Having recently had a look at the games coming out with the newer graphics - i.e. based on UE3 and Chromed and the like I have to say this...
Get a grip, next generation of texture makers!!!
Prey, Call of Juarez, Splinter Cell CT - all have really cruddy textures with hamfisted attempts at normal maps (I suspect done with a PS plug-in and subjected to absolutely ZERO critical scrutiny afterwards) and completely overdone specularity.
I mean, a weatherbeaten plank in the desert in summer is NOT going to be shiny FFS!
The skills of the current set of texture artists seem to be way short of the technology - it's like when a n00b guitarist gets a distortion pedal - he distorts the bejaysus out of everything, rather than subscribing to the theory of 'less is more'.
I mention all this because I sincerely hope that the TW 2-D artists working on 'The Next Big Thing' are using the time now learning to curb any "ZOMFG u can make everything shiny and luminous" tendencies - unless 'TNBT' is a psychedelic SF game.
Get a grip, next generation of texture makers!!!
Prey, Call of Juarez, Splinter Cell CT - all have really cruddy textures with hamfisted attempts at normal maps (I suspect done with a PS plug-in and subjected to absolutely ZERO critical scrutiny afterwards) and completely overdone specularity.
I mean, a weatherbeaten plank in the desert in summer is NOT going to be shiny FFS!
The skills of the current set of texture artists seem to be way short of the technology - it's like when a n00b guitarist gets a distortion pedal - he distorts the bejaysus out of everything, rather than subscribing to the theory of 'less is more'.
I mention all this because I sincerely hope that the TW 2-D artists working on 'The Next Big Thing' are using the time now learning to curb any "ZOMFG u can make everything shiny and luminous" tendencies - unless 'TNBT' is a psychedelic SF game.