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The main advice should be: not another pixel art game. Please. We have enough of these. Folks let's move on from the 1970s. Also this is getting tired seeing

The main advice should be: not another pixel art game. Please. We have enough of these. Folks let's move on from the 1970s. Also this is getting tired seeing honest, hard-working, self-motivated talented individuals push themselves into the same tried and tested crappy old corner of 'indie pixel art games'. It's quite difficult to see anything innovative or even remotely enjoyable from this genre anymore. It's not Romania. It's not boring buearacracy. Its not the savings. Hell it's not even you. It's pixel art crap that passes off as indie games. I hate AAA games but now I hate these indie pixel art games even more.

csmattryder 9y ago
Completely agree. There's a post on /r/GameDev right now (actually, it's a recurring theme) where a dev posts that their game isn't getting any traction; struggling to market; few social media interactions; and you find it's all down to being "Yet Another Pixel Metroidvania/DungeonCrawler". A lot of devs are still living with the 1980s "Build It And They Will Come" philosophy. That was great when Elite and Manic Miner were the only games out. Now you've got to onboard your market with Alpha builds, get feedback early - gee, it's all a bit Lean Startup now.
rootlocus 9y ago
> It's quite difficult to see anything innovative or even remotely enjoyable from this genre anymore. You probably haven't seen Undertale then http://store.steampowered.com/app/391540/Undertale/ http://store.steampowered.com/app/391540/Undertale/
- misnome 9y ago
  But surely this is part of the problem; Exceptions to the rules, that have succeeded due to an unpredictable combination of luck, timing AND developer inspiration. Nobody should look at Undertale and say "Yes, this is definitely a good area/style/genre to go into to make easy success.
devotedtoneu 9y ago
many of us prefer great pixel-art to 3D in certain genres (RPGs for example)
krapp 9y ago
Your advice really just boils down to "mindfulplay hates pixel art, so everyone who likes it should stop." I personally don't get the appeal of pixel art, the blocky look of much of it seems purposely lower res then the actual sprites they purport to imitate, but it's just an aesthetic choice that has no direct relation to the quality of a game and it doesn't ruin the experience for me. And, I've seen enough badly done 3D that I refuse to buy the premise that sprites are objectively inferior. The problem isn't the pixel art, it's that most indie developers (myself included, eventually) likely don't have the talent or staff to create a product that stands out, or they might, but want to focus on recreating nostalgia rather than iterating on the ideas and genres they like and creating something new. Chances are that's exactly what the games they like were doing back in the day, and that's why they became classics.
eps 9y ago
There are pixel art games and there are pixel art games. Look up "The Last Night".
tudorw 9y ago
this is a silly argument, no matter the medium there is room for original creativity, people didn't stop painting because they ran out of colours...

csmattryder 9y ago

Completely agree. There's a post on /r/GameDev right now (actually, it's a recurring theme) where a dev posts that their game isn't getting any traction; struggling to market; few social media interactions; and you find it's all down to being "Yet Another Pixel Metroidvania/DungeonCrawler". A lot of devs are still living with the 1980s "Build It And They Will Come" philosophy. That was great when Elite and Manic Miner were the only games out. Now you've got to onboard your market with Alpha builds, get feedback early - gee, it's all a bit Lean Startup now.

rootlocus 9y ago

> It's quite difficult to see anything innovative or even remotely enjoyable from this genre anymore. You probably haven't seen Undertale then http://store.steampowered.com/app/391540/Undertale/ http://store.steampowered.com/app/391540/Undertale/

misnome 9y ago
But surely this is part of the problem; Exceptions to the rules, that have succeeded due to an unpredictable combination of luck, timing AND developer inspiration. Nobody should look at Undertale and say "Yes, this is definitely a good area/style/genre to go into to make easy success.

devotedtoneu 9y ago

many of us prefer great pixel-art to 3D in certain genres (RPGs for example)

krapp 9y ago

Your advice really just boils down to "mindfulplay hates pixel art, so everyone who likes it should stop." I personally don't get the appeal of pixel art, the blocky look of much of it seems purposely lower res then the actual sprites they purport to imitate, but it's just an aesthetic choice that has no direct relation to the quality of a game and it doesn't ruin the experience for me. And, I've seen enough badly done 3D that I refuse to buy the premise that sprites are objectively inferior. The problem isn't the pixel art, it's that most indie developers (myself included, eventually) likely don't have the talent or staff to create a product that stands out, or they might, but want to focus on recreating nostalgia rather than iterating on the ideas and genres they like and creating something new. Chances are that's exactly what the games they like were doing back in the day, and that's why they became classics.

eps 9y ago

There are pixel art games and there are pixel art games. Look up "The Last Night".

tudorw 9y ago

this is a silly argument, no matter the medium there is room for original creativity, people didn't stop painting because they ran out of colours...