A rant about TF2's artstyle, and a persons views on it.

[BossBTL]

A foreword

I was watching a video just before writing this discussion called 'TF2: Are Skins Good or Bad' & while hearing the point of view of the creator of that video (who will remain unamed due to steam discussion rules) it got me thinking.

now, first off, these thoughts i have had plenty of times before, all brought up because of the same situation, where someone believes that TF2's artstyle is being corrupted or ruined by the more crazy and zany cosmetics & reskins, but i have never worded it in such a way, as i did in this video's comment section. the way how i worded my arguement, inspired me to write this discussion, to share these thoughts with others who dont see that comment.

now, by all means, this is not a way of me attempting an war of opinions, i simple want to show my point of view.

Why I am ranting

In the video, the creator had both a pro's & con's list for how reskins, but also cosmetics, effect TF2 as a whole. One of their positives were that it adds an additional level to how unique a player looks, that it adds their own flavor to an already exisitng character (an example they gave was how by adding a pirate hat to demoman could change how that character looked, and by further adding cosmetics & paints, the character could be more attributed to the player controlling them, hence the uniqueness)

but they then contradict themselves with one of their listed con's, saying how certain cosmetics or reskin weapons can kill the art style, further pushing it away from how TF2 is supposed to look. They even said that because of this reason alone, that these cosmetics & weapons should not be supported, used, or even purchased by the community.

This, is where I want to start my arguement

Main point

TF2's art style is just like every other art style, it evolves to a point where it delves into post modernism, and then furthermore into post-post modernism.

If you arent aware what post modernism is, or even post-post modernism, basically its when art changes to a point where everything becomes more distant from the original view, and then comes back to the point where the art style returns to the norm.

that being said however, the 'art style' to TF2 has been in the post modernism stage for years now. (Lore-wise its practically been in it since the beginning, but in the game itself it was probably around when danger-esq-tu was consider the more zanyiest of all the cosmetics, by the developers themselves) so much so that it has changed the game as a whole, both through lore (burly Australian mann sells hats & guns & hires mercs to kill robots & yetis all in the 1960's) & through gameplay (pyroland, bumpercars, bread monsters, zombies, wizards, the earlier mentioned robot's & yeti's)

you cant ignore it and say 'oh this cosmetic is too crazy for TF2' when TF2 in of itself is crazy.

if you really think about it, is a banana hat killing the art style when the art style has had time-traveling wizards, ghost's with hats, abraham lincoln (the inventor of the rocket jump) & gold bars that imbue people with younge age, large muscles, mustaches, chest hair shaped like continents.

[trash]

Originally posted by Smithy The Blacksmith:

if you really think about it, is a banana hat killing the art style when the art style has had time-traveling wizards, ghost's with hats, abraham lincoln (the inventor of the rocket jump) & gold bars that imbue people with younge age, large muscles, mustaches, chest hair shaped like continents.

the former is a functional part of the game; you see hats on players and their appearance plays a direct role in identifying them and offer players a way to personally express themselves
the latter is filler with no impact on how you play the core game outside of joke stuff like halloween maps and taunts

suspension of disbelief works for something like jarate; it can be absurd, but still grounded within the world
the same can't be said about this[i.redd.it]

tf2's identity is so well established and so much work was put into visual design with the base game that deviation sours things a lot faster than if it was a lesser game

recommended viewing
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1W8BZPf-N8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZ0kR03SjYg
http://www.valvesoftware.com/publications/2007/NPAR07_IllustrativeRenderingInTeamFortress2.pdf

tf2 workshop guidelines that have become increasingly irrelevant over the years
http://www.teamfortress.com/workshop/

melodramatic but still relevant
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9RjDRLBWio

[BossBTL]

Originally posted by slop:

filler with no impact on how you play the core game outside of joke stuff like halloween maps and taunts

joke stuff?

why do players allways brush off the more zannier aspects to tf2 as if it ISNT meant to be part of the game.

these things ARE a core part of the game. they change the game's story, they effect the characters themselves,the universe of the game, and even the hard built aspects, such as maps, weapons, the gameplay itself.

just as an example, Merasmus isnt a joke. he isnt just some character who hasnt been confirmed to actually be cannon who only appears during halloween, no, he's a full fledged character who exists throughout the TF2 universe, even past halloween.

If a wizard (completely unrelated to the time traveling wizard mentioned earlier YEAH THATS RIGHT, THERES MORE THAN 1 WIZARD IN TF2) who once lived with tom jones, who had his neck snapped, & was killed by the previous roomate of the wizard, and is now residing in heaven, and was then killed again by an angel (which was also by a neck snap btw) and has a talking book who spews bombs everywhere (and capable of haunting a black scottish mans eye every halloween in different forms) but is also still capable of being in debt to the russain mafia is able to exist

then a pyromaniac with a taxedermy pelt, plastic spring eyes glued to their mask and a large tounge sticking out of said mask, also weilding a discount, faulty magic voodoo stick is clearly not that much worse

[trash]

Originally posted by Smithy The Blacksmith:

why do players allways brush off the more zannier aspects to tf2 as if it ISNT meant to be part of the game.

these things ARE a core part of the game. they change the game's story, they effect the characters themselves,the universe of the game, and even the hard built aspects, such as maps, weapons, the gameplay itself.

if it's not something you can see on a 100% vanilla process server in the middle of july, it's just flavoring and isn't part of the core game
theming content after 'canon' doesn't make the source material relevant to immediate gameplay

it doesn't matter if there's yetis in tf2 canon; all that matters is that you can wear a yeti head as the heavy weapons guy on a server without halloween mode enabled

that's why cosmetics that destroy the artstyle are an issue; you can choose to ignore filler that isn't relevant to the gameplay; you can't ignore a scout wearing a banana hat and using a pink scattergun with neon green particles flying out

[BossBTL]

Originally posted by slop:

that's why cosmetics that destroy the artstyle are an issue; you can choose to ignore filler that isn't relevant to the gameplay; you can't ignore a scout wearing a banana hat and using a pink scattergun with neon green particles flying out

but dont you see, the fact that you ignore the 'filler that isnt relevant to the gameplay' , is what makes your views on what's killing the art style wrong.

the banana hat IS the art style

but since you ignore the other stuff, to you, it DOES look like its killing the art style. you cant just ignore the rest, and then say the stuff you dont ignore is wrong

dont you see this is a warped sense of thinking?

[trash]

Originally posted by Smithy The Blacksmith:

the banana hat IS the art style

the banana hat is a cashgrab to exploit people who want outrageous or overly flashy joke items
same deal as every other thing out there that stuffs in neon colors to make money off of the 14yearold Gamer™ demographic that is willing to burn money they don't know the value of

the artstyle was established in 2007 and was [mostly] kept intact for over half a decade
lime and pink paint weren't as much of an issue when there was only 1 hat slot and 1 misc slot, with a couple equippables
over the top belongs-in-a-mobile-game gaudy trashheaps are a relatively recent development, and given the comparatively low amount of content over the last 2-3 years, it's even more recent to the game's history than the years would suggest

if you want to argue that neo-tf2 'lore' is the new baseline that valve wants to use for the game's theming, fine, but if that's the case, there's bigger issues than just a few dumb hats because this ♥♥♥♥ is embarrassing given the game's past

[Tsar Platinum]

Well things like the Potassium Bonnet ruin the style already and then being painted lime or pink doesn't help either

There's also that flash helmet for Scout or those pizza skins

Halloween Items get a pass since they can't be viewable until Halloween.

[fakeloo]

I played Darkest Dungeon last night. I quite like the artstyle, it set out to be gritty and dark and did so effectively. But not once while playing did I think "this game is already pretty morbid, why not add vivid death animations?" They would just be out of place, there's a qualitative difference between the gritty atmosphere of Darkest Dungeon and the extreme gore of enemies exploding into a million pieces. While gorey animations would be a part of Darkest Dungeon if the devs added such a thing, there would be an obvious conflict in the artstyle. Likewise, there's a difference between the original cartoony style of TF2 and the current "random for the sake of random" approach to cosmetics. The latter conflicts with the former.

[Paladin]

Tf2 is butiful

[Seren]

Originally posted by Too Many Voices:

I played Darkest Dungeon last night. I quite like the artstyle, it set out to be gritty and dark and did so effectively. But not once while playing did I think "this game is already pretty morbid, why not add vivid death animations?" They would just be out of place, there's a qualitative difference between the gritty atmosphere of Darkest Dungeon and the extreme gore of enemies exploding into a million pieces. While gorey animations would be a part of Darkest Dungeon if the devs added such a thing, there would be an obvious conflict in the artstyle.

Thrall's Revenge says hi

[Experiment149]

I feel like the banana hat and heavy yeti head, and all those other weird cosmetics need to be halloween restricted

[{ Filet }]

Ouuh I am tearing this a new one when I have a free minute

[fakeloo]

Originally posted by UnofficialAether:

Originally posted by Too Many Voices:

I played Darkest Dungeon last night. I quite like the artstyle, it set out to be gritty and dark and did so effectively. But not once while playing did I think "this game is already pretty morbid, why not add vivid death animations?" They would just be out of place, there's a qualitative difference between the gritty atmosphere of Darkest Dungeon and the extreme gore of enemies exploding into a million pieces. While gorey animations would be a part of Darkest Dungeon if the devs added such a thing, there would be an obvious conflict in the artstyle.

Thrall's Revenge says hi

Not going to spoil myself by googling it, but if I'm wrong just substitute my example with some other needlessly edgy feature.