Bloodstained Graphics Discussion.

Nah please no, not realistic graphics please, we are deviating too much here. This is a Castlevania that will play in 2D 1/2 and will try to match Igarashi's art, this is not Lord of Shadows, Legacy of Kain or Blood Rayne although those games looked good also.

You are talking about that mock-up, right? I thought you meant the walking test video with Iga-san playing an alpha version.

But yeah, they already mentioned and made motions to not follow that path. I think it would have been a nice twist if it was like a mixture of Bloodrayne Betrayal and Shank/Dust Elysian Tale.

So next case scenario. Though they know they cannot please 100% of all the backers (that is realistically impossible) but as long as they communicate with us and we with them in turn, we should mitigate the lesser of two evils. Which is why I suggested Deadlight. It was bleak, dark with a modern touch. It could be changed to twist that modern touch to be more Gothic.

I actually think this looks pretty good while still being hyper-colorful.

Yup it's a good example of castlevania style gothic while being colorful and vivid

We had a topic (and a poll I believe) discussing how we'd like the cutscenes here, but I don't remember anything from the team about it.

castledan, I think LordKaiser was probably referring more to the mention of Mirror of Fate.

Ultimate GnG is not a bad example. And lol, I don't think we have to worry about PoR anime expressions (sorry crocodile) in this game. They actually drew out several of Miriam's expressions in the concept art and I'm thinking they will stick to something close to those for showing her emotions in-game...probably quite similar to the old in-game portrait conversations. I think panning/zooming the camera when necessary to show something more dramatic/a cutscene would be great, or they could use separate scenes. I'd be fine with it either way.

I know there's a lot of people that hate the Lords of Shadow games, but the art direction was pretty spectacular a lot of the time. Bloodstained is not a western-made or styled game though, so it should, and does, have a very different character. However. there's still plenty of things that the LoS games did that I would like to see a bit more of in Bloodstained. Namely, gothic mood and character. It has nothing to do with color and is independent of graphical style. Bloodborne is another Japanese-made game but with a very desaturated and decayed aesthetic. Certainly not the style Bloodstained is going for, but undoubtedly successful at achieving a great gothic feel.



Mirror of Fate certainly had areas that were similarly desaturated, but it also didn't shy away from color and fantasy stylization. Some great art was created for that game.







That first pic from Mirror of Fate is probably the closest in style to Bloodstained, though still far more western, naturally. However a similarly fairytale-esque approach for Bloodstained could be fun. But the thing I hope that translates is the gothic mood of these pics. Again, it's not about color or even art style. It has much more to do with shapes and light and shadow, and right now, judging only from those shader pics, Bloodstained is lacking in almost all of those areas.

I liked the first Lords of Shadow. IMO it's probably the best 3D Castlevania game, though CoD isn't far behind. Mirror of Fate was okay, though it was well below the Iga games. However, I hated Lords of Shadow 2.

crocodile  


Remember all those times I tried to explain what I wanted out of this game visually but couldn't get it across well?  I used Lament of Innocence numerous times as an example but people still seemed confused for what i meant. Now I have examples I can actually use from this game itself.

I kept using this image to say it needs a more textured and darker tone to the visuals, much more detail which will give it a less dollhouse ( yes I'm bringing the term back) look.



What we got originally was something like this -



It looked overly simple, which gives it a more cartoony, less threatening, less dark feel to it. It didn't hit that IGAVANIA tone I was hoping for.....

BUT then something magical happened. The images they revealed today fixed my issues with the look instantly, and capture the vibe Lament Of Innocence has perfectly in a 2.5d space.



Now people can see what I mean when I say a gritty, more textured, more dark, less cartoony feel. They nailed it. It's almost like Lament of Innocence is turned into a 2.5d game.


Now I no longer have to try an explain myself, the bloodstained team explained it for me

That's why it's important to have threads like this and to not always be content with whatever. That little push from people made a world of difference.