Unit - 78 : Digital Graphics for Computer Games - Types of computer game graphics

Level 3 Games Design

Unit - 78 : Digital Graphics for Computer Games

Research

Computer Game Graphics

-Pixel art

Pixel art can consist of 2D Sprites, 3D isometric sprites (2D Sprites that look 3D) and other things like backgrounds and stuff made from pixels. Pixel art is a popular art style amongst the 2D games. A well known game that uses pixel art is Pokemon (The older games like red)

Pokemon : Red uses both 2D sprites and 3D isometric sprites, the game mainly consists of 3D isometric entities and such to make the game look better.

-Concept Art

Concept art is essentially planning and drawing sketches to build up a game and know exactly what you are going to me creating when using the software's to create, Textures, backgrounds graphics, sprites etc...

Essentially sketching up ideas for a game.

This is a destiny concept art designed by Bungie. Concept art is also used to be submitted to a game published by developers to see if they will support the game and publish it.

-Texture Art

Texture art is making materials in a game actually feel like they have a texture, texture is the way a material looks and feels

This is an example of texture art. This is from Batman Arkham city and shows a few textures and how they are shown blending in with the surroundings.

-Background Graphics

Background graphics are vector or raster images used in the background or sky box of a game. These can be sky materials or even hills, it can be whatever suits the game.

This is uncharted 3, here it shows the difference between background models and background graphics, graphics are more or less put far away or are made to look far away where as models are there to interact with.

-In-Game Interface

In game interface can refer to stuff such as H.U.D or Heads Up Display. The H.U.D contains stuff like your EXP level, the stage your on in a game, health, ammo etc... Essentially anything you see all the time on the screen that helps you through out the game.

This is a Halo 5 H.U.D, It shows your shields health, current grenades selected/on your person, a map, cross hair, health, ammo and decorative features.

-Print media art

Print media art is essentially promotion to get a game known for people to see and make them want to buy the game, this can include stuff such posters, the video game cover, manuals and other promotional methods alike.

This is the game cover for aliens vs predator, it uses a bright green and black colour scheme and has logos along the bottom of developers, publishers and license holders. On the bottom left there is an age rating 'Mature 17+'. This tells people the sort of game it is if it has an age rating like that and that is was meant for people of the age of 17 and over.

-Vector Graphics

Vector Graphics are images that, no matter how far you zoom in, the image will never pixelate like a photo. So what this means is that you can scale the image to however big or small you want and it won't lose quality! Vector images use formats such as PSD (PhotoShop Document). WMF (Windows Meta File). FLA (Flash Movie Authoring File). and AI (Adobe Illustrator File).

-Raster Graphics

Raster Graphics are images that depend on quality to look goor or bad. Raster images are built up of pixels and when there is A LOT of pixels in a picture such as 1080x1080, then it is considered high quality but low pixels like are low quality images such as 64x64. Raster images use formats such as, BMP (Bitmap File), JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group), GIF (Graphics interchange format) and TIFF (Tagged Image File Format).