Rebirth of the Pixel

Our screens are filled with millions of pixels. There are so many of them we don’t even notice them any longer. They subtly form the lines and curves that shape what we see. Their population per inch has more than doubled with the advent of HD technology. And all this on paper thin screens.

This wasn’t always the case, however: the screens of the ‘80s and ‘90s were large, bulky, thick, and only a few thousand pixels appeared on them. In fact, you could see them quite clearly: little squares of a single colour tone, stacked from top to bottom. The look of games was limited to the number of colours and pixels you could fit on a single screen. Super VGA was the HD of the day, boasting 16 million colours and tiny (still very noticeable) pixels .

Despite the extremely high resolution of today’s screens, not to mention 3D goggles that actually interact with your surroundings, it is curious how the pixels of old persevere in games. In fact, I’d say there has been a resurgence of this antiquated look. Some very successful games on GOG and Steam have low resolution pixels depicting environments and characters. Just to name a few popular releases: Thimbleweed Park, Terraria, Door Kickers, and just last year Unavowed broke new ground where the adventure genre is concerned.

Technobabylon, a dystopian view of tomorrows' pixels.

It is worth noting these games have some variation in resolution, but visually they all fall into the category of “pixel art”. That is, the artwork is pixelated over two dimensions - the resolution being low enough that we can see the little squares at work shaping the environment.

There certainly is a charm to pixelated artwork, and while simplistic in appearance, it’s a medium that requires considerable skill. In a restricted resolution with a limited palette, each pixel and each shade counts. Detail is paramount and the slightest misplaced square can throw off the illusion of a curve or what would otherwise be a perfect degrade on a shadow.

Outside of the gaming world, pixel art has found itself decorating walls and merchandise. Indeed some beautiful pieces are printed onto canvas, as a kind of modern day art. Artists like Matej Jan or Jubilee have dedicated themselves to expressing their art with pixels. The fact that those little squares have moved from the screen to other surfaces, such as canvases or ceramic mugs, goes to show just how versatile they are as a medium.

Now one could argue this is a global case of nostalgia: as the gamer population grows into its 30s and 40s, they relish in reliving the experiences of their youth, be it in new games, or more subtle reminders of simpler times. However I believe this is a secondary factor in why these games are so successful in the age of augmented reality. If we ignore the pixels, they all have something else in common: excellent gameplay.

We are creatures who love stories. It is no surprise then if a good story supersedes amazing looks. The looks, though outdated, work to its advantage here, allowing the player to further focus on the narrative and characters, seeing the artwork as a beautiful backdrop, but not distracting eye candy. If the games’ mechanics are catered for, the characters become believable and the player relates to them, the plot enticing, the puzzles fascinating, and the dialogues memorable.

This is especially true for adventure games where you spend most of your time following characters and their relationships to others in the story. But not all of them fall into that genre. Many are platformers, or top down sims where you manage a prison, or build a colony. I would argue that simpler art styles allows developers to focus on gameplay. Who doesn’t love a good puzzle to solve or telling your minions what to build? Even Tales of the Neon Sea has wonderful characters (and kittens!) weaved into a captivating storyline. Here the platform game is intertwined with a strong plot to keep you going from one location to the next.

You get a wide range of beautiful materials from which to build your pixelated home on a new planet in Starbound!

Remember some 20 to 30 years have passed since the early days of computer gaming. Both pixel artwork and gameplay have had a great deal of time to mature. The tools available today have become very powerful, speeding up the work process for both artists and coders. From a purely practical point of view, adopting two dimensional pixel art means lower costs and quicker development times. When you combine this with today’s design paradigms focused on simple and intuitive user interfaces, you have the foundations for great game design. In other words, it is a tried and tested method that depends only on your ability to pull the player into a world of your own creation.

One might be tempted to believe pixelated art in games is just a passing fad, but I’m convinced it is here to stay in some form or other. It has undeniable advantages to game development despite its quaint, perhaps primitive, style. I say despite, but it really doesn’t play to the game’s detriment. Its simplicity enhances it. One can only hope there is enough talent willing to revive this art form before it is irremediably lost to super HD 3D virtually augmented reality goggles.