Twilight Princess Why is TP Thought to Have a More Mature Art Style?

[Salem]

It can't possibly be the lack of cell-shading, because there are plenty of mature-rated Cell shaded(that rhymes..) game out there.

TP and SS have a similar art style, I mean Link looks almost the same, plenty of SS character won't look out of place if placed aside TP character(minus the cell-chading), WW is the only outlier among them.


EDIT: Okay, the term I was looking for is actually "realistic" in addition to "mature", in either case my point still stands, what is in TP that makes it more "realistic" than SS?

 

[DarkestLink]

Well two reasons...

1) It has more detail and is darker.

2) It just contrasted Wind Waker so much at the time.

 

[Mangachick14]

Because apparently detailed textures=maturity.

Yeah. I don't see the correlation either.

 

[Snow Queen]

TP had an artstyle? I thought it was all just muddy gross Gears of War textures #brownandgrey

 

[Justac00lguy]

Well the term "mature", when talking about a visual style, never really made sense to me. Maybe it came from the term "mature themes" and somehow got muddled up with relating to the art style. I think it's just become synonymous with the term realistic now.

So about this "mature" artstyle, or realistic for that matter, it's quite obvious to me the contrast between the two games. Skyward Sword is kind of like abstract art--well not literally--in the sense that the colours and settings are exaggerated creating this painting like feel. When you look into the horizon, the world looks like a brush stroke . It's as if it's just been painted and, as you go closer, the picture becomes more clear. The artstyle is meant to be exaggerated to create that light-hearted feel. It suits the quirky, somewhat childish, characters, and general tone of the story.

Twilight Princess on the other hand is more realistic - something akin to what you would see in the real world. Obviously it's not an exact representation - that's where people misinterpret when others use the term realistic. It's realistic to a degree - as far as the hardware at the time and for a Japanese fantasy based game. It also has this dark gritty feel to the game that I see a lot of people criticise, but it complemented the tone and feel of the game perfectly. The story contains more mature themes and a lot of the character interactions are quite serious. Couple this up with the somewhat dark story, and it's a perfect match. Of course, it would be nice for a slightly brighter colour scheme, but the game had a decent contrast (Castle Town
Gerudo Desert, Lake Hylia/Fishing pond , Ordon Spring, Ordon Village etc.).

Both themes are different and suited the tone of each game. It would be great to see what Nintendo could do with a HD remake though.

 

[Azure Sage]

I think the average gamer tends to perceive colorful and bright art styles as "childish", so they associate darker colored art styles like TP's with maturity since it's essentially the opposite in terms of aesthetics when compared to games like Wind Waker. I think it's pretty ridiculous, to be honest. Wind Waker had a lot of charm, but it could be pretty dark at times, too. Skyward Sword is the same. Judging a game's "maturity" based solely on art style and aesthetics is very narrow-minded.

 

[Terminus]

Regarding realism:

This looks more like an actual human than this. While they're both stylized, TP character models look closer to real humans than TWW (stubby legs and misshapen heads).

 

[DarkestLink]

@Azure Sage

While Wind Waker had some dark moments, it has hard to take any of them seriously...granted, that was probably more because they added humor during several of them. The only time I think the graphics themselves were the actual problem was when Ganondorf was revealed and even then, I can't tell if they intentionally made him silly looking or not.

 

[RegalBryant]

Darkly colored.

 

[AncientPoe]

I would argue that Wind Waker actually had much darker and more mature themes than Twilight Princess. Compare the two.

In Wind Waker:

Spoiler

1. Hyrule was invaded by Ganondorf, and no hero was present. Many people were likely slaughtered at his hand, and those of his minions. In turn, many also likely fled in helpless fear, praying for the savior that would not come.
2. When all was nearly lost, the Gods saw fit to cover the land with water. However, if you pay attention to the opening script of WW, you'll notice it states: "Memory of the Kingdom vanished, but it's legend survived on the wind's breath." Wind Waker takes place only a few hundred years after that. So how does memory of an entire culture pass almost completely into obscurity? We, as a people, know quite well what our world was like 100 or 500 years ago, and indeed slightly more educated people can have a good idea what it was like for us several thousand years ago. Well, that's because…
3. Most people still didn't survive. The King tells Link that the people who live on the islands of the Great Sea are the descendants of those who occupied the land formerly known as Hyrule, but when you look at the numbers, really only a small handful of people remain. Hylians are scant, and Zoras don't even exist as far as we can tell. That's two entire cultures utterly destroyed. The Gods instructed the Hylians to flee to the mountaintops, but there's no way a few scant mountaintops could possibly have supported the population. It's likely that many of the survivors of the great flood and Ganon's onslaught perished a short time later, enough to almost completely obliterate all knowledge of the former Hyrule. The royal family, and indeed even knowledge of the idea of a royal family, appear to have completely escaped the consciousness of the people. The only surviving element is the idea of a young boy clad in green, and even his significance is not known to the people.
4. When the events of the game are over, Hyrule is given up forever, and the two men who had any living memory of it are left dead and gone.

Now, compare that to Twilight Princess:

Spoiler

1. The events of the game take place really in a matter of days. From the moment Zant invades the castle to when Link shows up to help is small, small enough for numerous people to comment on the fact that certain routes have lately become impassable (for instance, the mailman remarks on how only recently he can't get into Kakariko). And while we're on the subject of Zant's "brutal" takeover…
2. It's actually not brutal at all. From dialogue heard by soldier spirits in Twilit Hyrule Castle, many of them simply broke in fear rather than stay to fight. The castle soldiers are all very cowardly, as this particular iteration of Hyrule has long been at peace. They flee from Wolf Link in town if he so much as growls at them, and the ones guarding the princess essentially put up no fight when Zant storms the throneroom. Furthermore, despite their utterly savage nature when attacking Link (who is an obvious threat), Shadow Beasts can be seen to clearly incapacitate soldiers by holding them down on their backs or up in the air, and Zant offers Zelda a surrender. He doesn't really seem to want bloodshed all that much, merely to rule both worlds. This mercy is one Ganondorf has never shown.
3. The citizens of Hyrule don't even know what's happening. Even as spirits, they just go about their daily lives. Sure, some of them are troubled by odd goings-on, like the inability to access the Shrine at Lake Hylia, but by and large there are no noticeable effects from Zant's takeover, or the defeat of his shadow beasts and the return of Light to the world. And, once Link mops everyone up and it's all over…
4. They get everything back. Not only does peace return to Hyrule, but the Twilight Realm gets its rightful ruler back, fully restored to her former beauty and grace (and likely with a little more temperance added in thanks to her time spent with the selfless hero). So in actuality, Zant's assault leaves both worlds marginally better than when he first arrived.

Now, I believe someone brushed on this above, but what makes the two games differ is their aesthetic, not their themes. Twilight Princess has a very dark and gritty aesthetic, but relatively standard hero story themes, while Wind Waker hides very insidious implications behind a veneer of cheerful colors and slightly offbeat humor.

 

[Farore's Chosen]

I always thought it had more of a realistic art style.

 

[Spiritual Mask Salesman]

Its art style resembles real life humans and enviroments more so than say, Wind Waker. That's why its art is considered more “realistic” In terms of why its considered more mature, its a toss up, really it had nothing less than what most zelda games have in them. It had a “T” rating when it could have probably passed with an E10+ rating like SS did. So really I don't see why its considered more mature. I guess you could say it has a dark story, but MM is arguably darker.

 

[ihateghirahim]

It portrays people in a more realistic way in terms of their body proportions and facial features. This is a serious contrast to the cartoonish WW artstyle. Not saying it's bad, but it lacks grit or even to some extent the emotional expressiveness possible with TP's design. TP could show facial features and body movements that blended well with its darker textures and aestesthics.
Maturity is usually associated with realism in gaming. Cartoony or stylilzed games are often expected as either absurdly violent or kidish. Which is a shame as stylized games often allow for their own takes on facial features, atmosphere, and gameplay that can be great for story-telling and character development. Look at the Walking Dead Fire or Emblem Awakening. Both features stylized artwork and great stories a gamer of more advanced years can sympathize with. I especially like the still portraits and cel-shading of FEA. It allows for great character models that bring out color and make it look more like a painting than a gritty real world event. I've come to respect cel-shading more as I've seen what it can do to colors. Like the impressionists shook up art with their stylized work with light, I find it a nice change of pace. I wish more people could accept stylized art as a way to get stories across in a serious manner.

 

[Heroine of Winds]

I believe it's mainly due to the dark colors it had along with the characters looking more human. Tbh, it's not any different from what we've seen with OOT, MM, & later on with SS. Even the story isn't all that mature compared to the stories from previous Zelda games. TP is nowhere near as mature as MM, though.

 

[Salem]

I believe it's mainly due to the dark colors it had along with the characters looking more human. Tbh, it's not any different from what we've seen with OOT, MM, & later on with SS. Even the story isn't all that mature compared to the stories from previous Zelda games.

Exactly my point, SS is no different from TP. Which is way I don't understand the criticism against Wii U Zelda's art style as "childish" just because of the colours despite that it's like SS and TP.