Graphics of Zelda Wii

[Twilight One]

Going back to AoL artwork style maybe?

Hey, here's an already official style artwork for Adventure of Link, more than 20 years old. It the ideal mix between the styles. Realistic proportions, cel-shading and drawing effect!!! These are part of the pictures I found, just go to that site:
http://flyingfisch.wordpress.com/2010/01/08/top-30-expectations-of-zelda-wii/

to get more and read the 30 expected things in Zelda Wii, posted at ZeldaInformer in January 2010. The pictures only enrich the article but are from AoL manual. Of course 8 bit games don't look like that but id they had today's means and technology, we'd have a game just like this! How would you like that, it's Nintendo Official Art!!!

 

[CZG]

I hope they would do that actually. Nintendo's artwork from the instructionmanuals always looked quite good.
I hope the'd do some cell-shading, then draw over it a bit in this official artwork style or even partly like Okami or someting, put in some extra black like Majora's Mask and I think you'd have some great graphics then.

I do hope they choose to make a somewhat own graphic style, instead of aiming for the true photorealistic stuff.

 

[Jesper]

No more cartoon-Link in the next console games, plz.
Today us more grown gamers would like to see a more realistic Link, instead.
Kid-gamers can stick to the DS, that's the place toon-Link should be.

On to the topic:::
I really dont care about graphics. Maybe a little improvement over TP would be nice, but the gameplay matters the most.
As long as it gives us an epic story, great music, good controls, and a high replay factor, I'm happy.

 

[Aultimaespada]

Twilight One, I totally agree with you.

At first, I was surprised with the change of Princess Zelda's hair color, but now I really love it!
The colors and clothing changes were great, and made the true princess zelda that I love: a wise, gracious and serene woman that could do anything for her people and the ones she loves.

But, about Spirit Tracks, I think you said some things that I just don't agree with.
OK, maybe princess zelda was childish and a little selfish, but you hyave to remember that Spirit Tracks happens in a different world with different people. That Zelda is not the same Zelda seen in other games. She's still just a child that, with time, will learn and grow.
And, as you said, each game have its own world and its own characters that should fit in this world.

As you, I would love to see a livelier world, with realistic water, trees moving in the wind and not just monsters, but peacefull animals running around the fields. I would like to have a game hith a great diversity of places too.

And it's OK to write novels sometimes, after all, I kind of like them ​

 

[CZG]

I don't want boring, almost realistic crap because I'm old....
Maybe you would like that, but I know a lot of older gamers that though TP was pretty ugly.
If you want realism, go play outside. Videogames should be videogames.

Nintendo is always a step behind when it comes to graphical power.
Like the (extremely huge) signature above...
It's not the best graphic I've ever seen on a computer, a PS3 or a PC will do way better...
Yes, it was a GC game, but still the Wii can't match any of the competitors at the moment.
By the time the next game we get to visit the moon, the competition has already visited Mars.

While I admit I can play this TP look for a while, it never really stood out. Nor did OoT. The story and the music made up for it, but if it were only about graphics, OoT would have been my last mistake and I would never bough MM or anything newer. Not that I want to say the WW, PH or ST were the best graphics I've seen in my life, I found it less disturbing in these cases. The only Zelda game that I thought that was good looking, was A Link to the Past.

When they choose to create their own graphic style, that problem is solved.

Of course, it's all about the story, the music, the gameplay and the total balance of things.
I don't hold much love for replay value... I don't need to play it several times within a year. Once each five years or something will be just about dandy.

 

[Jupiter]

@CZG

I agree with everything you have said here, almost completely.

If they make an artistic effort, if they do something with style, it will look great. I did not think TP was a great looking game, it had repetitive textures, low poly count environments, and a lot of murkiness in general. It was good enough to carry the game, but not beautiful through and through. That said, I thought the art direction for some of the temples was really good. Snowpeak Ruins, the Summoners Grounds, and the Twilight Temple looked pretty good because of they stylistic effort they made and the mood they created.

Given the Wiis limitations, they are much better off going stylized than realistic. Look at Super Mario Galaxy, I think the game looks great, but that is largely possible because they went for an appealing artistic style.

(The one place I disagree with you on is OoT. I don't think the game looks good today, but at the time I was pretty impressed. The main thing that impressed me visually were the lighting effects, it was the first game I played that had realistic lighting effects from objects that you could interact with. I also thought they did a good job of creating a mood in certain places like Kokiri Village and the volcano crater)

 

[CZG]

They did have good mood, nice colours and great camera movements in OoT. In most Zelda games really...
Still, I think it was a low polygon game which was technically not very special.
Something rond is actually more like an octogon or something. Actually, you need qiute some imagination to make your brains think it's actually round. Personally I never had much troubles with that, as I prefer this over the pixel based graphics of most other videogames. I never liked the PSX for example... That look way worse in my opinion.

But, in fact, many people seem to lack this ability and imagination that Link's hat is actually soft and fluffy instead of a squarish thing on his head. Those people will say that the PSX looked way better and way more realistic. At least the playstation can make something look round, they would often say.

We know we would problably disagree on that, but we think in favor of the imagination, with the cool official art in the back of our minds... Many people seem to completely lack those skills. Like shadows or the back of something you see... Lot, and lots of people have no idea what it should look like. No clue at all...

I always looked at OoT as a stylized game (ALMOST cell-shaded like WW looked like on purpose). Just to make myself thnk it looked good. I assumed Nintendo accepted the limits of the N64 and decied to turn over another leaf, instead of aiming for realism....

I still love the games and the atmosphere though.
Actually, I've seen games look worse than OoT, while released many years later...
Even now it looks pretty good at certain moments. And, of course, TP isn't really ugly or anything.
But how far do you want to go with realism? We won't get that of affordable consoles for the next 20 years or so...
Until that time comes, lets do some stylized stuff!

Something like this. I can't explain what I exactly mean.

 

[Jupiter]

@CZG

"But how far do you want to go with realism? We won't get that of affordable consoles for the next 20 years or so...
Until that time comes, lets do some stylized stuff!

Something like this. I can't explain what I exactly mean."

I agree with you, and am actually totally happy sticking with stylized games even as systems get more powerful. If the future of games looks more like Pixar than Avatar, that is fine by me.

I think what this thread might ultimately be choosing between is...


Go in this direction:

Or this direction:

Both of these are Wii games, but look really good. But one is more effective than the other.

 

[CZG]

It's a tough decision isn't it? There is no way that one is 'better'than the other. Both shall do fine and both styles can deliver games worth playing...

I can't even tell which I like better. I think I vote the bottom one for the landscape, but I think I prefer the close up part on the Mario game. I think I like things like that red riding hood animated movie (Hoodwinked) or that other animated thingey called 'Up' over something like Avatar, which is quite overhyped in my opinion.

The cartoony graphics, combined with the awesome, quite realistic lighting of the cloured balloons was a total win for me. At least, graphical-wise, not story-wise. But I though Avatar's story was pretty lame too. Or at least the way the characters portretted the story.

In the end, I think you can do more with a 'cartoony' style (the word doesn't fully cover the whole thing), more than full-scale realism. In that case, you can't do strange things without making it unbelievable. Something like Paper Mario for example, Nobody can complain that it's not possible what the character does and how he slips into bed. He's made of paper, just like the rest of the game. Still, it has some great sense of realism to it, like the basic stuff like gravity and such.

I vote for handmade cartoons over any rendered scene anyday.
I still think ALttP look better than the four picture above.

 

[Seanileus]

Unless they look like Wind Waker or Majora's Mask, I don't give ****.

 

[Austin]

I rather have TP graphics for multiple reasons. One, they were really well (not the best, but not the worse). Two, it takes too much time to redesign the graphics!!! Less time on graphics, more time on story line and game play! If they can re-use sprites (video game term for a graphic. aka Link, NPC, building, etc), and have more time doing story line.

I have no problem with cell shading. I actually really enjoy Wind Waker, because it had a really good story line! The only reason I can think Nintendo would use Cell shading is the game deals with the Wind Waker timeline, or they want to childish it up a bit. Make it more appealing to younger children and less hard-core gamers. Personally, they're going to far with that approach. Before they know it, their hardcore, long term fans will give up on Nintendo. Thus they tell family and friends that Nintendo is no longer good, and Nintendo looses sales.

My final point is, I don't want Nintendo to spend too much time on graphics. Stick with what they already have, and work/continue on the story. If they don't become decisive enough, we wont see a game till Q4 2011.

 

[Seanileus]

Doesn't matter, it's probably going to suck even more than Twilight Princess.

 

[Ikana]

i have to go with Twilight Princess graphics.I like the cell shading but they just made a game with that.But I wouldn't mind if the game had cell shading.Like Cooldogs_1 said I hope they don't spend so much time on graphics that it wont come out till 2011.

 

[Y2K3]

It's hard for me to tell what I would rather, seeing as how I know nothign about the game. I absolutely love the graphics in WW - because they fit the theme of the game. WW graphics in TP just would work. Still, I wasn't a huge fan of the realistic graphics in TP. I thought it was a bit much - it looked nice, but not for a Zelda game, IMO. I'd want something in between cartoon and realistic. That's how I've always perceived OoT and MM, and I think that's the route Zelda Wii should go (obviously with improved graphics). If they were able to use the colour pallet from MM that would be amazing. It was the perfect balance between cartoony fun, and doom.

 

[Dark Princess]

I hope to see realistic graphics. I mean, sure, the cartoonish cel-shaded graphics were cute and all that, but I think realistic graphics would be much better for the Zelda games. In Twilight Princess, the graphics made the people look real, and I loved that. But sigh, we'll just have to wait until it's conformed. =(