The stupid art style of the remake of “Grand Theft Auto Trilogy” is actually good
Rockstar showed us the upcoming Grand Theft Auto: Trilogy-the final collection, which showcased a lot of work done to improve the visual effects of the game. For the remake, you are never sure whether you will get an upgraded version of the old game or a completely overhauled product, but so far, it seems that Rockstar and the developer Grove Street Games are treating these classic games with respect and what they deserve .
Rich Stanton, news editor: What surprised me was the simple technique of transitioning from the “old” scene to the new scene, it really emphasized that these environments look brighter and cleaner. Like many people, I think I haven’t played these games for more than ten years, so my memory of them is always “better” than the actual situation at the time. Seeing this is like Rockstar has entered my The brain, took out the nostalgic goggles, somehow turned it into a game. To be honest, I’m not that excited about the GTA trilogy, but suddenly, I can’t wait to return to the gorgeous, soft-soaked Sin City, put on Duran Duran, and burn the rubber.
News writer Nat Clayton: What a wonderful aesthetic! When “Grand Theft Auto 3” to “San Andreas” is released, you can’t really get rid of the grounded and gritty appearance of 4 and 5, so you can bypass it by improving their appearance and tone. This remake attempts to announce retrospectively that this is a well-thought-out style choice, and what you end up with is this unusually shiny low-fidelity look. The kind of thing you would see in a mag or some kind of deception game in the 90s appeared in the background of the CSI.
In other words, my experience with the early GTA was to play them in the cramped bedroom of my brother’s best partner, and endure his sordid jokes, because your parents won’t buy you level 18 games. Can the remake capture this energy? Does it even want it?
Evan Lahti, Global EIC: As someone who has read a lot of the 90s magazine Nat, I find it both nostalgic and interesting.It’s an aesthetic that pays more attention to the actual appearance of these games than how we think We remember them. The appearance retains the literal shape of the game and its characters, how ridiculous and clumsy these performances are, the jagged model of PlayStation 2.
It is unrealistic to expect these remakes to reverse the fidelity and style of modern GTA-this will require Rockstar to make three large games from scratch.
Phil Savage, Editor-in-Chief, UK: My first reaction was “Huh!”, followed by “Huh?” and finally solved “Huh?!”. In short, I don’t know where I landed, and probably won’t before I play it. The environment and lighting look great, and will seriously conflict with the original early low-poly character model.Rock stars have to do somethingAnd, as Evan rightly pointed out, achieving the look of a modern game will never happen.
Maybe part of my reaction is because I still like the look of those old GTAs. As a PC player, they are not ancient relics—unless I rescue an old dusty console from the attic, I won’t be able to access it. They are in my Steam account and can be played at any time. History is inevitable on PC: replaying Deus Ex, Doom II or Planescape is as easy as playing a new game like Far Cry 6. Unfettered by expectations of new and better-looking, my aesthetic of certain times.
The reason I don’t replay the old GTA is that the control scheme is clumsy and the controller support is not good. These final versions can modernize all of them and keep them as they are, and I will be very happy. They will never-this is not the way you remake-but this is why I am not sure about the new style.
Robin Valentine, printing editor: I think I like it? This is definitely a bold choice, and this alone is very attractive-I really hate digitally reproduced works, they often combine plain high-resolution textures with environments and animations to create Messy appearance. It’s a cool move to reimagine the old look into a new form that blends harmoniously together, and I think it also maintains a good separation between this GTA era and the more modern installments. If anything, I think they could have gone further-for example, the pointed anime hair points to a more exaggerated style that they haven’t fully promised.
Steven Messner, senior editor: Honestly, it reminds me of what you see in Dreams, the PS4 game engine of Media Molecule. There are some things about the character model—especially the protagonist of GTA 3—giving me this “sculpted out of clay” feeling that I can’t understand. But I also think I also like it very much, is it so different?
Chris Livingston, feature film producer: I am glad that they did not try to put a bunch of extremely realistic models or effects in it. This is always weird, just like the super cartoon characters in Pixar movies have very realistic hair. For example, why? Why make this aspect look real in other aspects? It looks very harsh and it seems that Rockstar has done a good job of preserving and updating the classics, and nothing seems out of place. But on the other hand, considering that this is not a large-scale upgrade or transformation, I think the original version is also very good. I think if I want to replay them, the original version is fine for me.