Type of graphics in VN

[BadPointer]

I've been wondering lately how you approach the issue of the type of graphics in a game? By the type of graphics I mean "hand drawn" graphics and graphics as 3D models. VNs from Japan most often have hand-drawn assets. On the other hand, many indie games and AVN use rendered images from 3D scenes. Does this somehow affect your perception of the game? Do you prefer a specific approach? Or maybe you have already created a few games with different ways of creating graphics and can you tell us how they were received by users?

[fleet]

Bottom line up front: Make the game/AVN using the type of graphics you want to use.
From casual observation of posts here at lemmasoft, games/AVNs made with 3D art are generally not as well received as those made with hand drawn art.
Other sites I visit (mostly adult game sites) have not shown a preference of one over the other.
I've played games/VNs made with hand drawn art, 3D models and AI created art. If preview images look good AND the story description interests me, then I'll play the game/AVN. I do not remember the last time that I played a game/AVN that used photos of real people.

It's always interesting to read why folks prefer particular art styles.

[jeffster]

Do you prefer a specific approach?

Some people (like me) prefer realistic images.

That means No to AI. The grade of equipment and software available to regular civilians like you and me just can't produce consistent quality visual stories. One picture is great; the next one looks like the same person is not the same person.

Real life photos and videos can be used mostly as backgrounds. Otherwise creating a game is almost like making a feature movie. Lots of acting, costumes, props, constructing sets, lighting and cameras etc. And if you only use a few pics where it should be a few dozens, then it's not a kind of quality to speak of.

Hand-drawn images can make a good game. "Sir Brante" is a relatively recent example of how you can make a successful story with minimal visual materials. But most of those 2D, especially "anime style" games etc. don't seem to me very engaging or immersive.

My top is occupied by high quality 3D modeled and rendered VNs. (Though people are different. I heard there are even those who love anime. Go figure...)

Bottomline:

• 2D is OK if the story and style and gameplay are good.
• But AAA games nowadays mostly mean 3D. (Unless it's chess or Heroes of Might and Magic. Those kinds of games are best in 2D. But we are speaking of VNs, so...)

[MapletreePaper]

Some people (like me) prefer realistic images.

But most of those 2D, especially "anime style" games etc. don't seem to me very engaging or immersive.

This being true, you should definitely stick with your idea to use 3D models instead of 2D art. I don't think it's going to harm your game in this case. If anything, it might help it. If you don't like the way your game looks, it may impact your work ethic. There are times when, for one reason or another, you need to deviate from what's popular.

Otherwise creating a game is almost like making a feature movie. Lots of acting, costumes, props, constructing sets, lighting and cameras etc. And if you only use a few pics where it should be a few dozens, then it's not a kind of quality to speak of.

Do you want to give each line in your game its own rendered CG? If so, I would advise some caution here. There's a VN I'm following which is doing this exact thing and as a result the game's size is exploding with every update. The size of a single 1920x1080 PNG may seem insignificant, but it becomes a massive burden once you place thousands of them in your Ren'Py project. You can easily surpass Itch.io's 1 GB upload limit if you're not careful.

That being said, using a CG for each line can add a climatic flare to your VN, so I can totally understand why you'd want to include it. If you do want to go down this path, I'd strongly suggest using a proper 3D game engine like Unity, Unreal, or Flax. Since these have full 3D support, they can render each frame in real time, achieving the same effect with drastically less data.

[jeffster]

The size of a single 1920x1080 PNG may seem insignificant, but it becomes a massive burden once you place thousands of them in your Ren'Py project. You can easily surpass Itch.io's 1 GB upload limit if you're not careful.

Actually .png should be compressed to .webp. Those can give virtually the same image quality but the size is an order of magnitude less.

That being said, using a CG for each line can add a climatic flare to your VN, so I can totally understand why you'd want to include it.

Nope. Like in a movie several sentences can be said in one visual frame (and even comic books do that), it's possible to use one picture for several sentences.

If you do want to go down this path, I'd strongly suggest using a proper 3D game engine

Since these have full 3D support, they can render each frame in real time, achieving the same effect with drastically less data.

I think that's not the case, unless we are talking of animations that can be

• compressed by video codecs
• or achieved by switching static images.

Of course compressed video can be of much less size than using a separate picture per frame. But that has nothing to do with 2D or 3D engines. Ren'Py can show video easily. And it shows 2D imagery using less memory and processor power than "full 3D" engines showing a 3D scene.

It's obvious that to get the same visual result, a complex 3D scene should contain more data than the resulting flat picture. Of course reusing the same 3D models in different positions could eventually be less data than a sequence of 2D renders, but like I said, use .webp instead of png's. Then for comparable quality I doubt that a game with 3D models would need less data. I don't recall a single example of that.

And the main point is, you need actually powerful video cards to render 3D on the fly and with high quality, like ray tracing etc. Both my laptop and my desktop, and obviously my smartphone just don't have that grade of GPUs. Therefore nothing is better that pre-rendered images in Ren'Py.