RF Generation Message Board

Miss games that were about skill and learning the game rather than saving and loading?
I do, I think the 16bit era of platforming was something special. The only way it'll live on though I think is if we take it upon ourselves to make our own games for our platform of choice.

This is my attempt,
Soulless (http://www.cobrablade.com/html/soulless.html) for OS X.

To be fair, the latest true revival for 2D was on the GBA [and to a lesser extent, DS].

The GBA had a huge number of ports of mostly SNES 2D titles.

Handheld owners are kind of lucky as 2D games have been strong for a long time, but as you noticed with the DS, they are slowly fading from there too.

The GBA was great for 2D, even if woefully underpowered in both graphics & sound in comparison to the SNES & Mega Drive. I'm actually surprised I never got one, but then again I had a Nomad during the time the GBA was alive and well.

There's been a big 2D revival on the console download services lately.

I forgot to mention how the current systems have classics, and even on the odd occasion something new so at least 2D games probably will never truly die.

Still miss the days when they were mainstream though.
Good luck with Resistance: Fall of Man by the way, I'm guessing it is pretty hard online.

Soulless is looking fantastic, Cobra :o

And you've made it all alone? That's so impressive :o

Thanks Sirgin, I really appreciate that.
Unfortunately it hasn't been all that cheap to do, but yes I am an independent game developer :)

That's supercool. To be able to deliver something that looks that good, I didn't even know was possible for a single person.

What did you study to be able to make that? I can imagine it can't be easy to program an advanced game like that.

That is where the cost comes in, I'm no programer so use game creation tools, nor can I create 3D from scratch so purchase 3D models to morph, play with and render.

It has all cost a lot, but this is the end result.
I already became aware of the fact it would be impossible to make the money back I was putting into the game, so compliments like yours are really great :)

That's neat-o.

But... I 2d never really died. If anything it is stronger now than any time since the 16 bit days. And there are a ton of new and innovative 2d games that have been coming out recently such as The World Ends With You, Braid, etc. not to mention new installments to classic series. But I see what you mean, it's overshadowed by 3d by a landslide. Anyway, I really look forward to your game and best of luck.

Thanks Shimra :)
Yeah I suppose 2D revival is kind of an overstatement. After all 2D games are much more alive than the cartoon movie industry vs 3D animated movies.

It is sad to see regular animation go, indeed. (Atleast here in the West) If there would only be some more daring animation movies made, just like with 3D animation, it'd be still alive.

Thank god for anime ;)

Yeah, at least we will always have traditional anime :)

Man, when was the last big name cartoon movie to be released? Sadly the last one I can think of was Spongebob. Everything else is Pixaresque.

The Simpsons I think.
Ironically many years ago I was hoping they would of continued that 3D episode where Homer came into the real world.

The next one is Princess and the Frog which is coming out late next year. It's Disney's first traditionally animated film since 2004, and oh god does it look great.

I didn't know you were a Strongbad fan Tondog,
I also didn't know Disney were making a new animated feature, I'm definitely interested.

You know, a lot of Flash based games are 2D. People tend to dismiss them as they're amateur works, but some are really worth the while.

I'll also add there are a lot of point/click/adventure style games too, among those.

Just watched the teaser on YouTube, looks great indeed! :)


[*RANT*]

There apparently has already been a controversy about this movie. I don't believe it... A controversy about a Disney movie???

The original princess had a darker skin, was named the "not-so-prestine" name Maddy and was a chambermaid. Now I'm not trying to point fingers here, but if it were a white princess, there'd be no controversy at all.
I understand how darker skinned persons were mistreated in the past but they shouldn't be oversensitive about everything. The word "racism" or "racist" is being yelled at anyone or anything even only slightly related to something that could be racism, it's rediculous. White people have to be careful these days just to look at a darker-skinned person or they're immediately branded racists.

These days people complain over even the smallest of things, it's a Disney movie for christ sake!!! >:(

[*/RANT*]

Sorry for the rant, I just feel that there have been too many "racist" controversies lately about things that aren't racist at all.

This whole political correctness crap is a joke. Last year there were complaints of Santa saying ho ho ho is offensive to women.

That's rediculous and probably even stupider than the Disney one.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it CHEAPER to do a CG movie now? Same with flash stuff.

2D gaming seems to be following a similar trend. Vector-based rendering is used more often than frame-animated sprites. Technically, a lot of these "2D" games are just 3D games with the objects being flat. Instead of Mode7, they just use the GPU rotation and scaling functions.

And "traditional anime" is getting less common. Today's stuff looks too photoshopped.

2D ARTWORK is better than ever, but it's not implemented the way we remember it.

Not only does 3D cost a LOT less, it was commented in the making of The Prince of Egypt that a scene that would of taken 9 months can be reduced to 3 weeks.

So time and money are pretty much the factors.

Prince of Egypt gets away with CG, it's more than a few years old. Its visuals were ahead of their time, which is what I consider to be good animation. Bad animation is being complacent with current technology.

I don't care what it is, ANYTHING is better than typical 3D today. Heck, some crappy rotoscoping would be better in my opinion. Have some sense of style, not complacency.

Time and money are luxuries that only a few studios have, so the rest are forced to make do without. This should be seen as an opportunity to do something other than try to copy Pixar. Pixar has the backing, so their films are detailed and presentable as showcases of what current 3D technique can do. Anything less looks low-budget. There's so many styles of animation that everyone could be using, but they go for the "safe" option.

*Sigh* I suppose it's more important for them to profit than to produce something with artistic value.

Back on topic, games like Mega Man 9 and FF1-2 for PSP are interesting examples of how modern 2D gaming SHOULD be. MM9 recreates the original style, which was great back then, and works as an artistic statement now. FF1-2 were updated with higher resolution sprites, because the platform allows for it. Everything is still in tiles and frames of animation, not vectors.

I agree that Prince of Egypt is a good example of CG done right, a lot of the hard work is still hand drawn, and they blended the CG in very well.

2D gameplay should never be phased out in my opinion as the two are just so different. Die Hard Arcade for example, while it pretty much was a 3D game, the gameplay was still very reminiscent of 2D games of its type, and I found it to be a LOT more enjoyable than the fully 3D Fighting Force.

I completely agree.

Oh, the last normal animation movie I remember being released in the cinema was Brother Bear. I didn't go see it though.

There was some farm animal movie that I THINK was after Brother Bear, but I can't remember if it was canceled or not. They mentioned something in the trailer about "OMG RETURN TO TRADITIONAL ANIMATIONZORZ," but I don't think anybody cared. All I though was "that's what it should be anyway."

I'm not going to rant anymore on animation. I'm too much of a curmudgeon now and I don't see my complaining bringing about any change in the industry.