Lewis B over at the gaming blog Tap Repeatedly has a three–part interview with ArenaNet’s Art Director Daniel Dociu. Lewis B took time and care in preparing for this interview, and he even takes Dociu by surprise pulling out Dociu’s quotes from decades ago. For any budding game artist, this interview is a must read.
With regards to the games, there is not that much new except Dociu hints at “next races to be introduced in future expansion packs.” But, given the treatment on the non-playable Guild Wars 2 races (recently the Skritt), amazing races are not necessarily going to be playable. Dociu also gives an interesting take on how they wanted to bring this “painterly” style to the original Guild Wars, yet the company was not ready for such a risk. The design of Guild Wars was played safe in areas, it appears.
Check out the full interview for a ton of other tidbits and insights.
–Ravious
For all that they go on about this ‘painterly’ style, are there any good examples of it in-game? The graphics look decent, don’t get me wrong, but what we’ve seen so far just looks like a tuned up GW.
More playable races is no surprise. It seems to me that races will replace professions as the killer incentive to buy expansions, as an easier to balance option.
I would like to know that as well, as the character models of GW2 so far seem to be metrosexual guys and cougars with hard eyes. The landscape is improved but indeed very much in line with the style of GW1.
You can somewhat see it in the skill icons and in the compass, which both look more like it’s drawn (in both cases I don’t like the look, especially in the compass, but oh well… I’m more the cold, steel-looking type when it comes to the interface.). The marking aura around targeted creatures (be they friend, neutral or foe) are perhaps supposed to be looking like they’re drawn too since they somewhat look like brushed, but to date big parts of the community (including me) think of them as ugly and atmosphere-destroying.
Another thing where I hope that there will still be some major adjustments is in the look of the humans and norn. Until now, they all look kinda like wax dolls, there is no life, no warmth in their appearence. Aside from this, I think they look pretty much OK, so I hope they will redo their skin textures.
Yeah, rather than Okami I think it’s the small things like the cut screens or the UI.
I think the main point that they make is that they want the in game images to closely resemble the concept art that they draw. Taking a look at other games’ concept art, you could be forgiven for asking “why doesn’t it look like that in game?” – I think with Guild Wars 2 they’ve tried to capture some of the dynamics and emotion of concept art.
I supposed it is yet to be seen whether they have properly succeeded, but they seem confident that they have.
Most of the “painted aesthetic” can be seen in effects and UI. It’s hard to make that classification with the actual 3D, it’s not as obvious as it was in the new Street Fighter or Prince of Persia.
Its evident in the human home city if you watch the original trailer. Its the city/village/environment that really make that style stand out – not unlike how Stormwind really pops because of the stylistic graphics.
one of the things that Anet promised its fans back in 07 was that it was going to be b2p->f2p model, and that the specs would, like gw, be quite low compared to the visuals.
And as far as I’m concerned gw even after 6 years, is still one of the best games graphically, especially in the concerns of “your” character
races aren’t replacing professions, if you watch the 53min interview, I think it is, they tell you how many combinations there are per class.
Furthermore, I’m 99% sure that we’ll see new professions, in the possible campaigns, that might come after the gw2 release, as well as races,
as well as Anet said that they won’t make the racial skills become a deciding factor, pvp/pve wise when making your char
The part that I found most interesting was at the end when he talked about the Sylvari being totally redesigned. Possibly why we haven’t seen much of them throughout the reveals.
yeah, I have no idea, but I’m hoping for a more of a treeant kind’a design