Quote from: Aos;458515That's just your feelings of nostalgia getting in the way of your proper judgment.

DiTerlizzi is a well-known, good artist. Not like much of the crap in 1e, but you know that.
And my comment that you quoted was that Benoist was really digging for the good pics. Out of the hundreds of images in the 1e PHB, DMG, and MM, there are probably 25 good pictures. The rest look like High School doodles.

Quote from: J Arcane;458730I think I've found a new worst game art nominee: Eoris.

People were glowing about this game in the other thread, which just proves to me, along with the defense of some of the worst of D&D art, how utterly terrible the local taste here is.

Wow, that is godawful

Quote from: danbuter;458732DiTerlizzi is a well-known, good artist. Not like much of the crap in 1e, but you know that.
And my comment that you quoted was that Benoist was really digging for the good pics. Out of the hundreds of images in the 1e PHB, DMG, and MM, there are probably 25 good pictures. The rest look like High School doodles.

Looks like I hit a little too close to the mark :rotfl:

Eoris is the high point of style over substance. And it's not even a very good style. As J Arcane correctly points out, it's basically imitation JRPG art that's so stylised and artificial that it's impossible to tell what the world is like.

The game is that angels are trying to kill God because she wants to commit suicide but can't do it herself. God lives on a giant planet that floats around through the universe with people living on the inside IIRC. You're a human or talking magical animal or some other kind of angel trying to stop them. It uses d20s for a dicepool system.

Quote from: APN;458714Thanks for the 'welcome to purgatory' - guess I'll check my hat, coat and soul in at the door before venturing in here too often

As for the Liefield art, I wasn't sure what the fuss was about the guy until I looked it up.



I've never seen a human being with a forearm wider than her waist, a backside you could land a plane on norks you can open the door with from several metres away, I must admit.

That said, the art in question is better than that of Blood of heroes simply because its got more background in than most of that games art.

I gather Liefield can't draw feet either. Didn't some of his work get used for a game? Fuzion or Champions millennium or something? I'll have to look it up.

Then avoid it like the plague.

Every comic book artist from the 30s to the present draws human beings with absurd anatomical proportions. What makes this guy so bad?

Quote from: Fifth Element;458611PC races in AD&D are, as far as I know, supposed to have relatively symmetrical heads.

Says who?

Quote from: Exploderwizard;458609The value of art is subjective. Why label stuff you don't like as incompetent?

Because he touches himself at night.

QuoteI'm not a big fan of Picasso but I don't have to say that he couldn't paint just because I don't happen to be a fan.

Picasso didn't draw demi-humans' heads symmetrically.

Quote from: jibbajibba;458597The fact that he might have been rushed offers some leeway I guess but its a professional project he doesn't have to be rushed I can't believe that by 83 TSR didn't have the cash to get in some decent artwork for MM2 for example.

What the fuck do you want in a gaming manual? Rembrandts? The sketches by Sutherland, Holloway, Parkinson, Wham and the others are meant to give the reader an idea of what a creature looks like. On that score, the art is more than "competent".

QuoteIt's probably not a coincidence that once DCS left TSR he found it hard to get work.

Vermeer wasn't really a "competent" artist, seeing as how he died in abject poverty, as did Van Gogh.

And who says these books were "professional"? Was Gygax a professional writer? These books were made by hobbyists for hobbyists. Hobbies being things people work on for the fun of it rather than as a job.

QuoteIf you are doing a job professionally then be a professional about it. If I expect to get paid for a piece of work then I really ought to be competent. I am not going to pay a mechanic to fix my car if he is goign to leave it til the day I turn up to collect it and do a half-arsed job of it.

There's an objective standard as to whether your car was fixed. There is no objective standard when it comes to drawing make believe monsters.

You are one dumb twat.

Quote from: Elfdart;458760Every comic book artist from the 30s to the present draws human beings with absurd anatomical proportions. What makes this guy so bad?

Aww come on, man.  We can't even all agree that Liefeld sucks?

Quote from: jgants;458769Aww come on, man.  We can't even all agree that Liefeld sucks?

I dunno, I never heard of him before someone brought him up on another board a year or so ago. I stopped giving a shit about comics in general in 1981, so the idea of "good" and "bad" comic art strikes me as being every bit as silly as good rap "music" vs. bad rap "music". If you're old enough to remember Carmine Infantino drawing Princess Leia with a square head (when he had photos to work with!) then this Liefield person doesn't seem like any big deal.

Quote from: jgants;458769Aww come on, man.  We can't even all agree that Liefeld sucks?

I agree that he sucks, but he isn't really a stand out in the department of suck. Look at the Larry Leiber's issues of Journey in to Mystery or even some of the secondary artists in Marvel's Cosmic line or the guy drawing ultimate Spiderman right now. It seems to me what makes people mad is that he made a ton of money whilst sucking. He was in the right place at the right time. There are dozens of equally mock worthy cartoonists.
And, yeah anatomical exaggeration is one of the key tools of cartooning.

Quote from: jgants;458769Aww come on, man.  We can't even all agree that Liefeld sucks?

Count me in, bro

Quote from: APN;458626The layout is eye wateringly dull as well. A missed opportunity, and ripe for a reboot, but whoever owns the system now has long forgotten about it...

IIRC with Blood of Heroes there was some sort of legal limbo involved where DC insisted that their deal with the original designer gave them ownership of the MEGS game system itself, so that he couldn't legally license it out to Pulsar. Definitely a pity.

I like the crappy, goofy art in rpgs. I recognize it as stupid, and probably would not try to organize a gallery showing or a coffee table book of it. But when I can look at my Trapper or PeeChee folder (PeeChees were the best) and the art there looks like the art in a rpg, then it's even more tacit approval for the diy approach I've always loved about the games.

That said, I love the beautiful, evocative art you see in some games. Art it would be hard to find a home for, otherwise.

Cyberpunk 3 made an interesting art choice that I got a kick out of, but is pretty generally reviled by fans of the old game. It's mostly portarait photography of custom GIJoes.

Quote from: stu2000;458800I like the crappy, goofy art in rpgs. I recognize it as stupid, and probably would not try to organize a gallery showing or a coffee table book of it. But when I can look at my Trapper or PeeChee folder (PeeChees were the best) and the art there looks like the art in a rpg, then it's even more tacit approval for the diy approach I've always loved about the games.

This definitely speaks to my feelings about it...

Quote from: Exploderwizard;458609The value of art is subjective. Why label stuff you don't like as incompetent?

There's lots of stuff that I don't like which I can still recognize as being competent or even of high quality.

And then there is simple incompetence.

Mistaking the two seems to be a common problem in the post-modern world because "Picasso's anatomy isn't perfect" or whatever. But Picasso had the skill to execute on the canvas exactly what he wanted to paint. This is not the same as someone who is merely incompetent.

And it's generally not that hard to tell the two apart. Those pretending otherwise in this thread are either (a) blind, (b) incompetent, or (c) disingenuous.

Quote from: J Arcane;458730I think I've found a new worst game art nominee: Eoris.

People were glowing about this game in the other thread, which just proves to me, along with the defense of some of the worst of D&D art, how utterly terrible the local taste here is.

This stuff is shit. It is exactly the kind of awful, tacky, overly glowy, cliched, mostly half-photoshopped Poser model shit I see for sale in mall painting shops. (...) Now all it needs is two more of those and a moon, and you could put it on a T-shirt.

Oh. My. God. It looks like a manual to a set of fucking New Age divinatory cards... Truly terrible. The whole game sounds pretty pointless and pretentious to me and the *cough* artwork *cough* only enhances that impression.