Seriously how does your head hold “good at game design” and “not an artist” at the same time without imploding.
Because thats me. I design and code games, but im not a good enough artist to make the textures or models. So I either have to but premade assets or hire artists to do the work for me. I dont understand why you think this is a contradiction, other than you just gatekeeping for no reason.
No: It makes certain specialised subskills more accessible
Nope it’s like saying “you cannot be a gardener without knowing about plants”. Games are art. To produce them, you have to be an artist. If you produce games, you are an artist. You might be a brilliant or shoddy artist, formally educated, self-taught, conservative or avant-garde, but you are, by definition, an artist.
Because thats me. I design and code games, but im not a good enough artist to make the textures or models.
If you understand game design then you should understand how it’s art.
…if you know game design, have no other art skills, and no team, there’s one choice you should make before all others: Do you want to get into creating that other kind of stuff, or do you want to make the lack of those things a style? Maybe even an expression in itself. It’s going to be the one or the other, so make it consciously, and informed, ideally after having explored both sides a bit, learned enough to know what you don’t know, practised enough to see what you’d need to practice to get results you’d like.
In case you think “I’m just going to throw AI images at my VN” – valid choice. But be aware that without any experience in creating picture media yourself you have no artistic eye for them, and can’t judge the quality of the AI output, and probably be unaware of the artistic possibilities inherent in lightening, choice of colour schemes, etc. No you don’t need to be able to paint everything yourself, but there’s still a baseline of skills necessary to use AI in a capacity that’s more than prompting “big bazongaz plz”.
I don’t doubt that you can train that artistic eye while hitting generate over and over, as long as you’re critical enough, but spending some time with a youtube tutorial and actual pencil, crayon, and paper, or actual blender and virtual clay1, will teach you a lot more in a much shorter time-frame. You don’t actually have to master that stuff, but you do need to be able to see that you’re not mastering it so you can judge whether the AI got it right.
1 Highly reommended but please, for the love of your carpal tunnel, don’t try to sculpt with a mouse for longer than a day. Huion tablets are good and cheap. You don’t need a display tablet (nobody does but some prefer it).
Yes, actually, someone arbitrarily deciding what makes someone an artist is by definition gatekeeping.
Have a look at Dwarf Fortress. How many textures and models
Quite a lot? This it has lots of art in it? Its just pixel art? Youre not making the point you think you’re making there.
…if you know game design, have no other art skills, and no team…
This whole paragraph wasnt really relevant to the conversation so im just moving past it if thats okay?
In case you think “I’m just going to throw AI images at my VN” – valid choice.
This is a false dichotomy. Your options are not either put in the effort with traditional art or lazily throw any random AI generated images at your game. You can put time and effort into AI images, to make them have a consistent style and to actually fit what are trying to make. The latest background im making for my game, for example, has taken me well over an hour already and its not quite finished, but its still orders of magnitude faster and better than if I drew it myself
Which is the entire point of my comment. If I had to rely on my own artistic skill or have to pay money I dont have to get art made, then I simply would not have been able to make the game I want to make. Even if I did what you suggested and designed around my lack of artistic skill, that would be a different game than the one I wanted to make. Thats why im saying AI art is a good thing and makes art more accessible. I simply would not be making my game, expressing my creativity and enjoying myself if it wasnt for the ability to generate AI art pieces.
Zero. Dwarf fortress has zero textures and models, at least the base version that generated the cult following, by now there’s some extensions. It’s rendering to console, not with some 3d API, how would it even use those textures and models? It also doesn’t contain pixel art (past the intro screen) same as a street map is not line art.
Seeing that you got such a basic thing completely wrong I do not believe you for one second that you’re anywhere close to being a gamedev. Or even programmer. Maybe you’re a hobbyist trying to write your first game, in that case be aware that your first ten are going to suck get them out of your system as quickly as possible, don’t settle. Move quickly and abandon things.
You can put time and effort into AI images, to make them have a consistent style and to actually fit what are trying to make.
Nothing I said contradicts that. That time and effort, to make it fit what you’re trying to make, is an artistic endeavour, all I did was give pointers on how to get better at that stuff.
Even if I did what you suggested and designed around my lack of artistic skill, that would be a different game than the one I wanted to make.
That’s not what I suggested. What I suggested was making a conscious, deliberate, informed, choice. Not saying “I want to make a science-based dragon MMO with photorealistic graphics” but “Here’s my options, here’s what I can do, here’s what I can learn in a reasonable amount of time, let’s see what option I like best”. Make a decision matrix if you have to.
expressing my creativity and enjoying myself
One thing art is not about is enjoyment. I mean it can come with the process but the opposite can be true as well.
Zero. Dwarf fortress has zero textures and models, at least the base version that generated the cult following
The only version ive seen is the steam version that actually has sprites
seeing that you got such a basic thing completely wrong I do not believe you for one second that you’re anywhere close to being a gamedev. Or even programmer.
lmao, fuck off.
One thing art is not about is enjoyment.
What in the actual fuck are you talking about? Theres is 0 chance you actually believe that.
Literrally what the fuck is the point of any of your comments besides being a troll?
The only version ive seen is the steam version that actually has sprites
Tiles are neither textures nor models1. The OG thing, also the one that’s in the MOMA, could render to an ANSI terminal.
lmao, fuck off.
…I mean, how long have you been around and how deep did you go that you don’t know that DF has existed for ages (2006)? It’s one of the standards. It’s like calling yourself a movie director but not having seen Seven Samurai.
What in the actual fuck are you talking about? Theres is 0 chance you actually believe that.
The tortured artist is literally a trope by now, though the boundaries to Faustian characters is often blurry. Art is expressive. It can be hedonistic but then because the artist is a hedonist, not because hedonism would make it art.
Literrally what the fuck is the point of any of your comments besides being a troll?
Art. I’m trying to get some basic art education into your skull so that your games won’t be, at best, trite slop with questionable mechanics. Producing something great is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration, if you think you can get away with 1% inspiration and 99% masturbation you’re in for a rude awakening on release. “Oh no material reality is impinging on my vision”, great, another escapist. Touch paint. Or admit that you’re dabbling. I’ll still grant you the artist title but it’ll be in the shoddy category: If you want to create art, fucking care about art.
1 except in a very technical sense when you write a tiler engine using 3d APIs because any grid of values is a texture in that terminology.
You’re not wrong, but honestly I cbf to blow my entire savings account on a project that isn’t guaranteed to get a good ROI or get me hired somewhere.
It’s not that I’m unsympathetic for artists, I just don’t have the “value” to give to those artists in the first place. But nonetheless, projects need to be fleshed out one way or another, and programmer art doesn’t cut it.
I find that fair actually (maybe if I was a visual artist I’d feel differently) - I can at least respect that you are willing to acknowledge that even if you have your reasons, it’s still a devaluation.
This is just gatekeeping nonsense
Because thats me. I design and code games, but im not a good enough artist to make the textures or models. So I either have to but premade assets or hire artists to do the work for me. I dont understand why you think this is a contradiction, other than you just gatekeeping for no reason.
And thus makes are more accessible.
Nope it’s like saying “you cannot be a gardener without knowing about plants”. Games are art. To produce them, you have to be an artist. If you produce games, you are an artist. You might be a brilliant or shoddy artist, formally educated, self-taught, conservative or avant-garde, but you are, by definition, an artist.
If you understand game design then you should understand how it’s art.
Have a look at Dwarf Fortress. How many textures and models in that one? It’s in the fucking MOMA!
…if you know game design, have no other art skills, and no team, there’s one choice you should make before all others: Do you want to get into creating that other kind of stuff, or do you want to make the lack of those things a style? Maybe even an expression in itself. It’s going to be the one or the other, so make it consciously, and informed, ideally after having explored both sides a bit, learned enough to know what you don’t know, practised enough to see what you’d need to practice to get results you’d like.
In case you think “I’m just going to throw AI images at my VN” – valid choice. But be aware that without any experience in creating picture media yourself you have no artistic eye for them, and can’t judge the quality of the AI output, and probably be unaware of the artistic possibilities inherent in lightening, choice of colour schemes, etc. No you don’t need to be able to paint everything yourself, but there’s still a baseline of skills necessary to use AI in a capacity that’s more than prompting “big bazongaz plz”.
I don’t doubt that you can train that artistic eye while hitting generate over and over, as long as you’re critical enough, but spending some time with a youtube tutorial and actual pencil, crayon, and paper, or actual blender and virtual clay1, will teach you a lot more in a much shorter time-frame. You don’t actually have to master that stuff, but you do need to be able to see that you’re not mastering it so you can judge whether the AI got it right.
1 Highly reommended but please, for the love of your carpal tunnel, don’t try to sculpt with a mouse for longer than a day. Huion tablets are good and cheap. You don’t need a display tablet (nobody does but some prefer it).
Yes, actually, someone arbitrarily deciding what makes someone an artist is by definition gatekeeping.
Quite a lot? This it has lots of art in it? Its just pixel art? Youre not making the point you think you’re making there.
This whole paragraph wasnt really relevant to the conversation so im just moving past it if thats okay?
This is a false dichotomy. Your options are not either put in the effort with traditional art or lazily throw any random AI generated images at your game. You can put time and effort into AI images, to make them have a consistent style and to actually fit what are trying to make. The latest background im making for my game, for example, has taken me well over an hour already and its not quite finished, but its still orders of magnitude faster and better than if I drew it myself
Which is the entire point of my comment. If I had to rely on my own artistic skill or have to pay money I dont have to get art made, then I simply would not have been able to make the game I want to make. Even if I did what you suggested and designed around my lack of artistic skill, that would be a different game than the one I wanted to make. Thats why im saying AI art is a good thing and makes art more accessible. I simply would not be making my game, expressing my creativity and enjoying myself if it wasnt for the ability to generate AI art pieces.
Zero. Dwarf fortress has zero textures and models, at least the base version that generated the cult following, by now there’s some extensions. It’s rendering to console, not with some 3d API, how would it even use those textures and models? It also doesn’t contain pixel art (past the intro screen) same as a street map is not line art.
Seeing that you got such a basic thing completely wrong I do not believe you for one second that you’re anywhere close to being a gamedev. Or even programmer. Maybe you’re a hobbyist trying to write your first game, in that case be aware that your first ten are going to suck get them out of your system as quickly as possible, don’t settle. Move quickly and abandon things.
Nothing I said contradicts that. That time and effort, to make it fit what you’re trying to make, is an artistic endeavour, all I did was give pointers on how to get better at that stuff.
That’s not what I suggested. What I suggested was making a conscious, deliberate, informed, choice. Not saying “I want to make a science-based dragon MMO with photorealistic graphics” but “Here’s my options, here’s what I can do, here’s what I can learn in a reasonable amount of time, let’s see what option I like best”. Make a decision matrix if you have to.
One thing art is not about is enjoyment. I mean it can come with the process but the opposite can be true as well.
The only version ive seen is the steam version that actually has sprites
lmao, fuck off.
What in the actual fuck are you talking about? Theres is 0 chance you actually believe that.
Literrally what the fuck is the point of any of your comments besides being a troll?
Tiles are neither textures nor models1. The OG thing, also the one that’s in the MOMA, could render to an ANSI terminal.
…I mean, how long have you been around and how deep did you go that you don’t know that DF has existed for ages (2006)? It’s one of the standards. It’s like calling yourself a movie director but not having seen Seven Samurai.
The tortured artist is literally a trope by now, though the boundaries to Faustian characters is often blurry. Art is expressive. It can be hedonistic but then because the artist is a hedonist, not because hedonism would make it art.
Art. I’m trying to get some basic art education into your skull so that your games won’t be, at best, trite slop with questionable mechanics. Producing something great is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration, if you think you can get away with 1% inspiration and 99% masturbation you’re in for a rude awakening on release. “Oh no material reality is impinging on my vision”, great, another escapist. Touch paint. Or admit that you’re dabbling. I’ll still grant you the artist title but it’ll be in the shoddy category: If you want to create art, fucking care about art.
1 except in a very technical sense when you write a tiler engine using 3d APIs because any grid of values is a texture in that terminology.
And by using AI you do neither of those things, and devalue the work of those who do make those things.
You’re not wrong, but honestly I cbf to blow my entire savings account on a project that isn’t guaranteed to get a good ROI or get me hired somewhere.
It’s not that I’m unsympathetic for artists, I just don’t have the “value” to give to those artists in the first place. But nonetheless, projects need to be fleshed out one way or another, and programmer art doesn’t cut it.
I find that fair actually (maybe if I was a visual artist I’d feel differently) - I can at least respect that you are willing to acknowledge that even if you have your reasons, it’s still a devaluation.