OUTLINES: discussion

[Ryumaru]

Thanks Gil, nice example. I had in mind a comparison - emphasis on examples that would "clearly be worse without outlines".

I needed an appropriate environment so I used this nice mockup by Vierbit (thankyou, PM me if you want it removed)


All I did was remove the outline, which caused him to lose a lot of weight. Also, the environment lacks outlines, which might make the character seem incongruous (although outlines being limited to characters isn't unusual)

I'll reserve my judgment for an additional post, but clearly both look alright. What do others think?

commercial games?

Nah, not necessarily commercial games. I wouldn't hold up a design choice as ideal just because it was in a commercial game - or even a popular one.

Problem is the sprite was obviously done with the intent of having outlines. I don't think it works without outlines in this particular case. The sprite still keeps some sort of priority due to its noise level being higher in comparison to the background but I definitely wouldn't say it's passable. At least not in the sense of it looking " good".

[Elk]

Contrast can also be created with different colors, see the game Snake is working on

the gameplay mostly is in a blue sky, and the color of the characters is mostly orange/brown, which is a great contrast for that specific thing...
Don't always need an outline

[Jad]

I just feel the need to state that I in fact can love the shit out of outlines every now and then. Like my little girl in the secret santa robot image, she has outlines. I like pixel linearting, and the interesting shapes you gotta work with to make it all tick. But yeah.