Q&A For Skyward Collapse (Plus New Screenshots!)

[x4000]

The RPS commenters already complained about the graphics, which I thought was a laugh.  I know the graphics in this one are quite good; they're simply 2D is all.

Anyhow, thanks for the encouragement.

[SRombauts]

Yes, it is 2D graphics, and thus I think like Billick that many (young?) will not really like it, at least not at first glance.
It's kind of old school, we know are accustomed to fancy 3D graphics, with cute animation, like for Civilization V or the last Sim City...

For me, it really loosk nice, but I am not so young anymore... and I also played ASCII DF
Please, keep on the good job!

[Professor Paul1290]

The problem is not that they're 2D, the problem is that some of their their light sources and perspectives don't line up.

Most of the buildings are OK because they seem consistent with how the land is angled, but some things look like they're lying flat on their sides or aren't standing in the same direction.

It's a tiny thing and seems insignificant, but it's still really jarring because of how our brains do perspective and automatically qualifies as "bad" to a lot of people even if they don't notice exactly what's making it look awkward right away.
I imagine now people are going to complain about how units of them look like their traveling up and out of the board rather than along the board, which is yet another finicky thing that seems small at first but is jarring because of how our brains process it.


Actually, in a way you could say the problem is that they are 2D, because 2D art that isn't limited by resolution or style carries high expectation of quality. Most devs don't bother with with higher resolution and higher detail 2D graphics unless they can hire much more expensive artists and spend much more time on them, or they are already talented artists themselves.

This is why you have so many indie devs churning out pixel sprites that all look the same even though they're getting old, overused, and a lot of players are getting tired of them, because the low resolution avoids running into that problem. That is also why devs that choose to avoid pixel sprites tend to use low-detail styles that are mostly outlines with very little detail, because again they'd rather deal with criticisms related to that than run into people's high expectations for the alternative.
It's one of those rather frustrating and annoying situations where you'll be less criticized for not trying.

It's very finicky, problematic, and limiting in a lot of ways, but that's how things have turned out.


I could go on a rant about how the situation with this type of art is frustrating and harmful in a lot of ways and why I would personally rather not deal with that whole mess in any projects I do, but this is more than enough negativity and frustration for one post.

Instead I'll wonder why I'm not smiting villagers with godly wrath right now.

[x4000]

Cheers folks.  Art hate is universal anyhow.  RPS proved that with a fake post about how the crate textures in Crysis 2 were terrible (IIRC), and players were all going "yes you're so right!" before it was exposed as a joke.  In other words, there is a large crowd that will never be satisfied by anything, ever, it seems.

In the end, I don't sell games on graphical merits, though I obviously want them to look as nice as possible.  AI War is proof that you can sell into the seven figures on gameplay alone.

[Cinth]

Cheers folks.  Art hate is universal anyhow.  RPS proved that with a fake post about how the crate textures in Crysis 2 were terrible (IIRC), and players were all going "yes you're so right!" before it was exposed as a joke.  In other words, there is a large crowd that will never be satisfied by anything, ever, it seems.

In the end, I don't sell games on graphical merits, though I obviously want them to look as nice as possible.  AI War is proof that you can sell into the seven figures on gameplay alone.

I've never held how a game looks against it (I still love some of the Atari classics I grew up on).  It's all about gameplay and story (genre depending).

[tigersfan]

Ok folks, so, we changed things up a bit....

We're going to be sending an invite to everyone I've gotten a PM from to this point. If you've already sent me a PM, check your forum inbox. If it's not there, let me know.

That said, I'm not going to be taking any more invites right now. We've got enough people for this round. I'm not sure yet if there will be another round of alpha or not, but either way, beta should be coming out very very soon.

[Professor Paul1290]

I'm not sure if you've noticed this already, but someone commenting on the moddb article for this Q&A has illustrated why a lot of people are going to hate with the graphics regardless the detail and work put into them.

http://www.moddb.com/news/qa-for-skyward-collapse-plus-new-screenshots

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/21309241/skywardperspective.jpg

This illustrates how, as I've mentioned before, the building perspectives do not line up.
It's a tiny thing, but that's all it takes for it to look wrong and of poor quality. Many games with equivalent or lower art budgets and/or less detail will look "better" than Skyward Collapse because they either don't have these issues or are too low detail for it to matter. Unfortunately human brains really don't like this sort of inconsistency, as small as it is.

Most people are going to look at the game and feel that something is horribly wrong, even if they don't consciously know what it is right away.

It's finicky and extremely annoying, but that's how it works.


There's probably not much that can be done about it this late in the game, but it's probably helpful to know for later.
At the very least it's good to know where the complaints will be coming from.

[x4000]

See, what that picture is missing is the fact that buildings don't have to all be aligned directly on an axis.  Aka, the fact that a building is pointing slightly a different direction than a traditional squared-off isometric view doesn't make it wrong, technically.  If the actual lines and so forth were showing things from the wrong perspective that would be a different thing; and I suppose that's what is being interpreted here.  But having a building be rotated on its base in the isometric view by a small amount isn't actually incorrect; it's less orderly than something with everything lined up, but that's about it.

Anyway, you know what?  I'm not able to control what the artists did.  I'm not working with those artists or that art studio again in the future, partly because of that.  If anyone is put off by something so small in the visuals of a game, and wants to complain loudly, that doesn't strike me as a very nice thing for them to do.  This community is awesome, and I'd hate to see it poisoned by people who are (apparently) intentionally trying to tear others down to no particular purpose. (Not that I've read the comments about the game, or have any intention of doing so.)

And in the end, AI War has all sorts of wrong perspective, and it grossed 7 figures.  I mean, that's what it comes down to.  If the game is awesome, people will play it and gripe a bit.  If the game isn't, they'll gleefully point out the graphics as the reason why people didn't like it.  But that's not the truth.  A game mostly stands or stumbles on its own merits and word of mouth, and graphics are just one small part of that.  It's a first impressions thing to be sure, and that's an obstacle I hate having to overcome, but there's nothing I can do about it. 

I'm not interested in discussing it further, because such discussion literally serves no point whatsoever.  Literally, completely, none.  a) I can't change it.  b) I understand perspective as well as I need to. c) if you want to fuss at the artists who did it, they aren't here and they aren't going to be doing further stuff for us anyhow; c) so what's left to discuss?

[chemical_art]

If we are drawing comparisons with AI War, 80% of the time for new players, and a much higher percentage for vets, have the zoom so far out you just see abstract forms of the units. This form of art is not unique, and common for many grand strategy games. While they sometimes will be derogatorily called "paint the world" or similar, in general, abstract representation is less noticeable (and criticized).

For me, if your art isn't good enough to be praised, the best to aim for is for it to not be noticed at all.

Haven't played enough of this game to make a judgement, but having one sore thing stand out, if seen enough, can ruin the art of a game.

Which is why I hate the art of AVWW 2, not because most of it is bad, but because the thing I see all the time is a slideshow. That one thing was bad enough for me to not like the art, and was a constant turn off because I couldn't abstract it away and look away from it.

For SH, the art was so...not appealing...that I haven't even downloaded the demo.

[Misery]

I'm not sure if you've noticed this already, but someone commenting on the moddb article for this Q&A has illustrated why a lot of people are going to hate with the graphics regardless the detail and work put into them.

http://www.moddb.com/news/qa-for-skyward-collapse-plus-new-screenshots

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/21309241/skywardperspective.jpg

This illustrates how, as I've mentioned before, the building perspectives do not line up.
It's a tiny thing, but that's all it takes for it to look wrong and of poor quality. Many games with equivalent or lower art budgets and/or less detail will look "better" than Skyward Collapse because they either don't have these issues or are too low detail for it to matter. Unfortunately human brains really don't like this sort of inconsistency, as small as it is.

Most people are going to look at the game and feel that something is horribly wrong, even if they don't consciously know what it is right away.

It's finicky and extremely annoying, but that's how it works.


There's probably not much that can be done about it this late in the game, but it's probably helpful to know for later.
At the very least it's good to know where the complaints will be coming from.

It's good to see that the guy who posted it wasnt spraying "GAH THIS GAME SUCKS" comments or the like.... usually when I hear of a post of this style, for any game, I generally expect it to be this hideous screaming mess.   This guy.... is actually excited for the game though.  I think my brain shut down at this point to protect itself, as thanks to the usual derps on the Net I have trouble comprehending someone doing a post quite like that.

Still.... I gotta say, I seriously *never* noticed this, in the art.  I can see it now that it's been pointed out, but.... I dunno, this doesnt really change it to me.


And that article, I hadnt seen it before.  I note some things in it have outright changed now, with some stuff in the game being altered heavily or replaced.


Also the first I'd seen of any of the god token descriptions.... holy crap, those really are stupidly powerful.   That one from Athena, just MURDERS EVERYONE..... on her own side.  The really funky thing is.... I can actually see an immediate strategic use for that.   Bloody amazing.

[x4000]

If we are drawing comparisons with AI War, 80% of the time for new players, and a much higher percentage for vets, have the zoom so far out you just see abstract forms of the units. This form of art is not unique, and common for many grand strategy games. While they sometimes will be derogatorily called "paint the world" or similar, in general, abstract representation is less noticeable (and criticized).

Well, okay, let's talk about Valley 1, then.  Nothing is abstracted away there, and loads of people hated the art.  That grossed somewhere north of $300k.  Whether or not something is rubbing some people the wrong way, there's nothing I can do about it and nothing I have ever seen says that art hate leads to a paucity of sales.  I've also never seen anything that says that good art will lead to a lack of art complaints.  I've seen people criticize Gratuitous Space Battles very heavily for its art, which to me is just crazy: that game looks amazing.

TLDR:
1. Most indie games aren't sold on their art, although good art is always a plus obviously.
2. There will be people who complain, loudly, even with the best art.
3. We always do the best we can, but we have to work within our budgets and talents and ultimately it comes down to what is possible for us to do.

For SH, the art was so...not appealing...that I haven't even downloaded the demo.

I'll grant you that that one probably crossed a line.  Though I think the success of some other games that I won't name out of respect implies that this could still have done quite well.  I think you have extremely high standards in general when it comes to your threshold of trying things, as has been discussed in the past.  Thank goodness the market as a whole isn't like you.

[chemical_art]

Art 1 had its own can of worms. But that is like SC, and not like AI War.

I think you are missing my point.

Abstraction works because it doesn't rub people the wrong way.

The strategy crowd, at least the harder midcore and above crowd, doesn't want good art. It wants art that doesn't cause an eye sore.

If I'm starting at the same thing for 15 hours, it is more important I don't see a flaw over 10 hours then be wowed by the first hour I see it.

AVWW 1, 2, SH all caused eye sores for me. AI War is abstract and low detailed enough I don't notice it.

Good art is great, but abstract (little art) is better then bad art.

[x4000]

I see your point, but I can't really argue with you because it's all subjective.  There's no way for me to say "oh you're wrong because x y z," but it's also not something that I wholly agree with.  And it's not something that I've seen borne out in terms of sales of games, or what I know of sales of other indie games.  There are many many other indies who have better graphics than us, who I know personally, and who have 1/10th our sales volume.

Would we get better sales with graphics that more people liked or loved?  Of course, I'm sure.  So we strive for that.  There's no argument here.  But just sticking to abstract art is neither required nor advisable: there's no opportunity with growth in that, there's a limited amount of games we could make like that, and it's not something that would actively help sales from anything I've seen.

[chemical_art]

*shrug*

When it comes to all my strategy games, they all are abstract for the most part.

Europa Universllis, Crusader Kingdoms, Hearts of Iron, AI War, all have mostly abstract art and concept yet all have been hits because resources that instead of being put into better art were used for time to polish them. They are not known for their art, but their gameplay. Their art may wow for a little while, but is not hated because it doesn't cause an eye strain ever.

But I understand what you are saying.


It's just that art is as strong as its weakest link.

Have a great looking warrior? But his arm clips the whole game? That is a terrible looking character. That one flaw ruins the image.

[x4000]

I get what you're saying.  And if it helps, our art budget on this was actually pretty darn low.  90% of our expenditures are on the game and gameplay itself.  The reason we can't spend more on art mainly has to do with our fixed expenses from having a staff of our current size, and having some recent heavy blows from poor launches of Valley 2 and Shattered Haven.  That said, "poor" in our case is still around the scale of some other indie games that I know that have better art, so take that for what you will I guess.  For something to be a success for us, because of our size and other factors such as how much work we put into each game, we have to have much higher sales than many other indies.

Skyward Collapse is actually an exception, because we've developed that relatively cheaply by using existing engine assets, inexpensive art, and focusing on gameplay and the experience as a whole.  So our bar for breaking even with this game is actually lower than anything other than an AI War expansion, and will come in at around the same price.  That's more or less the strategy we're going to pursue for a while, although we're also going to try to play to our strengths in terms of art that won't stand out as bad, by making it easier to create.  But it's still not going to please everyone, so unless we have a big hit that gives us a lot more financial wiggle room, we'll still be in the same boat for the foreseeable future.