Actually the title says it all really. I would love to hear insight of any type on this subject, but I will clarify my meaning below. Don’t hesitate to throw in your thoughts, even if it doesn’t actually address my question!! just put yourself in my shoes and if it seems like I would gain from your info on this subject, throw it out there.
First off I am new to game development, and, like a lot of people I have an idea for a game, which I would like to develop.
In my game you would play an animal that wanders around a natural/nature environment. Maybe a small “continent” or island that has a variety of climes like “desert”, “forest”, “mountain”, etc. There would be other animals, but no humans or buildings.(imagine DayZ or H1Z1 except you are an animal, there are natural predators instead of zombies, and it takes place away from all civilization). The game would be full 3D either way.
This is an idea I have had for many years, and I always thought that I would probably need to make the game with very simple graphics, since I would likely be making it alone.
I am a very good non-professional artist and I would be making the art myself most likely.
I imagined my game like these examples. This is what I have thought I would shoot for.
Low Poly / Cartoony:
Take note of the trees and plants:
https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/tower-defence-and-moba-pack
I thought if I was lucky I would be able to make a game with graphics closer to this:
**The Witness:**The Witness first official gameplay trailer - YouTube
But instead, perhaps I could make realistic graphics like this, which is something I might prefer.
Realistic:
https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/nature-package
Open World Demo Collection in Epic Content - UE Marketplace
So my question is what are the pros and cons of making realistic graphics instead? Especially in terms of time I will spend and complexity or knowledge that I will have to know or learn.
So that’s the question I have pondered some in the past. Here are some pros and cons I have come up with:
- If I was making a cartoony style I would almost certainly design all the nature art myself. Thus insuring a fair amount of effort.
- If I did realistic graphics would this actually be a lot more work? Is there terrain generators or plant/flora generators that I could use to quickly make my assets? How complex are they to use and would using them create more work versus handpainting lower poly assets?
- Would the fact that I would be hand painting the cartoony art actually make it significantly more work than quickly generating a bunch of assets and throwing it into a level?
- If I do cartoon style I would almost certainly be designing all of the art for my animals to insure consistency of style.
- It seems plausible that I may be able to find some quality realistic animals out there to buy from someone which might actually save me time.
- How much will having realistic graphics effect things like frame rate? Assume the “realistic” graphics are not ULTRA realistic, but just run of the mill fairly realistic.
- Would realistic graphics mean many more hours spent tweaking stuff to get the game to run smoothly than if I were to just do cartoon graphics? (Keep in mind this is single player, there wouldn’t be insane explosions vehicles that would speed quickly through levels)
- Would realistic graphics significantly affect the size of map I could create? I mean, I would like a big open world to explore. The bigger the better, within reason. So the question is if two game developers simultaneously made the same massive open world game, but one used realistic graphics, would he run into problems making the massive world that the other one wouldn’t? (I know that either way the bigger the level is the more effort it’ll take of course)
Sorry about the wall of text, but its a nuanced and also open-ended question. I am interested in any thoughts anyone has on this, even if I somehow already have 50 replies when you read this!
Thank you in advance, if anyone is actually willing to read this!