5 ms·

I'm super happy that games that look and feel like those from Spiderweb Software exist. I think it's charming. But the fact that he feels compelled to write an

by nothis 7y ago

I'm super happy that games that look and feel like those from Spiderweb Software exist. I think it's charming. But the fact that he feels compelled to write an article in defense of the art style is telling to me. I think it's not unreasonable to answer the headline question with "because they're stubborn". Their games look crap, not because of a lack of resources but because of a disrespect for visual design (it's not even "art", they could make a better looking game with colored squares). There's probably many, many ways to improve the look that have nothing to do with "AAA art". He fails to see how Baba Is You is a better looking game than any of theirs, simply because it's focused and has a good use of color and contrast. Any $10/hour freelance game artist can tell him that the problem with the games is a mismatch in detail, between background and characters, between resolution and texture detail. This makes tiles look either blurry or covered in white noise and together with a sever lack of contrast, makes the game look flat and unlit. Solving that doesn't require hiring expensive artists, it first involves acknowledging there's an issue at the core that can't be solved by sticking stuff on top of it. I see zero patience or passion for that and that's why their games look the same as 25 years ago (and I could argue, worse, since higher resolution doesn't do them any favors). Again, I have no problem with their games and them looking like they do but going into defense here is a battle they can't win. Their best move is to acknowledge that they don't care and do so with pride. Everything else just feels at best insecure and at worst somewhat disrespectful towards devs who care.

dwild 7y ago
> Their best move is to acknowledge that they don't care and do so with pride. Everything else just feels at best insecure and at worst somewhat disrespectful towards devs who care. You put your finger on exactly what felt wrong for me when I read their post. They are just trying to find reason to justify their art, while they have none and simply don't care. I'm not saying it's wrong that they don't care, it's alright, but doing this kind of post is disrespectful for people who cares.
close04 7y ago
The problem isn't going into defense, it's having an acidic attitude towards it: > What fascinates me here is that the guy seems to think he is telling me news. Like, I'm smart enough to keep a software company running for 25 years, but I am unable to notice qualities in my games that are instantly obvious to Joe Q. Rando. Imagine that being said in any other context to realize how uncalled for such an attitude is and how much it undermines any other point the author wants to make. Microsoft or Apple have indubitably created some of the most successful and valuable businesses that are still at it decades later. Now imagine them giving the response above when faced with criticism. If it would sound awful it's because it is. People who can't take even constructive criticism will have a hard time existing on the internet. And it will show.
- vkou 7y ago
  But that is pretty much exactly how Apple responds to criticism of their most asinine product decisions. They double down on them. (And occasionally, years later, quietly come to their senses)
  - chipotle_coyote 7y ago
    I don't see "doubling down" as analogous to "responding acidly," and I'd actually say that Apple's most common response to criticism isn't "doubling down" as much as "not officially responding at all." You may find their lack of apology for arguably dubious design decisions or out-and-out product flaws to be annoying, and I get it, but it's not as if the tech industry is chock-full of counterexamples. In any case, the OP's argument for "why all of our games look like crap" is "we're not prioritizing the resources to put into consistent, polished aesthetics." I'm going to bet that if you made a consensus list of the most common complaints with Apple over the last ~5 years, "they just don't pay enough attention to how things look" would not be near the top.
  - close04 7y ago
    If you know of cases when Apple or MS came with this kind of aggressive sarcasm (read quote above) and moreover, people still found excuses for them I am open to discussing a particular example. Absent such an example I will assume you're just doing what I implied above: judging Apple and MS a lot harsher for a lot less just from strong bias. And if such an example exists it just strengthens my point that it would sound just as awful and that the only difference is that people will judge MS or Apple with far more bias that this guy, regardless of the actual "crime".
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- jtms 7y ago
  You must be quite sensitive to see this as “acidic”. I have seen this guy speak at several conferences and he is absolutely the opposite of “acidic”. Here’s an “acidic” comment for you: He makes great games that people love and he doesn’t owe you a thing.
wolco 7y ago
I won't download a mobile game with too much art. Wastes spaces and usually causes the app to run slowly. I stopped downloading desktop games when they hit 3 gigs. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
- nothis 7y ago
  Okay, but art direction has nothing to do with the size of the game? I basically just argued that their games look worse since going HD.
- 0xffff2 7y ago
  In so far as there are very few things where anyone is the only one on a planet 8 billion people? sure, but you're probably pretty close.
uhoh-itsmaciek 7y ago
Absolutely. I think it's telling that the one piece of artistic criticism he admits he wants to fix is that characters are looking diagonally, which seems trivial compared to other visual design issues in the game. Part of the problem seems to be that his critics range from the unrealistic "Just™ triple your budget and make it look competitive with AA games" to the more practical "why not think about visual design more coherently and address some of the low-hanging fruit to make your games more approachable and broaden your audience?" and he's lumping everything into one big WONTFIX pile. But at the end of the day, if he's found an audience and can support his family, more power to him.
Cybiote 7y ago
I did not read that as defending his art style, I saw it as getting at something deeper. His argument is not really about defending the quality of graphics in his games, they are much more about showing the calculus and weighing of his choices. The first and key point is that there are people (such as myself) who actually like his graphic style and who, above all, prioritize the excellent story telling in his games. These are the people who sustain his business. The second point is one of niche indie versus AAA or even popular indie. It's a similar sort of argument as between "life-style" businesses versus VC backed businesses. Specifically, in the game industry, the effort into graphics and assets versus reward from customers gained is not a linear function of effort, where small increases result in small gains. It is not even a smooth function where there are small in-between things you can do that will have an impact. Now, in hackernews style, you believe that there is a simple solution but remember, the issue is not of graphics but getting to a sustainable business. This is someone who has survived making games for 25 years where so many better more consistent looking games have flopped or their parent companies folded. Besides, from my short time working on games, it seems to me you are both overestimating and underestimating the gains from such touchups. The people who care about such things are very exacting and the people who don't care are very forgiving. The upshot is, either the touchups you list will not matter or they will never be enough. Which leads to a key point. There is a large step function covering not just graphics but also animation and sound quality to where the majority would consider acceptable. He is not complaining that good artists are too expensive, he is stating that the incurred risk required to afford majority acceptable game assets is not worth it, compared to what he is comfortable with and how he wishes to live his life. He is happy with his current niche and those of us who feel nothing for the latest shiny 3D raytraced games are grateful that developers like him exist. Those of you who seek to create businesses should consider knowing yourself and what will truly make you happy. Do you want great wealth and acclaim or the freedom to live your life mostly as you please, content without any great material or status need?
skywhopper 7y ago
What a weird comment. The guy says he likes the style of his games, and that they make a profitable business for him. Why do you insist there's a "problem"? I thought this was a great article. Why do the games look "ugly"? Because 1) perfect graphics aren't even the point; and 2) this is a way to build a sustainable business. Your technical complaints about the art entirely miss the point. And I guarantee that there is not a good supply of talented and reliable freelance artists charging $10/hour out there.
- nemetroid 7y ago
  > What a weird comment. The guy says he likes the style of his games, and that they make a profitable business for him. Why do you insist there's a "problem"? The author believes there's a problem, or they wouldn't have written an article about it. I agree with the grandparent comment. The tone of the article isn't "yes, the graphics are bad but it's fine", it's "you just don't appreciate the style". The author lists four things they believe to be the cause of the complaints: > 1. Queen's Wish has a very retro square-tile top-down view, reminiscent of old Ultima games, old Pokemon games, Spiderweb's first games, tabletop D&D, that sort of thing. For some, that old style is really unfamiliar and/or alienating. > 2. Queen's Wish uses art made by a lot of different artists. That means that the style is not quite consistent. We've done our best to make it blend well, but it's a little off. > 3. All the characters only look in diagonal directions. I made this choice because I once thought all the art would be hand-drawn, and I desperately needed to reduce the number of icons I needed. This was a mistake, and I'll probably try to fix it in Queen's Wish 2. > 4. It's not in 3-D. Some people will only ever be happy with 3-D. Of these four, two are "you don't like the style" (1 and 4), and one is a technical complaint that the author agrees with (3). But in this comment section, the focus is clearly on point 2 (lack of art direction). The author has an explanation for point 2 (cost), which most commenters find reasonable (some disagree of course, which is to be expected). But it's the large amount of text spent debating point 1 and 4 (which are unrelated to cost) that people take issue with. To me, the inclusion of point 1 and 4 come off as deflection from point 2, the point that most complainants actually have an issue with.
  - jodrellblank 7y ago
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
crooked-v 7y ago
I seem to recall stubbornness being the key reason behind the creator refusing to use Steam or other storefronts for so long, too, even though doing so made sales go up substantially.
2Xheadpalm 7y ago
I love Spiderweb Software and the games they produce but I see what you did their Jeff. Come on guys this is clearly a precisely crafted, controversial traffic increasing blog (ahem advertisement) piece to stir additional attention for his soon to be released latest game. Plus he gets to rant a bit with IMHO reasonable justifications. As in it has already created salty posts on the front page of hacker news (+ other news outlets). He is turning what is perceived as many as a weakness of his games into another advantage, bloody brilliant and well done sir! =)

by nothis 7y ago

dwild 7y ago

> Their best move is to acknowledge that they don't care and do so with pride. Everything else just feels at best insecure and at worst somewhat disrespectful towards devs who care. You put your finger on exactly what felt wrong for me when I read their post. They are just trying to find reason to justify their art, while they have none and simply don't care. I'm not saying it's wrong that they don't care, it's alright, but doing this kind of post is disrespectful for people who cares.

close04 7y ago

The problem isn't going into defense, it's having an acidic attitude towards it: > What fascinates me here is that the guy seems to think he is telling me news. Like, I'm smart enough to keep a software company running for 25 years, but I am unable to notice qualities in my games that are instantly obvious to Joe Q. Rando. Imagine that being said in any other context to realize how uncalled for such an attitude is and how much it undermines any other point the author wants to make. Microsoft or Apple have indubitably created some of the most successful and valuable businesses that are still at it decades later. Now imagine them giving the response above when faced with criticism. If it would sound awful it's because it is. People who can't take even constructive criticism will have a hard time existing on the internet. And it will show.

vkou 7y ago
But that is pretty much exactly how Apple responds to criticism of their most asinine product decisions. They double down on them. (And occasionally, years later, quietly come to their senses)
- chipotle_coyote 7y ago
  I don't see "doubling down" as analogous to "responding acidly," and I'd actually say that Apple's most common response to criticism isn't "doubling down" as much as "not officially responding at all." You may find their lack of apology for arguably dubious design decisions or out-and-out product flaws to be annoying, and I get it, but it's not as if the tech industry is chock-full of counterexamples. In any case, the OP's argument for "why all of our games look like crap" is "we're not prioritizing the resources to put into consistent, polished aesthetics." I'm going to bet that if you made a consensus list of the most common complaints with Apple over the last ~5 years, "they just don't pay enough attention to how things look" would not be near the top.
- close04 7y ago
  If you know of cases when Apple or MS came with this kind of aggressive sarcasm (read quote above) and moreover, people still found excuses for them I am open to discussing a particular example. Absent such an example I will assume you're just doing what I implied above: judging Apple and MS a lot harsher for a lot less just from strong bias. And if such an example exists it just strengthens my point that it would sound just as awful and that the only difference is that people will judge MS or Apple with far more bias that this guy, regardless of the actual "crime".
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
jtms 7y ago
You must be quite sensitive to see this as “acidic”. I have seen this guy speak at several conferences and he is absolutely the opposite of “acidic”. Here’s an “acidic” comment for you: He makes great games that people love and he doesn’t owe you a thing.

wolco 7y ago

I won't download a mobile game with too much art. Wastes spaces and usually causes the app to run slowly. I stopped downloading desktop games when they hit 3 gigs. I'm sure I'm not the only one.

nothis 7y ago
Okay, but art direction has nothing to do with the size of the game? I basically just argued that their games look worse since going HD.
0xffff2 7y ago
In so far as there are very few things where anyone is the only one on a planet 8 billion people? sure, but you're probably pretty close.

uhoh-itsmaciek 7y ago

Absolutely. I think it's telling that the one piece of artistic criticism he admits he wants to fix is that characters are looking diagonally, which seems trivial compared to other visual design issues in the game. Part of the problem seems to be that his critics range from the unrealistic "Just™ triple your budget and make it look competitive with AA games" to the more practical "why not think about visual design more coherently and address some of the low-hanging fruit to make your games more approachable and broaden your audience?" and he's lumping everything into one big WONTFIX pile. But at the end of the day, if he's found an audience and can support his family, more power to him.

Cybiote 7y ago

I did not read that as defending his art style, I saw it as getting at something deeper. His argument is not really about defending the quality of graphics in his games, they are much more about showing the calculus and weighing of his choices. The first and key point is that there are people (such as myself) who actually like his graphic style and who, above all, prioritize the excellent story telling in his games. These are the people who sustain his business. The second point is one of niche indie versus AAA or even popular indie. It's a similar sort of argument as between "life-style" businesses versus VC backed businesses. Specifically, in the game industry, the effort into graphics and assets versus reward from customers gained is not a linear function of effort, where small increases result in small gains. It is not even a smooth function where there are small in-between things you can do that will have an impact. Now, in hackernews style, you believe that there is a simple solution but remember, the issue is not of graphics but getting to a sustainable business. This is someone who has survived making games for 25 years where so many better more consistent looking games have flopped or their parent companies folded. Besides, from my short time working on games, it seems to me you are both overestimating and underestimating the gains from such touchups. The people who care about such things are very exacting and the people who don't care are very forgiving. The upshot is, either the touchups you list will not matter or they will never be enough. Which leads to a key point. There is a large step function covering not just graphics but also animation and sound quality to where the majority would consider acceptable. He is not complaining that good artists are too expensive, he is stating that the incurred risk required to afford majority acceptable game assets is not worth it, compared to what he is comfortable with and how he wishes to live his life. He is happy with his current niche and those of us who feel nothing for the latest shiny 3D raytraced games are grateful that developers like him exist. Those of you who seek to create businesses should consider knowing yourself and what will truly make you happy. Do you want great wealth and acclaim or the freedom to live your life mostly as you please, content without any great material or status need?

skywhopper 7y ago

What a weird comment. The guy says he likes the style of his games, and that they make a profitable business for him. Why do you insist there's a "problem"? I thought this was a great article. Why do the games look "ugly"? Because 1) perfect graphics aren't even the point; and 2) this is a way to build a sustainable business. Your technical complaints about the art entirely miss the point. And I guarantee that there is not a good supply of talented and reliable freelance artists charging $10/hour out there.

nemetroid 7y ago
> What a weird comment. The guy says he likes the style of his games, and that they make a profitable business for him. Why do you insist there's a "problem"? The author believes there's a problem, or they wouldn't have written an article about it. I agree with the grandparent comment. The tone of the article isn't "yes, the graphics are bad but it's fine", it's "you just don't appreciate the style". The author lists four things they believe to be the cause of the complaints: > 1. Queen's Wish has a very retro square-tile top-down view, reminiscent of old Ultima games, old Pokemon games, Spiderweb's first games, tabletop D&D, that sort of thing. For some, that old style is really unfamiliar and/or alienating. > 2. Queen's Wish uses art made by a lot of different artists. That means that the style is not quite consistent. We've done our best to make it blend well, but it's a little off. > 3. All the characters only look in diagonal directions. I made this choice because I once thought all the art would be hand-drawn, and I desperately needed to reduce the number of icons I needed. This was a mistake, and I'll probably try to fix it in Queen's Wish 2. > 4. It's not in 3-D. Some people will only ever be happy with 3-D. Of these four, two are "you don't like the style" (1 and 4), and one is a technical complaint that the author agrees with (3). But in this comment section, the focus is clearly on point 2 (lack of art direction). The author has an explanation for point 2 (cost), which most commenters find reasonable (some disagree of course, which is to be expected). But it's the large amount of text spent debating point 1 and 4 (which are unrelated to cost) that people take issue with. To me, the inclusion of point 1 and 4 come off as deflection from point 2, the point that most complainants actually have an issue with.
- jodrellblank 7y ago

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

crooked-v 7y ago

I seem to recall stubbornness being the key reason behind the creator refusing to use Steam or other storefronts for so long, too, even though doing so made sales go up substantially.

2Xheadpalm 7y ago

I love Spiderweb Software and the games they produce but I see what you did their Jeff. Come on guys this is clearly a precisely crafted, controversial traffic increasing blog (ahem advertisement) piece to stir additional attention for his soon to be released latest game. Plus he gets to rant a bit with IMHO reasonable justifications. As in it has already created salty posts on the front page of hacker news (+ other news outlets). He is turning what is perceived as many as a weakness of his games into another advantage, bloody brilliant and well done sir! =)