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Squeenix Square Enix need to create an FF faithful to Amano's art

Nihilism

Educated
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
60
I did not associate FF with anime until FF7. I didn't even know what anime was until then. Amano's art is genuine fantasy, and it's unique at the same time. And with the lack of originality being the biggest problem with fantasy art, I think they've had a treasure in him for decades and should really give him the respect he needs and drop that Namura, who seems keen on creating characters inspired by a blend of Aladdin and Charlize Theron, for a guy mind you.

A game with art design faithful to Amano's would look fantastic. Doncha think?

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betamin

Learned
Joined
Mar 28, 2009
Messages
626
I like the one with the pale, triangular faced girl with the painted lips.



But seriously, some of those were really bad ass, my favorite one was the one with the bearded guy with the blond girl with the cup. Makes me feel like i'm being sucked into another world.
 

Damned Registrations

Furry Weeaboo Nazi Nihilist
Joined
Feb 24, 2007
Messages
14,980
Alas, it'll probably never happen. Would need to be 2D to get the feeling right, and cut back on the glowy particle effects.

http://www.phoenixdown.it/everlasting_fantasy/ff6/artworks/atma_weapon.jpg

somehow became

http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/_...Ultima_Weapon.png/300px-FF8_Ultima_Weapon.png

in two fucking games. And shit has mostly just gotten derpier since. Unless he leaves square and works for some company willing to do actual fucking art instead of mass produced 3D shit, there'll never be a game that has even an ounce of his style in it, let alone one that stays with it the whole way. Since FF7 they haven't even managed to make a fucking cast that doesn't have at least one dorky mother fucker completely ruining the aethsetic of the rest. I don't even particularly like what they were going for in FF 7, 8, or 9, but even if I did, Cait Sith, Zell and Steiner don't even look like they belong in the fucking games they're from.
 

LESS T_T

Arcane
Joined
Oct 5, 2012
Messages
13,582
Codex 2014
CG Movies for PSX version of FF6 attempted it.





I've been waiting real-time rendering like this and think it's possible now, but...oh, well.
 

Whisky

The Solution
Joined
Feb 22, 2012
Messages
8,555
Location
Banjoville, British Columbia
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera
I think this topic is just an excuse to post Amano art.

I approve!

And yes, an FF game with Amano artstyle would be massive incline, but it would be hampered by all the other stupid things Square has been doing lately.

Oddly enough, the FF6 PSX version had an FMV intro that seemed to try and make his style in 3d.

EDIT: Is the dude with the black hat supposed to be from something? He appears in quite a few of these examples.

EDIT: He's from Vampire Hunter D.
 

Damned Registrations

Furry Weeaboo Nazi Nihilist
Joined
Feb 24, 2007
Messages
14,980
Dissidia has some decent 3D stuff too, but it still doesn't translate quite right and the bigger issue is that doing a whole game in 3D tends to involve a lot more hands, with a much blurrier design that lacks a cohesive theme.

Amano's characters always feel distant and unapproachable, and the landscapes and monsters tend towards the outright alien. Which is all well and good, but when you have a hundred guys working on shit, you know some fucker is going to think 'this game really needs some orcs. Yep, I'm gonna make this guy look more like an orc.' and then you're fucked. Or if not orcs, some other completely unfitting thing, like fucking motor cycle summons or whatever.

Games need a stranglehold on their design or it goes all over the place and you get Diablo 2 instead of Diablo. Especially for art, since it tends to involve the most people.

Another problem would be getting a writer to stick to the theme of the art. Square has been pretty schizo about that too since the PSX. They just throw in characters, places and events into the games without regard for the story as a whole. Compare how the arena in FF6 fit in with the world compared to the arena in FF7. Sidequest in FF6 after mid game? Hunt down the dragons that have escaped their prison when the world was torn apart. Sidequest in FF7? Hunt down and breed chocobos after the world is under threat of apocalypse. One of these things is not like the other.

Even if the story is cliche or campy or whatever, it still needs to stay in theme or things just start to feel tacked on. Game designers seem to have forgotten this for years now, or have simply been unable to maintain control. There are a few that get by with a proper design, but the vast majority do not.

An Amano style game that suddenly throws in a card battle minigame or flashy casino would just seem garish.
 

ghostdog

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Dec 31, 2007
Messages
11,079
I love his work. He has also done great illustrations for the Vampire Hunter D novels and a nice little novella by Neil Gaiman (The dream hunters).

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Nihilism

Educated
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
60
A FF, not an FF.

http://www.grammar-monster.com/lessons/an_or_a.htm

Dissidia has some decent 3D stuff too, but it still doesn't translate quite right and the bigger issue is that doing a whole game in 3D tends to involve a lot more hands, with a much blurrier design that lacks a cohesive theme.

Amano's characters always feel distant and unapproachable, and the landscapes and monsters tend towards the outright alien. Which is all well and good, but when you have a hundred guys working on shit, you know some fucker is going to think 'this game really needs some orcs. Yep, I'm gonna make this guy look more like an orc.' and then you're fucked. Or if not orcs, some other completely unfitting thing, like fucking motor cycle summons or whatever.

Games need a stranglehold on their design or it goes all over the place and you get Diablo 2 instead of Diablo. Especially for art, since it tends to involve the most people.

Another problem would be getting a writer to stick to the theme of the art. Square has been pretty schizo about that too since the PSX. They just throw in characters, places and events into the games without regard for the story as a whole. Compare how the arena in FF6 fit in with the world compared to the arena in FF7. Sidequest in FF6 after mid game? Hunt down the dragons that have escaped their prison when the world was torn apart. Sidequest in FF7? Hunt down and breed chocobos after the world is under threat of apocalypse. One of these things is not like the other.

Even if the story is cliche or campy or whatever, it still needs to stay in theme or things just start to feel tacked on. Game designers seem to have forgotten this for years now, or have simply been unable to maintain control. There are a few that get by with a proper design, but the vast majority do not.

An Amano style game that suddenly throws in a card battle minigame or flashy casino would just seem garish.

It's hard to understand what Square's philosophy has been over the years. I suppose the overseer of the project would have to mandate his underlings to be as faithful as possible to Amano's style.

Final Fantasy 6-8 really found unique universes for themselves. Unfortunately, they've pigeonholed their worlds and are recycling their most commercially accessible ideas and constructs. One of their biggest issues is Tetsuya Namura. While neither Amano nor Namura have tried much different in the creation of their characters, at least Amano's creations aren't imitating anything immediately recognizable, whereas Nomura's look like most other anime on the market. Also, the characters don't look "fantasy," they look trendy and like they're vying for a position as a VJ on a Japanese equivalent of MTV.

The best work Square ever did was on FF6. I believe, based on concept art that's out there, that much of FF6 was imitating Amano's work. Unfortunately, it was 2D and on SNES. Imagine what could be done with today's technology considering what's out there, like Okami, Dishonored, SC2, BioShock, SF4, El Shaddai.

amanofinalfantasyvi.jpg

Kefka's Tower, Vector, the Phantom Train, and of course the Magi-tek Armor are all reminiscent of this piece.

I would settle for a FF6 3D remake, faithful to Amano's style, along with increased difficulty. I can dream.
 

Fens

Ford of the Llies
Joined
Nov 3, 2009
Messages
1,899
Location
pitcairn
he does seem to be a fan of gustav klimt's style and art nouveau... nothing bad about that, really
 

Giauz Ragnacock

Scholar
Joined
Jul 16, 2011
Messages
502
I have voiced the opinion of Nihilism previously in other threads- THANK YOU FOR THIS THREAD!- and will say it again: I wish Square or Mistwalker would use cell-shading like Dragon Quest 8 used to bring Amano's artwork alive. Just imadine coming across that rainbow chimera beast in one of the postings above- it is as beautiful as it is terrifying.

Also, no coincidence that those artworks of Darth Vader and Golbez are the awesomest :smug:
 

Nihilism

Educated
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
60
This is El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, made by the team behind Okami. Probably the nicest breath of fresh air I've had from simply looking at a video game in a decade. Why can't a Final Fantasy look like this?

el-shaddai-screenshot-04.jpg
 
Joined
May 6, 2009
Messages
1,875,967
Location
Glass Fields, Ruins of Old Iran
Didn't Amano just say in an interview he wanted to make a game about cute girls doing cute things?

Yeah, and Berserk's author is addicted to Idolm@aster. It seems artists' brains are capable of dissociating their personal tastes from their own stuff. :lol:

FF's "anime influence" is more due to gameplay and presentation than the art sytle itself (noticeable in the Dissidia games, which look like reskinned Dragon Ball titles), I don't think simply slapping Amano's style on the usual Squeenix game would make a big difference. Nomura definitely needs to go work in the fashion industry like he really wants to, though. (Amano also has an eerily persistent clothing fetish - earrings and scarves - but it's less noticeable)
 

Whisky

The Solution
Joined
Feb 22, 2012
Messages
8,555
Location
Banjoville, British Columbia
Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera
Wow, is El Shaddai as good as it looks?

Honestly, I don't hate Nomura as much as some people, just I really don't like his FF work. I'm perfectly fine with his work on The World Ends With You because it fit the setting and his particular brand of insanity (BELTS AND ZIPPERS) fit the game. Amano on the other hand, is just screaming to have a fantasy game based around his drawings and in the scope of Square, he's been pushed aside and that is a travesty.

FF as a whole didn't start to go downhill until FFX (FF8 was...questionable, but I still liked 9) which eliminated old concepts like a world map and exploration (Anyone miss controlling airships? I do) and made way to unacceptable linearity. However, the art itself took a big plunge around FF7, though Square was able to salvage the lesser art-style through usage of pre-rendered environments, which resulted in many cool looking areas. Once Square went in-game graphics with FFX, it was the death-cry of the series.
 

Major_Blackhart

Codexia Lord Sodom
Patron
Joined
Dec 5, 2002
Messages
18,300
Location
Jersey for now
It's amazing to me that Final Fantasy 6 is 18 fucking years old.
It's amazing to me that I played that game for years, sometimes straight, sometimes on and off.
Fucking loved that game.
Amano's art for that game was absolutely so great because it was so different from everything.
The detail, the shapes, and especially the colors were all magnificent.
But not only that, the character appearance, the facial features, the body styles, all of it was amazing because it was so different from everything else out there.
The art style was totally alien to me, and it while I didn't appreciate it right away, it made a definite lasting impression on me.
I have such nostalgia about that game right now that I'm listening to the soundtrack as I type this.
Such a good game man, great style, art direction, all of it.
The enemies were designed well in appearance also, I might add.
The soundtrack was top notch as well.
But really, it was the first final fantasy I played (outside of the original for nintendo) and it made a real lasting impression on me.
Fucking loved that game man, it was so fucking good.
But yeah, FF has gone downhill for a while now.
I actually stopped at 8, wasn't really interested in them after that. Was in college, didn't have time, and really I guess you could say I grew out of them.
Still, out of the final fantasies I played (and I played all the originals up to 8 thanks to some wonderful PC programs), 6 is still by far the best, most well rounded, and in depth of them all.
It was a truer to the concept of RPG than any of the others, with regards to completely interchangeable characters (something they abandoned to my dismay later on), character development, non-linearity (to a point, second half of the story).
The characters were all well thought out, and well rounded, and each brought an interesting set of skills to the group.
All of it was damn good man, damn good.
FUCK I miss my youth, 6th and 7th and 8th grade playing this game. FUCK ME I hate that my innocence is god.
When I die, I hope God makes me a child again so I can forget, just so I can rediscover it all again.
I have such good memories of this game, as does my brother.
Amazing, how I got the game. Saw it in a Nintendo Power and off hand told my mother I wanted it for Christmas.
I completely forgot about it two months later and got it in this box art:
160px-Ff3usbox.gif


And had no idea what to expect.
Fuck I loved it.
God I feel so nostalgic I want to cry.
 

deuxhero

Arcane
Joined
Jul 30, 2007
Messages
11,324
Location
Flowery Land
Didn't Amano just say in an interview he wanted to make a game about cute girls doing cute things?

Yeah, and Berserk's author is addicted to Idolm@aster. It seems artists' brains are capable of dissociating their personal tastes from their own stuff. :lol:

FF's "anime influence" is more due to gameplay and presentation than the art sytle itself (noticeable in the Dissidia games, which look like reskinned Dragon Ball titles), I don't think simply slapping Amano's style on the usual Squeenix game would make a big difference. Nomura definitely needs to go work in the fashion industry like he really wants to, though. (Amano also has an eerily persistent clothing fetish - earrings and scarves - but it's less noticeable)

The modern Atelier games are a lot better than modern FF, so he may be onto something actually.

Funny thing is, Nomura DID do an RPG set in the fashion-slave populated Shibuya (The World Ends With You, which is worth playing) and his designs were a great deal more mundane looking there.
 

J1M

Arcane
Joined
May 14, 2008
Messages
14,616
The important rule is that a/an is determined by how the statement is intended to sound.

Nobody reads FF in this context as "eff eff". It is read as "final fantasy" and clearly shortened due to title length.

To be fair, this rule isn't covered by your website, but would fall under a similar situation as the use of a roman numeral.

"A III-time victory." not "An 'eye-eye-eye'-time victory."
 

Damned Registrations

Furry Weeaboo Nazi Nihilist
Joined
Feb 24, 2007
Messages
14,980
Eh, you could read it either way. The series is popular enough that people abreviate it as 'eff-eff' while speaking about it, especially since in conjunction with the sequel number you're looking at 6-8 syllables for something you might be mentioning a lot in a discussion.

DNA stands for shit too but I sure as fuck don't read it as what it actually stands for.
 

Nihilism

Educated
Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
60
The important rule is that a/an is determined by how the statement is intended to sound.

Nobody reads FF in this context as "eff eff". It is read as "final fantasy" and clearly shortened due to title length.

To be fair, this rule isn't covered by your website, but would fall under a similar situation as the use of a roman numeral.

"A III-time victory." not "An 'eye-eye-eye'-time victory."

The determining factor in whether one is to use "a" or "an" is whether the succeeding word begins with a vowel sound or not. "FF" is an acronym; Roman Numerals are not. I read "FF" as "eff eff," and preceded it with "an" thusly. Moreover, I could argue the "an" was a strong indicator that I intended my audience to pronounce "FF" as such, as well.
 

Machocruz

Arcane
Joined
Jul 7, 2011
Messages
4,315
Location
Hyperborea
I don't know about the printed word, but anyone who goes around saying "Hey, did you play the new ef-ef?" needs to be lashed. That's as bad as the dicks who say "ef-pee-es."
 

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