this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2024
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Greentext

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Anon wants to stop the mad painter (sh.itjust.works)
submitted 2 months ago by Early_To_Risa@sh.itjust.works to c/greentext@sh.itjust.works
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[โ€“] Cethin@lemmy.zip 12 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah, there are a bunch of tricks to make levels readable, but yellow paint is by far the easiest.

One that you may have noticed in the past, but has become increasingly less common as "realism" has taken over graphics instead of art, is interactable doors having door handles but static ones not having them. It's a very quick way to tell the player there's nothing to do without ruining the look.

A option that is especially easy to see in FromSoft's games is leading the player with things like torches. They fit in the world, but can also work as guidance.

I really appreciate when developers actually consider the problem they're trying to solve and find something that works for them. Sadly with all the "design by committee" AAA games, they just pick the easiest, most boring, but well tested option, which is how you have every game with yellow paint. It does have a purpose and it almost always works, but there are so many more options to accomplish the same task that may work better.

[โ€“] SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world 6 points 2 months ago

yeah that's true. Better readability without destroying the realism is possible. How ever I think studios like FromSoft can get away with subtle direction pointers since their target market is seasoned gamers. While a Playstation Studio dev studio who basically makes interactive stories nowadays and markets to the masses, from new gamers to veterans, has to unfortunately use the most on the nose method to please the least experienced gamers.