Look at Tyrande's box cover art for WC3 and notice how gritty the design is. Then look at WoW:
Nightelves went from a dark purple/brown skin tone to fluorescent pink. In WC3 they were almost more blue than purple and when WoW came around they were pure, unfiltered easter egg pink. Their ears also went from
What else? The only buildings they had in WC3 were open stone temples with few walls and lots of pillars, to ridiculous wooden buildings that look like they belong in a Japanese tea garden. And then of course in general the colors of the NE environment in WoW are ridiculous. There is a pink mist that enshrouds absolutely everything, and the sky is never a deep blue, it's always purple, or teal, or pink, or some other ridiculous color. And then of course the trees have pink and purple leaves... It's ridiculous, none of it was in WoW, but
And Diablo 2 had already lost the majority of the goth look right off the bat, so it's not that much of a difference. Just disappointment that they arent returning to their roots I guess.
It's just the way that Blizzard operates. They are trying to appeal to a certain (mass) audience. When people got frustrated with the new look to diablo 3, and started editing photos and demonstrating the atmosphere of the original game, Blizzard released an interview defending themselves, basically just making up whatever they wanted to save face. Like that BS about a light radius. That it isnt practical to make a "smart light radius" which we know is a load of crap because it's been done for the last 10 years in every game that wanted to give off a certain impression in terms of atmosphere (Silent Hill 2 anyone? That was, what, 6 years ago? They managed it back then on a PS2).
It's just blizzard's style: lie about something until people dont think it is a lie anymore. If you tell anyone something enough times, they will start believing it. That's what they did with WoW, and it worked wonders.|||Quote:
Nightelves went from a dark purple/brown skin tone to fluorescent pink. In WC3 they were almost more blue than purple and when WoW came around they were pure, unfiltered easter egg pink. Their ears also went from
Erm... what? Looks pretty purple to me.
The pink ones you're talking about are Blood Elves.
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And Diablo 2 had already lost the majority of the goth look right off the bat, so it's not that much of a difference. Just disappointment that they arent returning to their roots I guess.
It's just the way that Blizzard operates. They are trying to appeal to a certain (mass) audience. When people got frustrated with the new look to diablo 3, and started editing photos and demonstrating the atmosphere of the original game, Blizzard released an interview defending themselves, basically just making up whatever they wanted to save face. Like that BS about a light radius. That it isnt practical to make a "smart light radius" which we know is a load of crap because it's been done for the last 10 years in every game that wanted to give off a certain impression in terms of atmosphere (Silent Hill 2 anyone? That was, what, 6 years ago? They managed it back then on a PS2).
It's just blizzard's style: lie about something until people dont think it is a lie anymore. If you tell anyone something enough times, they will start believing it. That's what they did with WoW, and it worked wonders.
First off, 'gothic' is more mood and atmosphere and not simply 'dark colors'. To this end, Diablo III remains true to its roots, especially if the concept art seen are anything to go by.
Furthermore, Diablo II has fair share of bright colors. And to top it off, what we've seen is Act I which takes place in Sanctuary (as opposed to Hell) decades after the end of Diablo II, during which there was peace, people have forgotten about the Prime Evils and the world has recovered. It's likely Diablo has yet to make his return, nor have there been any overt signs of such a plot. Therefore, there's no surprise that the surroundings look less 'evil'.
A reminder: This is the first act. If the dungeons here already feature blood on the walls with bones and corpses littering the ground, the developers can't make Hell look any worse without going over the top, which would then just look camp. By starting off clean, the game can get progressively darker.
Lastly, when designing game visuals, there's more to take into account than just art style. Blizzard also has to think about:
- How resource intensive the visuals would make the game?
- How visible and readable are the enemies and items?
- How time consuming would be to produce the particular visual effect? Can quality be maintained without sacrificing time?
These are just a few other considerations Blizzard must take on board before going ahead with a particular visual style. And all of the ones I've mentioned are as important, if not more so, than artistic flavor.|||Quote:
Erm... what? Looks pretty purple to me.
If you had read a bit more carefully, you might have linked a picture of Tyrande's box art for WC3 as well
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First off, 'gothic' is more mood and atmosphere and not simply 'dark colors'. To this end, Diablo III remains true to its roots, especially if the concept art seen are anything to go by.
Furthermore, Diablo II has fair share of bright colors. And to top it off, what we've seen is Act I which takes place in Sanctuary (as opposed to Hell) decades after the end of Diablo II, during which there was peace, people have forgotten about the Prime Evils and the world has recovered. It's likely Diablo has yet to make his return, nor have there been any overt signs of such a plot. Therefore, there's no surprise that the surroundings look less 'evil'.
1) Forgot about the prime evils in 20 years, huh?
2) Dungeons full of demons = evil is on the rise.
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A reminder: This is the first act. If the dungeons here already feature blood on the walls with bones and corpses littering the ground, the developers can't make Hell look any worse without going over the top, which would then just look camp. By starting off clean, the game can get progressively darker.
Stories with dark themes dont really tend to convey their darkness through shear contrast. The same goes for most things that are well done. Schindler's list didnt get its point across by saying "Ok, so we're going to start off with the part of the holocaust where all the Jews were cherished and celebrated by the Nazi party so that then toward the end when they start the mass genocide thing it's so much more powerful!"
Yes, contrast can be utilized to spectacular results, but when talking about a specific atmosphere, contrast isnt what hits that feeling home.
[quote]Lastly, when designing game visuals, there's more to take into account than just art style. Blizzard also has to think about:
- How resource intensive the visuals would make the game?
- How visible and readable are the enemies and items?
- How time consuming would be to produce the particular visual effect? Can quality be maintained without sacrificing time?
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These are just a few other considerations Blizzard must take on board before going ahead with a particular visual style. And all of the ones I've mentioned are as important, if not more so, than artistic flavor.
Yet you fail to explain how on earth "artistic flavor" gets compromised by any of those factors.|||Quote:
If you had read a bit more carefully, you might have linked a picture of Tyrande's box art for WC3 as well
There's definitely a change in coloration between WC3 and WoW. Just not the drastic bright pink you're making it out to be.
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1) Forgot about the prime evils in 20 years, huh?
2) Dungeons full of demons = evil is on the rise.
Paraphrased from Blizzcon 2008's lore panel:
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Otherwise, life in Sanctuary has gone as normal. Unfortunately, "normal" for Sanctuary is still pretty bad. While the demons aren't around in force, there are still dark creatures who prey on humanity, and people die young very often, making 20 years practically a generation. Those who remember the events of Diablo II are few and far between. Most of them went insane at the time, or have since died. Most people these days believe that the stories of Demons and Angels are just that, stories and myths. Very few believe in Heaven or Hell anymore.
If you have a problem with that, take it up with Blizzard. As for evil being on the rise, that would be correct. However, it hasn't fully risen. Hence, why things aren't fully corrupted yet.
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Stories with dark themes dont really tend to convey their darkness through shear contrast. The same goes for most things that are well done. Schindler's list didnt get its point across by saying "Ok, so we're going to start off with the part of the holocaust where all the Jews were cherished and celebrated by the Nazi party so that then toward the end when they start the mass genocide thing it's so much more powerful!"
Yes, contrast can be utilized to spectacular results, but when talking about a specific atmosphere, contrast isnt what hits that feeling home.
The differences between Schindler's List and Diablo III are firstly, the length (I certainly hope Diablo III is longer than a couple of hours) and likely the time course of the plot. From what Blizzard's revealed, the story kicks off before Diablo (or anyone from Hell) has revealed his return.
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Yet you fail to explain how on earth "artistic flavor" gets compromised by any of those factors.
Actually, it's the other way around. Artistic flavor is often in opposition to those influences:
- By adding more features, effects and doodads, a computer will require more memory to run the game.
- As Blizzard has mentioned before; they want their monsters to be quickly spotted and instantly recognizable when they appear. Making things too dark reduces the amount of detail that can be seen and so directly impedes this.
- The more features, effects and doodads are added per location, more time is needed to create them and to test them for glitches. Therefore, the more detail is added, the more time is needed. Odds are people have other things to do.
1) Forgot about the prime evils in 20 years, huh?
This might sound ridiculous to us who live in an age of mass-information storage and where living past 80 years is nothing out of the ordinary, but think about it from the point of view of the average inhabitant of Sanctuary. 20 years = one generation. In that much time a lot of the population of Sanctuary would have already died naturally from old age, and all the youngsters have to go by is the ramblings of their decrepit elders.|||Quote:
All that you said tells me you know nothing about Diablo world at all .. you just hate asian themed stuff or maybe a case of asian-phobia or anime-phobia (where everything asian = anime = cute girls in bunny suits = yuk!!! ) ... and whatever cause you those issues has nothing to do with what's going to be in D3.
D1 had an African mage
D2 had a Middle Eastern sorceress and a dark skinned paladin
Sanctuary is already bolstering with racial diversity .. there is no logical reason to exclude Asian themes from it whatsoever (unless you have something against it).
And before you play the Gothic card (which makes no sense either) i doubt you even know what Gothic means or where it originated from ... either way ... a Middle Ages Themed game can have Asians, Middle Easterners and people of any race because they all existed during them middle ages period .. it's not like middle ages were in Europe alone XD
So i see no problem in including Asian themed characters or culture (or from any culture) .. D3 team is aiming for diversity and the world of sanctuary has more than enough space to include many races and cultures ... a monotone world with one theme or culture is damn boring and monotonous.
Sorry .. that's total nonsense .. have ever seen an Asian in real life ... go watch some WW2 movies or something ... japanese soldiers and officers looked and acted pretty damn serious to me (if not too serious)
That was a little excessive, Knight_Wolf. I don't think OP means to be an ethnic exclusionist or "racist", I think it's just his opinion that Orient-inspired characters don't fit well into a game which he considers to be centered around Medieval European fantasy. I happen to disagree with him, as I feel an Asian character should be the first addition to any fantasy game due to their martial background and deep cultural material and aesthetics, but I wouldn't be too harsh on the guy.
However...
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p.s. the assasian class was not asian! what makes you think so?
The Assassin was definitely Asian-inspired, dude. C'mon. In fact, I consider her to be the Sanctuary equivalent of Japanese. You can't have blacks, whites, and Persians in the game yet exclude East Asians! Blasphemy!!!
I will say this: I wasn't a fan of the Paladin being black in D2. It seemed out of place that an African-inspired character would don knightly plate mail from Medieval Europe. It's not impossible, but it's a little strange to me. That's not to say I don't want black characters in Diablo. In fact, I love the Witch Doc's design! A little stereotypical and on the nose, but what can I say? I'm a sucker for traditional, romanticized character roles inspired by the European imagination.|||Quote:
The assassin was definitely Asian-inspired, dude. C'mon. In fact, I consider her to be the Sanctuary equivalent of Japanese. You can't have blacks, whites, and Persians in the game yet exclude East Asians! Blasphemy!!!
asians are the only people who have martial arts! if i remember correctly word assassin comes from the middle east as the middle east had a whole assassin society. also even if we accept that her fighting style was asian inspired(which it wasn't) she did not look asian appearance wise in anyway.
also i don't think th paladin was black in the way that he wasn't african black. he just seemed to be a dark skinned european looking guy. maybe he was south asian.
p.s. i m not racist i just think you shouldn't mix things up with each other when they belong with each other. Wouldn’t it be awkward if an Asian horror flick had western themes in it?|||Quote:
This might sound ridiculous to us who live in an age of mass-information storage and where living past 80 years is nothing out of the ordinary, but think about it from the point of view of the average inhabitant of Sanctuary. 20 years = one generation. In that much time a lot of the population of Sanctuary would have already died naturally from old age, and all the youngsters have to go by is the ramblings of their decrepit elders.
Meh, I could buy it if MAYBE if they said 40 years. I'm aware of the massive differences between the sate of our civilization as opposed to humans in Sanctuary, but one generation just doesnt forget that quickly. It's also a bit iffy to expect people to assume that every bit of evidence that demons walked the earth somehow just got buried. If humanity is having this much trouble in the complete absence of demons, it doesnt make sense that they survived up to this point anyway.
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The differences between Schindler's List and Diablo III are firstly, the length (I certainly hope Diablo III is longer than a couple of hours) and likely the time course of the plot. From what Blizzard's revealed, the story kicks off before Diablo (or anyone from Hell) has revealed his return.
Ok, I guess you're suggesting that Blizzard still has time to show the darker side to the game. We'll see, but based on everything blizzard has said in response to the complaints... well, wouldnt they say "just wait until the later parts of the game" if they were planning on addressing those concerns?
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Actually, it's the other way around. Artistic flavor is often in opposition to those influences:
* By adding more features, effects and doodads, a computer will require more memory to run the game.
* As Blizzard has mentioned before; they want their monsters to be quickly spotted and instantly recognizable when they appear. Making things too dark reduces the amount of detail that can be seen and so directly impedes this.
* The more features, effects and doodads are added per location, more time is needed to create them and to test them for glitches. Therefore, the more detail is added, the more time is needed. Odds are people have other things to do.
Ok, I'm sorry but the only remotely relevant point you brought up was the middle one. The other 2 have nothing to do with the atmosphere. Who was asking for more detail? As for monsters to be quickly spotted and instantly recognizable, it STILL doesnt speak for the general lack of the dark feeling from Diablo I that people are asking for. A silhouette and a shape is more than enough to accomplish that, and that's not even what they would have to settle for.
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