies to plenty of mid 90s games like Quake. I think it's mostly due to a lot of the textures relying on one pixel wide lines and dots to define detail, and I find this to be diminished a great deal when filtered.

Good point. :+

 

[Stimpack]

This thread needs more Xenogears.

Wow, do I really need to replay Xenogears? I don't remember this Gear at all.

 

[vetrox]

The games being rendered at very low (240p - 480p) resolutions also had a lot to do with it. The low fidelity of rendering obscured much of the very simplistic geometry, essentially abstracting it for us. Old 3D games played at modern resolutions get a very different feel because of that. Especially emulated PS1 games have their wobbly, unstable polygons greatly exasperated. It was all there in the first place, it's just that we didn't notice it. Very much like how old dithered 2D graphics were designed around poor TV/video outputs in that regard.

Yep. The original, unaltered image on the left is the superior one. It loses all of it's charm with the muddy, smoothed out textures. These should be viewed as they are, in the format they were meant to be viewed at. They are indeed art. They lose all of their charm if seen any other way.

Some modern remakes also suffers from this effect. Resident Evil 4 still looks better to me on the GC/PS2/Wii than the recent HD port does.

Even Durantes DSfix for Dark Souls detracts from the original vision in my opinion, even though I see how many couldn't play without it.

 

[gafneo]

Yeah, I really hope that in a few years Low-Poly will be the new go to retro aesthetic opposed to 8/16 bit pixel art.

I love the look of MGS1.

That's my dream. Pixelated 3d in hd is the best thing in life. If only controls were modern.

 

[Lightning Count]

Kawasaki Superbike Challenge on the SEGA Mega Drive.

 

[piggychan]

needs more saturn love in here...

brb with some hopefully soon

 

[RedSwirl]

Wing War is the perfect example of my ideal style in regards to low-poly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFcAe1OLQtQ

If you look at this video, notice that despite having few polygons, flat shading, and basically no textures to work with, the game still manages to have pretty detailed environments.

 

[AgeEighty]

Ehhhh.... no. I think this generation looks hideous. Second only to the Atari 2600 in terms of how badly the graphics have aged.

Even the best-looking polygonal games of this generation are ugly.

 

[patrickthehedgehog]

Some beauties from my tumblr...

Stunt Race FX

Wing War

Metal Gear Solid

 

[Crisium]

needs more saturn love in here...

brb with some hopefully soon

Shinrei Jusatsushi Tarōmaru (心霊呪殺師 太郎&#20024:

Images stolen from here:
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/taromaru/taromaru.htm

Clockwork Knight games:

Grandia:

Pandemonium:

Croc:

Ninpen Manmaru (忍ペンまん&#20024:

Wachenröder:

Images stolen from:
http://www.satakore.com/sega-saturn-game,,GS-9183,,Wachenroder-JPN.html

 

[epmode]

I really love high-resolution, low-poly stuff. Flat shaded or simple textures both look great so long as the textures are unfiltered.

So yeah, these threads are great.

Wings of Saint Nazaire has an impressive art style that still calls back to older games and an older aesthetic

This game looks phenomenal but isn't it using a bunch of sprites? Just like Wing Commander 1 and 2.

 

[More_Badass]

Another cool low poly game

Necropolis

It's from Harebrained Schemes, devs of Shadowrun Returns

 

[closer1000]

Don't forget Blasto on PSX [in 4k using PCSX-Reloaded].

 

[vilmer_]

Some of these shots are just fantastic! The mid to late 90's for me was the pinnacle of gaming. Dusting off the old PSX now.

 

[celsowmbr]

Sonic X-Treme

Spoiler

Project AXSX

 

[Lijik]

Don't forget Blasto on PSX [in 4k using PCSX-Reloaded].

I remember as a kid just being really taken with the pixelated planet backgrounds. Im not really sure why, might be how flat shaded and obviously polygonal the rest of the game was compared to them.

 

[Solid Samus]

Sky Rogue

Yooooo, Sky Rogue looks like my kinda game.

 

[AmyS]

Moar!

EGM's lovely Virtua(l) Racing preview

 

[Gattsu25]

Shocked to NOT see this:

This brings a tear to my eye. Glorious

 

[Calvero]

thought this would be about the Geist vagina

 

[Clockwork5]

Not a fan but some of these contemporary games have a bit of a Picasso look to them. Very interesting art direction.

 

[Temporal Mess]

YES. I love the look of PS1 games, even now. I don't know if it's just nostalgia or if there's actually some aesthetic reason, but I just love how the lighting, meshes and textures look in games from this era.

Low poly Lara is best Lara.

 

[Voyevoda]

YES. I love the look of PS1 games, even now. I don't know if it's just nostalgia or if there's actually some aesthetic reason, but I just love how the lighting, meshes and textures look in games from this era.

Low poly Lara is best Lara.

This. I tend to find most N64 games horrible-looking. But I just absolutely love the look of PS1 games.

 

[trikster40]

I remember the first time I saw NBA In The Zone for PS1: mind blown.

 

[Temporal Mess]

This. I tend to find most N64 games horrible-looking. But I just absolutely love the look of PS1 games.

All my N64 gaming was done at my grandmother's house, as she owned the console, not me, so I definitely probably have some bias towards the PS1 since that was the console I played more.

But I was replaying Mario 64 a couple of months back and the textures and lighting just didn't seem to compliment the low poly models as well as they did with PS1 titles.

Again, I'm likely super biased in regards to this.

 

[Lightning Count]

Severance Blade of Darkness.

 

[Raptomex]

Lowpoly level design has a kind of elegance and minimalism to it that you don't really see in cluttered, overdetailed modern level design.

What game is this?

 

[sixteen-bit]

What asshole called it monogamy instead of low-poly?

 

[blu]

Yooooo, Sky Rogue looks like my kinda game.

If you like that make sure to check out DID's (published by Ocean) F-29 Retaliator and Epic.

Ultimately, TFX was their crown jewel, but that's from a later era.

 

[CharminUltra]

I still find Mega Man Legends graphics impressive even to this day.

 

[sixteen-bit]

I still find Mega Man Legends graphics impressive even to this day.

Yeah. They got a lot of mileage out of the limited hardware. The characters are so expressive.

 

[Just_myles]

Yeah I love low poly. that's when games started getting more interesting and creative imo(in regards to exploiting limitations).

 

[HappehLemons]

YES. I love the look of PS1 games, even now. I don't know if it's just nostalgia or if there's actually some aesthetic reason, but I just love how the lighting, meshes and textures look in games from this era.

Low poly Lara is best Lara.

This is not a screenshot from the PS1 game, I'm pretty sure this is the PC version.

 

[itsmanny]

Ha, thread comes absolutely in time for my first post Here are some screenshots from a game I have worked on back then. It was called Navy Seals: Covert Operations a TC for Q3. Maybe somebody here even remembers it, it was quite popular back then

 

[The Orz]

Finally managed to get Cool Cool Toon running in NullDC. Every bit as good as I remember it (except for the "notty" bits. Those can bite me). A great little hidden gem for the Dreamcast that does wonders with flat textures and limited polygons. And the music's fun, too!