Here are some more examples of Rare’s art stye with Star Fox Adventures:
Science fantasy aesthetics are fantastic. Sadly I couldn’t get into the gameplay too much, but Rodea the Sky Soldier I realized also has a similar art style to Skies of Arcadia or parts of Sonic Adventure. Would anyone have knowledge about Yuji Naka’s influence on art styling?
It’s hard to say because the old Sonic Team art style is dead. I can’t think of any other game or company that currently spends time to detail their texture work like old Sonic Team did. And I mean a level of detail you can notice everywhere sort of like a painting come to life with exquisite detail around every corner. And most open world games don’t have this because assets are repeated and overused. It’s the smaller, more self-contained games that truly make use of their art styles imo.
Beat Skies of Arcadia recently. I tend not to get lost in texture quality, preferring to look at the bigger picture/impression of a game’s setting. That said, Sonic Adventure and Skies of Arcadia take their ruined civilizations and really make an impression that something apocalyptic occurred in the past.
I wonder if Sega’s financial issues played a role in inspiring Sonic Team and Overworks to create bleak, post-apocalyptical worlds. Sega was at the risk of dying. Their development teams knew their livelihoods, IPs, and projects were on the line. And while the Sonic Adventures and Skies of Arcadia end on upbeat notes, the games’ happy endings occur in a world where some ultra-destructive entities destroyed everything from an old world.
It would make some initiative sense that teams of artists collaborating on these games would pour some of their fears of the future into their games. A stable company, for better or for worse, is one that plays it safe with ‘baldy-mcnose’.
Here are some more examples of Rare’s art style with Conker’s Bad Fur Day and a few pics from Banjo Tooie. Notice the little details in the lantern, the shimmer of the candle, the sprawling vine texture work, the 2D skyboxes of the Moon and castle and even the water textures which contain 2 layers of colored textures, the elaborate textures in the ice world in Banjo Tooie, and notice just like Sonic Adventure, when Conker touches a dandelion, spores fly out! The little details!
I miss games with vibrant detailed textures like these. Which is why I admire old Sonic Team and Rare!:
Yup, another great series with a unique and vivid art style. I was disappointed when it didn’t win anything at the game awards!
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What’s the second game?
It’s The Artful Escape and its amazing and on Gamepass at the moment
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Also, look at all the Sonic Team members that helped make Panzer Dragoon Saga. And this isn’t even all of them!!
Shirō Maekawa
(Panzer Dragoon Saga Original Concept & Setting) Sonic (Adventure DX Sonic Adventure DX Director’s Cut) (Sonic Heroes main game designer) (Sonic Adventure A-life system designers) (Sonic Adventure 2 Battle Story Event Designer)
Katsumi Yokota
(Panzer Dragoon Saga Image Illustration & Character Design) (Sonic Adventure field art support)
Satoshi Sakai
(Panzer Dragoon Saga Dragon Design) (Sonic Adventure lead field artists)
Mitsuteru Iwaki
(Panzer Dragoon Saga programmer) (Sonic Adventure enemy program support)
Mitsuru Takahashi
(Panzer Dragoon Saga programmer) (Sonic Adventure enemy program support) (Nights Joureny of Dreams Senior programmer)
Masamichi Harada
(Panzer Dragoon Saga field design) (Sonic Adventure lead field artist) (Knuckles Chatoix attraction designer)
Nanako Yarimizu
(Panzer Dragoon saga field design) (Sonic Adventure field art support) (Sonic Adventure 2 event scene artist)
Tōru Mita
(Panzer Dragoon Saga Battle program) (Sonic Adventure enemy program support)
Isamu Yamasaki
(Panzer Dragoon Saga Effect design) (Sonic Adventure CG movie artist)
I recently replayed Sonic Adventure 1 and 2 on PC. I hadn’t played all the way through these since the Dreamcast days, so it was great to revisit them. Charming, if very flawed games.
I remember abandoning the franchise after being disappointed with Heroes, playing demos of 06 and Unleashed which were much worse, but coming back for Generations (half good), Forces (eh), and Mania (great). I have Lost World in my Steam account, so that one can come next. I’ll get to the recent PC releases like Colors and Frontiers eventually.
Be warned about Lost World. This is the game where they completely changed Sonic and friends personalities. Same for Colors and Forces. And the writing is absolutely terrible! As the game is only written for very young children and not all Sonic fans. Not to mention the level aesthetics are a complete rip-off of Mario Galaxy.
And unfortunately, Frontiers is a let down as well. Uninspired, generic aesthetics for the islands, ,short, repetitive Cyber Space levels, game feels unfinished by the third island, music is unfitting for a Sonic game etc.
I know music is subjective but ever since Forces the music has sounded off. In Frontiers’ case its more unfitting as you will be listening to slow piano music for most of the game. And Sonic music has always been melodic and upbeat. If I want that kind of music I’d go and play Breath of the Wild; the game it’s obviously copying. This slow atmospheric music just doesn’t feel right for a Sonic game. So, sadly, I probably won’t play Frontiers…