Blake Reynolds, the artist over at Dinofarm Games, has
written a long post about why the studios games will no longer use pixel art. Its an interesting read, and perhaps the most fascinating part is his breakdown of
Street Fighters animations.
Focusing on
Street Fighter III and
Street Fighter IV, Reynolds explains why the animation in
SFIII is better than
SFIVs.
Chun-lis body in
SFIII works like a whip cracking. When every frame is a new drawing, it allows for things like flowing drapery, muscles flexing and unflexing, the natural sort of warp the body takes when it moves in extreme ways, etc. The effect is nothing short of magical, Reynolds writes.
While Ive seen far worse than Chun-li in
SFIV, the animation is just kind of dead and sloppily done. There is no urgency, and many of her limbs and facial movements seem bizarre and out of place, he continues.
Because of this,
SFIV Chun-li looks like shes posing for a photo shoot, whereas
SFIII Chun-li looks full of adrenaline and intensity
almost as though she were in a fight!
Reynolds breaks down the animation in both of these
Street Fighter games in this way to illustrate one of his points in the article: that to explain why a games art may be better than another one to an average player takes a lot of effort. He reasons that most players would instantly perceive
Street Fighter IVs art as being better merely because its in 1080p and runs at 60 frames per second, whereas
Street Fighter III is what most people would refer to as pixelated.
This was one of the criticisms levied at Dinofarms latest game
Auro.
His point is that not enough people appreciate pixel art these days, no matter its quality, and thats why hes abandoning it for Dinofarms previous games instead, hell use HD art as thats better understood and admired by todays players. You can
read the whole article here.
Read more stories about
Street Fighter III &
Street Fighter IV on Siliconera.
