PS2 era feels like the last time games were allowed to be art first. The 360/ps3 is when the whole most graphics is best graphics became a thing. With obvious exceptions here and there.
And what's wrong with something looking like a PlayStation 2 game? Most games from that generation aged very well due to something called "Great art direction."
Oh I know, I was being hyperbolic, but this is one of the big reasons I only own Nintendo consoles. I think they’re genuinely the only major company with a long term vision for the industry.
1/
I've argued for a while that I would much rather see a creative and artistic aesthetic in a game, which can endure the test of time, than all of this recent craving for 'photo-realism' shoved down our throats.
I don't care if you can see the 'pores of the skin' of a 3D model if I'm shooting...
2/
...it in the face or hacking it to death for 5 seconds before moving on to the next target. I also don't care if it has a million polygons for the same reason.
Is it okay for some games? Sure.
But I'd much rather see an art style that stands out, in a game that doesn't hog 150 gb of space. 🤷♀️
I still regard OG Shadow of the Colossus as one of the greatest technical achievements on the system, and pretty damn good in a more general sense as well.
It's funny because whenever I see someone say a game looks like a ps2 game I'm baffled because they've clearly never seen a ps2 game.
"No, that looks like a mid gen ps3 game, wtf are you on about?"
PS2 graphics age but PS2 artstyles will live on forever. People need to learn the distinction between the two because we are in dire need of some solid artstyles that arent just trying to make you appreciate that the character models have pores and hair on their faces.
Also its so fucking tragic how so many PS2 games are something you cant play anymore on modern platforms, all people get is remakes of the popular ones that more often than not fucke up the artstyle. People need to go back and play old games so they can see just how much history has been lost.
People really underestimate how good PS2 games could look. Some of those “bad graphics” had so much character and atmosphere that modern games still struggle to replicate it 😂
Usually they are referring to model and texture quality.
Or as I call them: "Floor Lickers."
>Be part of an incredibly well composed scene with artfully placed assets and mastery of color theory.
>Stare at some grass as zoomed in as possible: "Texture's a little muddy.
"pretty sure two of these are from hd rereleases" i'd say it counts if they still use the original textures from the ps2 release, like the only real graphical difference between okami ps2 and HD is the render resolution.
Also like, the fidelity of the textures are not what make these games beautiful, it's just good art direction.
Upscaled textures or not, the art direction remains the same.
In Okami's case I'm actually a lot less sure, as iirc they had to rebuild any post-PS2 port basically from scratch since they somehow managed to lose, like... everything lol. They did try to stick as close to the original as possible, though.
this is starting to go off
yall should support my game that is very specifically meant to look like it came out in 2001
www.kickstarter.com/projects/pos...
We should change the saying to "looks like a shovelware game" because that's probably what people mean when they say "looks like a PS2 game" lol, almost ALL shovelware games look absolutely awful
I've been playing the new Silent Hill on my steam deck, which is clearly not up to specs for the game's graphic requirements. About 15 minutes in i said "i had better graphics on PS4 and in that 3DS Resident Evil."
Based on youtubers i am watching play it, it is just my steam deck's fault.
i think the 'bad-looking ps2 games' are either the simple 2000 ones or the really late ps2 titles that were all either ports from wii that had to be hastily downgraded or ports from psp that were basically unchanged (and thus looked worse due to the assets being made for a lower resolution)
I love this Mandalore Gaming's quote from the Legion: The Legend of Excalibur video
"I know people who have never touched one like to say:"Looks like a PS2 game" as an insult, but this kinda looks like what they're imagining"