@Developers: Can we please have the unpixelated original graphics, too?

[Lilly-Cat]

Whenever a game is being developed in high quality and then turned into some pixelated mess to have a retro-look, I ask myself why not make the pixelation an OPTION, maybe a default option if a developer wants to make it a selling point. People who want pixel, will buy it.

But why forcing everyone else to strain their eyes? Pixelated stuff isn't healthy to look at, back then technology wasn't advanced like today, so there was no option.

But nowadays simply advertize a game with pixel look and make it a default option, so those who really want PIXELS will buy it. That's it.

Since you are not creating the graphics in that way however, it would be great to give other gamers the option to have the beautiful original graphics - instead of leaving them unused and just internal work that never gets outside the studio.

[Keytee Tamira]

Origineel geplaatst door TheSaltTrader:

Origineel geplaatst door Gamrage:

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I feel like it was definitely a choice to bring back the feelings of nostalgia from people who enjoyed "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time."

I think the issue is TMNT In time never really looked pixelated, CRT screens hid most of the imperfections, the problem nowadays are modern displays, Most arcade emulator use crt shaders to hide all the imperfections, would be nice if they included one, but we can always use reshade and apply it manually ourselves.

I don't care how they looked back in the day.

In fact, i did play old NES and Sega Mega Drive games on my old TV. But once i started playing on emulators, i started to prefer crisp clean pixels more than smooth stuff on TV.

Heck, even in 3D games, whenever i get the option to turn off texture filtering, i choose that and enjoy gorgeous pixel textures.

[Spotts]

Origineel geplaatst door Keytee Tamira:

People who criticize Pixel Art simply haven't seen how gorgeous it can look like.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/c0/86/01/c086016cf4472ad4ab69de88d231f68b.gif
https://vistapointe.net/images/the-legend-of-zelda-the-minish-cap-wallpaper-19.jpg

Sadly, however, most Pixel Games today use very blocky designs, as in, they focus too much on making it look pixel.
This TMNT game, however, is visually done right. Pixelated, yet artists push the boundaries of pixel art, making it look lively.

I think what people don't talk about is the Pixels Per Inch, PPI, which is what your eyes see. In the 90's, the PPI was not much worse than today, because typically you were playing on a 15" - 30" TV. Now people are playing on 65" or higher. That means, in order to have the same PPI, you need to have 2x - 4x the resolution, just to be the same. All these games that -intentionally- have horrible resolutions are making people's eyes water across the world. No one wants a single pixel to be a full square inch. They need to make it an option, because, why not. It would cost them very little as a % of costs, and would result in more sales. Because I'll never buy a game that intentionally looks so bad.

[Silhouette]

A) The pixel art looks gorgeous.
B) You get a ton of sprite-sheet optimization benefits by limiting the resolution.

While Streets of Rage 4 looks amazing with it’s high-resolution background/character art, I’m skeptical you could get 6 players in it without running into performance issues.

[Valtus3200]

I feel like games that use hand drawn graphics instead of sprites don't animate very well...or they end up looking like cardboard cutouts or something, so I'm not a fan of those as much. I actually prefer the pixel look of SR.

[WiFiDi]

while the devs may or may not be able to undo the pixel art. it depends on how it was made and even then its still alot of work reguardless. the user can apply filters/scaling [en.wikipedia.org]
to the pixel art changing the look and making it look less like pixel arty. i believe one could apply these effects using sweetfx if i recall i haven't tried it yet because i like pixel art generally.

xbrz is the one im most familiar with, it gets rid of a lot of pixelzation and gives it an almost watercolor/drawn aesthetic. (on gameboy games) i am not sure how that would effect something of higher resolution compared to a gameboy sized games i use it on.

https://a.fsdn.com/con/app/proj/xbrz/screenshots/xBRZ%2022.png (an example image)

[Minneyar]

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

I think what people don't talk about is the Pixels Per Inch, PPI, which is what your eyes see. In the 90's, the PPI was not much worse than today, because typically you were playing on a 15" - 30" TV. Now people are playing on 65" or higher. That means, in order to have the same PPI, you need to have 2x - 4x the resolution, just to be the same.

People don't talk about it because that's just completely wrong. People have always had a wide variety of screen sizes. My parents had a 50" TV when I was a kid in the 90's, and I'm playing on a 27" monitor now. And, of course, relevant to this specific game, a lot of people played on arcade cabinets where you were standing right in front of the display rather than sitting five feet away on a couch.

Of course, in reality, a lot of artists already do exactly what you're suggesting. The SNES' most common rendering mode ran at a resolution of 256x224. Shredder's Revenge, which has an art style reminiscent of the SNES games, runs at 480x270, so noticeably higher than the SNES.

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

All these games that -intentionally- have horrible resolutions are making people's eyes water across the world.

No they're not. Seriously, if looking at low-resolution artwork makes your eyes water, you should see an optometrist. That's not normal.

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

No one wants a single pixel to be a full square inch.

It's a good thing that on a 60" TV you'd need a resolution of roughly 36x20 in order for every pixel to be a square inch, so that literally never happens.

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

They need to make it an option, because, why not.

Because it's an artistic choice and a lot of people like it, regardless of whether you do or not.

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

It would cost them very little as a % of costs, and would result in more sales.

You have no idea how much work goes into making sprites, do you? They do not draw everything at a high resolution and then scale it down; all of the pixels are placed at the exact scale that they're rendered, and unlike with 3D models, every frame of animation for every sprite has to be individually drawn. Drawing high-resolution sprites is much more work than low-resolution ones, and if you want to have the same sprites at multiple detail levels, all of them have to be drawn individual levels; drawing them once and scaling them down or up just makes ugly results. There are reasons why very few games use high-resolution sprites -- and if they do, they often use vector transformations to animate them instead of drawing individual frames.

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

Because I'll never buy a game that intentionally looks so bad.

Good news, this game intentionally looks great, you just don't like the art style.

[Silhouette]

Origineel geplaatst door Minneyar:

You have no idea how much work goes into making sprites, do you? They do not draw everything at a high resolution and then scale it down; all of the pixels are placed at the exact scale that they're rendered, and unlike with 3D models, every frame of animation for every sprite has to be individually drawn. Drawing high-resolution sprites is much more work than low-resolution ones, and if you want to have the same sprites at multiple detail levels, all of them have to be drawn individual levels; drawing them once and scaling them down or up just makes ugly results. There are reasons why very few games use high-resolution sprites -- and if they do, they often use vector transformations to animate them instead of drawing individual frames.

^This.

There’s no easy way for the developers to just magically increase the resolution, and even if there was, I imagine the game would quickly run out of “texture memory” as all the game’s art assets would need to be at least 16x bigger.

(That would make the game’s resolution 1920x1080.)

This game wasn’t built with higher-res art in mind, so I doubt it would still run smoothly, especially on lower-end systems like the Nintendo Switch in hand-held mode. The higher-res art would undoubtedly introduce all kinds of performance issues.

[Emig5m]

Pixel art as you guys call it was OK back in the low res CRT days where CRT distortion kinda gave it free antialiasing but these modern pixel perfect displays pixel art just looks way too blocky and flat. I have six original 80s arcade games and old graphics look great on a arcade CRT monitor but the same game on a modern display is just too blocky and flat looking. A game like R-Type Dimensions did it right, it gave you the option to either use the original 80s graphics or the new HD remade version and switch it on the fly with a press of a button. Someone mentioned some CRT filters, I think that these games should come with CRT filters.

[Tribute JF]

It’s an artistic choice.
Pixel art is what we’re known for. It’s not a cheaper way to make games. That’s what we love doing and that what we’re good at.

You wouldn’t ask a painter to pull out maya and start 3d modeling because that’s the future.

It’s not everyone’s cup of tea and that is fine. But we’d never change the art style.

[Keytee Tamira]

Origineel geplaatst door Spotts:

No one wants a single pixel to be a full square inch..

I want.

Why did you use "No one wants" arguement, when you are talking to the person who WANTS?

[Madjestik85]

I completely agree with the author of this topic! the pixels look terrible, why not let the players make their own choice - if they want to strain their eyes, then let them choose pixelization in the settings. but I'm much more comfortable playing with good graphics. the lack of an option to disable pixelation is the main reason I don't buy this game...

[FOXDUDE69]

Origineel geplaatst door Tribute JF:

You wouldn’t ask a painter to pull out maya and start 3d modeling because that’s the future.

But one could ask a digital painter to drop paint for photoshop.

[Madjestik85]

Origineel geplaatst door Tribute JF:

It’s an artistic choice.
Pixel art is what we’re known for. It’s not a cheaper way to make games. That’s what we love doing and that what we’re good at.

You wouldn’t ask a painter to pull out maya and start 3d modeling because that’s the future.

It’s not everyone’s cup of tea and that is fine. But we’d never change the art style.

Do you understand that there are people who love ninja turtles, but at the same time they do not absolutely love pixel art? why not give the players a choice? why is pixel art mandatory and not an option?

[FOXDUDE69]

Origineel geplaatst door 76561198211140331:

Origineel geplaatst door Tribute JF:

It’s an artistic choice.
Pixel art is what we’re known for. It’s not a cheaper way to make games. That’s what we love doing and that what we’re good at.

You wouldn’t ask a painter to pull out maya and start 3d modeling because that’s the future.

It’s not everyone’s cup of tea and that is fine. But we’d never change the art style.

Do you understand that there are people who love ninja turtles, but at the same time they do not absolutely love pixel art? why not give the players a choice? why is pixel art mandatory and not an option?

Saw an interview where they said they wanted it to look retro, but this is not what retro games looked like. Ninja Turtles games on a CRT had a very different look from this. Pixel Art was never meant for the screens we have now. CRTs blended the pixels together and made it look good, which is why the emulation community has put a great deal of work into shaders that emulate (but unfortunately can't ever match) the CRT.

I have mad respect for the old games but games made for today's displays should be made with asset resolutions that look the best on those displays. And HD hand drawn assets simply look better on these displays compared to low resolution assets.

[BrianPatrickDMF]

Origineel geplaatst door Silhouette:

A) The pixel art looks gorgeous.
B) You get a ton of sprite-sheet optimization benefits by limiting the resolution.

While Streets of Rage 4 looks amazing with it’s high-resolution background/character art, I’m skeptical you could get 6 players in it without running into performance issues.

IDK, I've played SoR4 on some old laptops that barely run Dead Cells, and the game runs butter smooth even with like 50 enemies so I don't think a half decent pc with discreet gpu and mainstream cpu would struggle with 6 player characters.