Maximum Color

[aaron552]

Maybe I overreacted saying UE3 in every sentence I wrote

You did have a point, though. Most UE3 games have this almost "neon glow" post-process effect that gets a little tiring to look at for extended periods of time, at least for me. However, I'll admit it really suits sci-fi games like Mass Effect.

I could see it in Batman: Arkham Asylum too. It was tolerable, but it didn't "feel" quite right to me.

Of course there are games where it is either not present or not noticeable (again, to me) - Mirror's Edge, Borderlands - but sadly, they are in the minority.

Also, FYI, Bioshock uses UE2.

I have yet to play Crysis 2, but the original certainly had great use of colour, too; and while the screenshots of Crysis 2 seem to show less colour in some areas (it's in a city, of course there's going to be concrete, rocks and asphalt everywhere), they don't seem to have changed their use of colour significantly (this is a good thing); the grey and brown parts only serve to make the brighter colours, where they are used, stand out even more.

 

[Flying Dagger]

note - zeno clash made excellent use of colour.


/fanboyism.

 

[faefrost]

Not to be picky, but isn't the overwhelming trend of modern video games to have that washed out brown and grey color pallet almost entirely the fault of the same guys that just made crysis 2 and developed the new Crytek engine? I thought that so many modern games used those monotone washed out color pallets in large part because that was part of how the licensed Unreal or Crytek engine, that they used to build them, worked. You could increase the colors in the engine, but it was awfully time consuming and expensive, so few did it. The only major exception in modern FPS's is TF2, who's cartoony style uses its own engine and color mechanisms.

I mean it's fantastic that their new engine so clearly permits a much broader pallet to be used without major reworking. That is fantastic and I hope all of the development houses jump on it with the next generation of games. But praising them while deriding other games maker over a percieved problem that they in fact caused seems just a tad unsporting.

Or did I misunderstand what I read about this issue?

 

[Dhatz]

worst of all, the multiplayer in C2 has problems saving the progress I make. Some people lost like 17 levels to that.

 

[Stevepinto3]

In The Matrix, the virtual world was tinted green to help the audience keep track of what world they were in.

Oh my god. I never noticed this before, but the minute I read it I instantly thought back to the movie and realized it was true. Mind is blown.

 

[scott91575]

"If I can deliver a bit of a beating to one of last year's sacred cows: Mass Effect 2"

We've all or should all have seen your lets play of this game Shamus, you insult ME2 is like Ruts trolling mumbles. oh but rightly so of course Sci-Fi Liner shooter with a strange plot that i still seam to want to defend.

speaking of colour, Fallout suffers imo from the worse case of brown shooteritis, simply because the world was huge and everything was grey/brown and bland, if we took a pan from two parts of the wasteland you'd struggle to tell someone which is in zone 1 and which is zone 9. its like their entire colour budget went into Oasis, which was severl shades of green instead of brown/grey, different but would have been even better if there was the odd rose bush or vibrant radioactive man eating daisy.

edit: note i dont mean make everything zany and mad, but hell the real world is a bland uninteresting mess, id rather games add some vibrancy to it sure have grey and brown but not just grey and brown.

I always give Fallout a break since the depressing brown is supposed to be a part of a post apocalyptic world. They still could do a better job of mixing it up a little, but for the most part I understand why it's that way.

Sadly it gets thrown in with so many other games that do the same thing, and it doesn't really fit the mood of the games.

 

[scott91575]

Not to be picky, but isn't the overwhelming trend of modern video games to have that washed out brown and grey color pallet almost entirely the fault of the same guys that just made crysis 2 and developed the new Crytek engine? I thought that so many modern games used those monotone washed out color pallets in large part because that was part of how the licensed Unreal or Crytek engine, that they used to build them, worked. You could increase the colors in the engine, but it was awfully time consuming and expensive, so few did it. The only major exception in modern FPS's is TF2, who's cartoony style uses its own engine and color mechanisms.

I mean it's fantastic that their new engine so clearly permits a much broader pallet to be used without major reworking. That is fantastic and I hope all of the development houses jump on it with the next generation of games. But praising them while deriding other games maker over a percieved problem that they in fact caused seems just a tad unsporting.

Or did I misunderstand what I read about this issue?

The CryEngines (1 and 2) were not used by many games outside of Crysis and Far Cry games. The other handful of games were not that popular or are still in development (Aion being the exception).

The Unreal engine, on the other hand, has been a part of a ton of games. Many of them pretty big titles.

I am not sure the two engines are connected in any way since the Unreal engine is done by US developer Epic, and the Cryengine was developed by Crytek in Germany (there is a modified Cryengine 1 done by Ubisoft Montreal which is used for the more recent Far Cry games).

 

[EmeraldGreen]

The colors you see in movies are carefully chosen to set mood, to draw the eye. To denote importance. To make the audience remember an otherwise unremarkable detail.

How you could omit a shout-out to Mirror's Edge at this point is beyond me.

I found the green areas in Mirrors Edge relaxing for some reason

That's because they usually were relaxing. Green was for elevators, or puzzle areas with no enemies around - places where you could relax and take a breather. The colour-coding in Mirror's Edge is really strong, brilliantly designed to let you keep running full speed and still take in the cues you needed from the environment.

Apropos of which, I just love The Runner's post on the use of colour in Mirror's Edge - not least for its spectacular collection of screenshots. Reading it after I finished playing Mirror's Edge gave me a whole new appreciation for the game's craft.

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

Shamus wants more games to use color like Crysis 2

I agree, whats the point of spending millions on a new game engine that can render the most beautiful 16.7 million colours the human eye can perceive if all its going to render is grey and brown?

Not saying Crysis 2 is grey and brown, just all the other multi million dollar games out there that are.

 

[mechanixis]

I think this is a valid argument, but I wish people would stop framing it in terms of 'color.' Games with bland environments aren't bland because they "don't use enough color," they're bland because they're bland. Desaturation is a stylistic decision, and while it's true most "realistic" games tend to abuse it, it's not necessarily awful for a game to be brown and gray. The real reason we dislike "brown-and-gray shooters" is that they're all designed that way on account of being uninspired, grimdark facsimiles of reality, which is something that we've been overexposed to in recent years.

This would not be improved by bringing out the greens and purples.

 

[Seneschal]

In The Matrix, the virtual world was tinted green to help the audience keep track of what world they were in.

Oh my god. I never noticed this before, but the minute I read it I instantly thought back to the movie and realized it was true. Mind is blown.

This is a quite common indicator that reality isn't exactly right in the scene. Green isn't noticeable enough, but it subconsciously lets you know something is off. You can spot it in films like Fight Club.

Then again, film post-production has that annoying habit of colouring everything cyan + orange because it creates the biggest possible contrast between human skin and the background. But it makes everyone in the film look like they have spray-on tan. You can spot that in stuff like Transformers.

 

[Serving UpSmiles]

The colors you see in movies are carefully chosen to set mood, to draw the eye. To denote importance. To make the audience remember an otherwise unremarkable detail.

How you could omit a shout-out to Mirror's Edge at this point is beyond me.

I found the green areas in Mirrors Edge relaxing for some reason

You will like this then.

 

[PunkRex]

I loved this!

Although I agree a good game needs a compeling story with interesting characters but this idea tends to over shadow the art itself. People think that as long as the things under it are good then they dont have to worry about what goes on top but artwork in itself can be deeper. Contrast, shading, subtle hints of colour or shape, they can all make for great experiences. My favourite games are ones with not JUST interesting story, characters and enjoyable gameplay but ones that ALSO use their art style to push these other things even higher.

This may be the most ive ever agreed with an article on the Escapist.

People might think im shallow but I think that why look at it as style over substance when the style ITSELF can be substance... if that makes sense.

 

[I want to leave because extra credits is gone]

I think it is good that a new engine is able to deliver visual effects that are nice to see. It would be interesting to see what the engine would do for a 3rd person game or a sand box world.

 

[sunsethorizons]

In The Matrix, the virtual world was tinted green to help the audience keep track of what world they were in.

Oh my god. I never noticed this before, but the minute I read it I instantly thought back to the movie and realized it was true. Mind is blown.

They did this in Gladiator too: all of the opening in Germania was all tinted blue to make it feel cold and uninviting, and all of Rome had a very yellow filter to give off the dusty, dry, desert feel. Most movies do, and for the most part, we don`t realize it. Which is what makes it so awesome.

 

[thethingthatlurks]

Damnit Shamus, now you made me want to play Jade Empire again. That was a truly beautiful game, remember the pirates' lair? Or the Imperial City? Or the Heaven level? Yeah, it had the graphical finesse of the last console generation, but it still had this weird charm about it. And colors, lots and lots of colors. And an end boss to whom you could surrender and get a corresponding "sacrifice" ending. Lovely game, I DEMAND A SEQUEL!

 

[draythefingerless]

Want me to blow your mind right now?.........

Bioshock, American McGee, Borderlands, and last but not least, Mirrors Edge, all use the Unreal Engine. There are pretty games out there. Its easy to overlook them to promote how bad some others look.

Yeah... those too... well...

Alraight, okay, those game do have more variety in their color schemes, I know, first hand, that they all look great (except Mirrors Edge wich I haven't played it yet and American McGee's wich, well, hasn't been released yet) and I may add Arkham Asylum to that list of yours. Maybe I overreacted saying UE3 in every sentence I wrote, but that wasn't the point, heck, I'm learning how to use the UE3.

I was just saying that we need more color in our gaming lives, not more shades of grey and brown. And for the record, I can't wait for Brink to get released and that game looks like it's going to have some impressive and colorful art assets.

Make no mistake, i dont like the U3 engine that much. Nothing against, just i find other engines prettier and better, as well as easier and much more interesting. This engine is old now. It needs to be replaced, and NOT by another fucking Unreal engine. Theyll just update it with better graphics. like from U2 to U3.

 

[Flyingmind]

You're kidding me right? Crysis 2 was the most bland colorless experience i've ever played.
If you want color in a Crysis game, play the first one.

 

[Lazyjim]

Brink looks to be positioning itself in the colourful shooter lineup. I really like the Hyperealistic exaggerated art-style they went with.

But yeah totally agree, more inventive use of colour in games please.

 

[raankh]

I agree that Crysis 2 is unusually good looking and colourful for a DX9 game.

But I'd preferred if they'd have spent that cash on actual gameplay instead. The entirety of Crysis 2 plays like the less-than-stellar parts of the first games, in my opinion.

Sure, colour it up, but pretty graphics does not make for a good game-- however creative the lighting or contrasts be. In my opinion as a gamer, most major studios are just doing it plain wrong. Once they have the gameplay and mechanics there, they should start thinking about artwork, not this cinema-style production that seems to be going on with most major releases today. Everything is conceputalized and story-boarded; gameplay is molded to fit visual styles rather than the other way around. Even the players actions are molded to visual styles through quick-time events and heavy-handed scripting. Crysis 2 is a great example of just that; Bulletstorm springs to mind as well. Everything is a gimmick, more or less-- I suppose that's what designers convince themselves "gameplay elements" are.

At least that's the feel I get from these games. Colour isn't going to help, at least not in my case. I'm going to pick up Brink when it releases, but I'm anticipating dissapointment by forcing myself through Crysis 2 and Bulletstorm while mumbling under my breath....

What I'm most sore about is that I bought those games, thus I'm involuntarily supporting these developers and might contribute to them thinking they've got it right. I constitute a "succesful sale" in their view, no doubt. OC, I'm unlikely to buy any more games from People Can Fly or CryTek, but see if they care....