Starting work on a game project one of the first things any developer should take care of is the visual art style in which your future game will be kept. Nowadays in the modern game dev industry, there are many different video game art styles, which can be conditionally divided into two main directions – 2D and 3D art. In today’s edition of our digital digest, we will introduce you to the most popular 3D art styles used to develop modern video games. What exactly is a 3D game art style In simple words, 3D game art covers almost everything you see in most modern video games. Character models, environmental elements, or special effects, basically all of the tangible 3D objects that fill and create the game worlds are 3D game art. Its importance can hardly be overemphasized for one simple reason: it’d be difficult to find a title created in the past decade without at least some degree of 3D art utilized. 3D game assets , aside from the code and idea of a game, are what video games are made of. Game art style in general consists of every single visual feature in the game which creates a visual language that is easily understood and consistent with the project world and atmosphere and greatly helps the players to immerse in it. High-quality video game 3D art immediately tells users what they’re getting into. Masterfully tailored game-style design sets the scene and itself is the basis that the game is built upon, not to mention the game’s visual storytelling can greatly affect gameplay and game mechanics. The choice of game art style design, among other things, affects the potential audience for your project. Focusing on younger players? Cartoon animation or hand-painted art is your choice. Want to reach the audience of first-person shooters, choose realistic game styles such as realism or fantasy realism. Speaking of video game art styles let’s get to know them a bit better. Top 5 3D Game Art Styles There are many types of 3D game art styles, which may be radically different from each other or may be distinguished only by their rendering techniques or methods of shading. Here we will consider only the main ones, which serve as a basis for many branches and 3D style variations, as well as provide the most popular examples of their use in modern game development. The most popular and common types of 3D game design art are Cartoon, Realism, Fantasy Realism, Low Poly, and Hand-Paintedstyles. Cartoon Cartoon animation style is one of the oldest and yet the most distinctive visual game design styles. Cartoon style was in great demand at a time when systems weren’t evolved enough to even contemplate realism or serious VFX and physics. Many game developers had to take on a cartoonish approach with as little detail as possible to make their products run on every platform possible. It would seem that the cartoon style was supposed to lose its popularity with the advent of powerful hardware and the proliferation of affordable technological gadgets, but it turned out to be the opposite. Nowadays, cartoon-style art has gotten a second wind and has firmly carved out a niche for itself among unconventional, different 3d art styles. Modern game developers can explore and create the most extraordinary and bizarre worlds without any thoughts regarding realistic modeling, physics, and lighting, and this lack of constraints has played a role for the many indie and AAA studios favoring cartoon animation for their projects. The Asian game dev deserves a special mention. The vast majority of JRPGs, adventures, and other games of different genres produced by Asian developers tend to more often use different variations of cartoon art, such as anime style. Noted representatives of cartoon-style games: Overwatch; Fortnite; Minecraft; Among Us. Realism Game realism is a relatively new 3D game style. Its appearance has become possible due to the continuous perfection of technical and hardware characteristics of devices, both those that were used for game development and those on which the games were played. Picture-perfect models, realistic lighting, and environmental effectsare the main features of this 3d art style, and every year advances in VFX technology make the visual appearance of the games designed in this art style even closer to real life. But realistic 3d modeling doesn’t come without challenges. If you are creating a game in the 3D realism art style be ready for long-term work on the game engine, objects physics, lightning, and dozens of various other factors every single one of which matters and one mistake can ruin everything. Noted representatives of realism-style games: Red Dead Redemption 2; GTA 5; Call of Duty series; The Last of Us. Fantasy Realism Fantasy realism is similar to the previous game art design style, especially in terms of engine physics, focusing on details, and eye-catching performance. But with one major difference. Game developers who are creating their titles in the fantasy realism style do not depend on the laws of the real world. Unseen creatures, undiscovered worlds, and the portrayal of alternate universes of steampunk, sci-fi, and altered history are what fantasy realism art style is all about. Noted representatives of fantasy realism-style games: Skyrim; The Witcher 3; Dark Souls; Bloodborne. Low Poly/Cell Shading When your goal is to make a spectacular game without overthinking the photorealistic environment or the laws of physics then low poly art style is your choice. In simple words, games developed in the low poly/cell shading art style- this is a sort of realism at minimum preferences. On the one hand, using cell shading art for your title allows some room for creative freedom and is not as demanding on hardware as the prior styles. On the other hand, it retains the spectacularity inherent to realistic game design, and with long efforts can even surpass it. Noted representatives of low poly/cell shading style games: Borderlands 1,2,3; Torchlight; A Scanner Darkly. Hand-Painted The name of this style speaks for itself. Each shot of hand-painted game art style can be a unique piece of art. The main features of hand-painted 3d game design are bright, colorful shades, a dynamic environment, and uniqueness of every scene. While seemingly primitive, especially when compared to games created in realism art style, hand-painted style games are much more time-consuming and labor-intensive. They don’t use pre-build assets and scripts. Each scene in the hand-painted game is unique and behind each frame, there are huge efforts of people drawing every stroke to perfection. Noted representatives of hand-painted style games: Ori and the blind forest; Darkest Dungeon; Hollow Knight. We’ve listed all the major 3D art styles of game development. They seem to be completely different in terms of quality of performance, hardware requirements, artist skills, and the target audience they are aimed at. But they all have one thing in common, namely that no matter what 3D art style you choose for your game, to implement your vision you will need approximately the same set of tools. Stages and Software Used For 3D Games Art Creation Regardless of the art style you choose for your title, you will have to work through the same stages of game art design development: Idea and first sketches and concepts The initial stages of game art development start from discovering the piece and trying out different interpretations of the brief or idea presented. The art is explored through rough sketches and exploration pieces that undergo multiple refinements and modifications. Modeling Once the art concept is finally approved, the 3D modelers come into play. It is precisely at this point it is decided what kind of software will be used for further work. There are three main tools used for 3d art modeling you can choose from Maya, Blender, and 3Ds Max. Each of them has its pros and cons but each of them is fully suitable for creating high-quality 3D art for your game. Texturing Here the final highly detailed 3D model with a large file size is created. It’s called “high poly”. Then the model will be turned into the “low poly” version with the high poly details backed as a texture. Saving on size without sacrificing detail. Shading The last part is where the modelers make parts of the model look like the materials they’re made out of. Various metals, wood, and skin, these objects have different texture properties and must react to the light accordingly. From here, the 3D model would be handed off to the animators to be rigged and animated. Animator will rig to the proper in-game controls so that it could be inserted into the game. And the final touches are made by 3D modelers and VFX artists who take care of the lighting and special visual effects whenever it’s essential. A short description, backed by a lot of hard work from a lot of specialists, this is the path that every 3D model goes through before it gets into your title. No matter what 3D art style you will choose for your game.
Starting work on a game project one of the first things any developer should take care of is the visual art style in which your future game will be kept. Nowadays in the modern game dev industry, there are many different video game art styles, which can be conditionally divided into two main directions – 2D and 3D art. In today’s edition of our digital digest, we will introduce you to the most popular 3D art styles used to develop modern video games. What exactly is a 3D game art style In simple words, 3D game art covers almost everything you see in most modern video games. Character models, environmental elements, or special effects, basically all of the tangible 3D objects that fill and create the game worlds are 3D game art. Its importance can hardly be overemphasized for one simple reason: it’d be difficult to find a title created in the past decade without at least some degree of 3D art utilized. 3D game assets , aside from the code and idea of a game, are what video games are made of. Game art style in general consists of every single visual feature in the game which creates a visual language that is easily understood and consistent with the project world and atmosphere and greatly helps the players to immerse in it. High-quality video game 3D art immediately tells users what they’re getting into. Masterfully tailored game-style design sets the scene and itself is the basis that the game is built upon, not to mention the game’s visual storytelling can greatly affect gameplay and game mechanics. The choice of game art style design, among other things, affects the potential audience for your project. Focusing on younger players? Cartoon animation or hand-painted art is your choice. Want to reach the audience of first-person shooters, choose realistic game styles such as realism or fantasy realism. Speaking of video game art styles let’s get to know them a bit better. Top 5 3D Game Art Styles There are many types of 3D game art styles, which may be radically different from each other or may be distinguished only by their rendering techniques or methods of shading. Here we will consider only the main ones, which serve as a basis for many branches and 3D style variations, as well as provide the most popular examples of their use in modern game development. The most popular and common types of 3D game design art are Cartoon, Realism, Fantasy Realism, Low Poly, and Hand-Paintedstyles. Cartoon Cartoon animation style is one of the oldest and yet the most distinctive visual game design styles. Cartoon style was in great demand at a time when systems weren’t evolved enough to even contemplate realism or serious VFX and physics. Many game developers had to take on a cartoonish approach with as little detail as possible to make their products run on every platform possible. It would seem that the cartoon style was supposed to lose its popularity with the advent of powerful hardware and the proliferation of affordable technological gadgets, but it turned out to be the opposite. Nowadays, cartoon-style art has gotten a second wind and has firmly carved out a niche for itself among unconventional, different 3d art styles. Modern game developers can explore and create the most extraordinary and bizarre worlds without any thoughts regarding realistic modeling, physics, and lighting, and this lack of constraints has played a role for the many indie and AAA studios favoring cartoon animation for their projects. The Asian game dev deserves a special mention. The vast majority of JRPGs, adventures, and other games of different genres produced by Asian developers tend to more often use different variations of cartoon art, such as anime style. Noted representatives of cartoon-style games: Overwatch; Fortnite; Minecraft; Among Us. Realism Game realism is a relatively new 3D game style. Its appearance has become possible due to the continuous perfection of technical and hardware characteristics of devices, both those that were used for game development and those on which the games were played. Picture-perfect models, realistic lighting, and environmental effectsare the main features of this 3d art style, and every year advances in VFX technology make the visual appearance of the games designed in this art style even closer to real life. But realistic 3d modeling doesn’t come without challenges. If you are creating a game in the 3D realism art style be ready for long-term work on the game engine, objects physics, lightning, and dozens of various other factors every single one of which matters and one mistake can ruin everything. Noted representatives of realism-style games: Red Dead Redemption 2; GTA 5; Call of Duty series; The Last of Us. Fantasy Realism Fantasy realism is similar to the previous game art design style, especially in terms of engine physics, focusing on details, and eye-catching performance. But with one major difference. Game developers who are creating their titles in the fantasy realism style do not depend on the laws of the real world. Unseen creatures, undiscovered worlds, and the portrayal of alternate universes of steampunk, sci-fi, and altered history are what fantasy realism art style is all about. Noted representatives of fantasy realism-style games: Skyrim; The Witcher 3; Dark Souls; Bloodborne. Low Poly/Cell Shading When your goal is to make a spectacular game without overthinking the photorealistic environment or the laws of physics then low poly art style is your choice. In simple words, games developed in the low poly/cell shading art style- this is a sort of realism at minimum preferences. On the one hand, using cell shading art for your title allows some room for creative freedom and is not as demanding on hardware as the prior styles. On the other hand, it retains the spectacularity inherent to realistic game design, and with long efforts can even surpass it. Noted representatives of low poly/cell shading style games: Borderlands 1,2,3; Torchlight; A Scanner Darkly. Hand-Painted The name of this style speaks for itself. Each shot of hand-painted game art style can be a unique piece of art. The main features of hand-painted 3d game design are bright, colorful shades, a dynamic environment, and uniqueness of every scene. While seemingly primitive, especially when compared to games created in realism art style, hand-painted style games are much more time-consuming and labor-intensive. They don’t use pre-build assets and scripts. Each scene in the hand-painted game is unique and behind each frame, there are huge efforts of people drawing every stroke to perfection. Noted representatives of hand-painted style games: Ori and the blind forest; Darkest Dungeon; Hollow Knight. We’ve listed all the major 3D art styles of game development. They seem to be completely different in terms of quality of performance, hardware requirements, artist skills, and the target audience they are aimed at. But they all have one thing in common, namely that no matter what 3D art style you choose for your game, to implement your vision you will need approximately the same set of tools. Stages and Software Used For 3D Games Art Creation Regardless of the art style you choose for your title, you will have to work through the same stages of game art design development: Idea and first sketches and concepts The initial stages of game art development start from discovering the piece and trying out different interpretations of the brief or idea presented. The art is explored through rough sketches and exploration pieces that undergo multiple refinements and modifications. Modeling Once the art concept is finally approved, the 3D modelers come into play. It is precisely at this point it is decided what kind of software will be used for further work. There are three main tools used for 3d art modeling you can choose from Maya, Blender, and 3Ds Max. Each of them has its pros and cons but each of them is fully suitable for creating high-quality 3D art for your game. Texturing Here the final highly detailed 3D model with a large file size is created. It’s called “high poly”. Then the model will be turned into the “low poly” version with the high poly details backed as a texture. Saving on size without sacrificing detail. Shading The last part is where the modelers make parts of the model look like the materials they’re made out of. Various metals, wood, and skin, these objects have different texture properties and must react to the light accordingly. From here, the 3D model would be handed off to the animators to be rigged and animated. Animator will rig to the proper in-game controls so that it could be inserted into the game. And the final touches are made by 3D modelers and VFX artists who take care of the lighting and special visual effects whenever it’s essential. A short description, backed by a lot of hard work from a lot of specialists, this is the path that every 3D model goes through before it gets into your title. No matter what 3D art style you will choose for your game.
Many professionals recommend taking some time to learn basic drawing skills before diving into 3D modeling. Drawing provides a fundamental understanding of shapes, perspective, and composition which can be beneficial when transitioning to 3D modeling.
Consider the game genre and target audience. Certain game art styles are more common or expected for different game genres. For example, a realistic style for FPS or a cell-shaded style for family-friendly games. Think about what visuals your target players will find appealing.
Most iconic video games of the last decade, such as The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, Fallout 4, Cyberpunk 2077, The Witcher 3, Dark Souls, etc use a fantasy realism art style or elements of fantasy realism style whenever its possible.
Low Poly 3D art style is best suited for games that require low-demanding graphics yet still have an unique design. But you still should consider that it doesn’t matter which 3D game art style you’ll choose as you’ll still have to master some basic drawing and modeling skills.
