Diablo 3 Art Director Quits!

  Brian Morrisroe, the lead Diablo 3 Art Director apparently quit last week, according to a statement released by Blizzard to game blog Kotaku. The announcement comes on the heels of criticism from Diablo fans about the style of the new game's art, but according to Blizzard Morrisroe's disembarkment is unrelated. Blizzard also stated that the game art would not be changed and that they "are pleased with the look and feel" of the game, and it won't change after Mr. Morrisroe's departure.   Still, the timing of the event leaves one to wonder if the Diablo community has offended. Blizzard is now seeking new talent at the Art Director position. It doesn't look like they'll have a tough time of it.   Source: Kotaku.com

 

Just because that man was criticized by the fans he decided to leave the project ? Was he fired ?

I don't see why the fans dislike the art, the graphic of Diablo 3. It's beautiful !

 

probably because of the rainbows..

samwise didnt quit just because some people didnt like his art style.

 

I see why people don't like the art: Their heads are so far up their asses they can't clear the **** out of their eyes I can respect legit art concerns, but these fans just like to ***** and moan.

 

@Seradin. Samwise might be a lot more stubborn and secure though.

At WWI, He said that every time he would hear the community complain about the wings on the Zerglings he would add another pair of them. (then he showed a picture of a Zergling with four wings XD)

 

lol yeah samwise is just that cool.

I also am for the artwork of Diablo 3.

 

I'm all for the art style, shame though.

Some of the fans that took screens and "lolphotoshooped" them can piss off...

 

I seriously doubt he was fired/quit just because a few fanboys ****ed about Diablo 3's art style. At least I hope so because if that is all it takes then Bliz is in trouble.

Personally I think it looks really good and don't see what those fanboys are whining about.

 

If you saw the pairs of screens then you'd know. The edited ones looked much more eerie, and the whole Diablo lore has a truckload of that. The current art style doesn't go with the lore, I reckon.

 

I don't agree with that in the slightest. The current style is eerie. Just look at the teaser we got from the Invitational. The dungeons were especially eerie, what with the ghouls scaling the walls, sacrificial blood golems being summoned, and glimpses of the Siegebreaker patrolling the shadows. What the 'fans' did, that was just emo. They practically just made it black and white, added a sketchy filter over the whole screen, and increased the darkness, but believe it or not, that doesn't suit all environments. Outside is supposed to be brighter, light is supposed to refract and goatmen aren't supposed to be as gloomy and dark as the freaking undead. Now obviously it shouldn't be all sunshine and rainbows, but it wasn't. It suited perfectly.

 

What has art style got to do with what happens on a level? The ghouls climbing up the walls and all the stuff you mentioned are nice and eerie, but they're merely mechanics - nothing to do with what the community didn't like about D3.

Outside environments should be different, yes, and that's why the colour range for that and the dungeon levels shouldn't be near the same. In a dungeon where you have one flare every 10 minutes, you shouldn't see such vivid colours, not to mention see that far. Note that the photoshopped screens not only changed the colours to what you'd see in that environment, but it also had reduced line of sight, both of which make perfect sense.

 

It's all related because it all effects the mood and atmosphere. Colour, mechanics, whatever. It's all related. Besides, I was mainly talking about the colours when the ghouls are scaling the walls. It's definitely not what would be considered as being vibrant. If that's vibrant, then you've got problems.

The colour range for outside and the dungeon are definitely not at all similar. I don't see how you could see them as being so similar. Being a dungeon doesn't prohibit brighter or 'such vivid' colours either. You'd definitely see those sorts of colours in a dungeon like that. And all that stuff about the reduced line of sight was just BS. That, along with Stamina, where the two things that sucked balls in Diablo2. Not only are there lit torches and braziers scattered everywhere, but you'd get used to the darkness so it definitely wouldn't be as overwhelming. Having such restricted vision does nothing but slow the game down and screw with other events, like bridges breaking, walls collapsing and, again, the Siegebreaker roaming the background.

The 'fans' also completely shat over all the spells and effects as well. Well, all except the Witch Doctor's fiery concoctions, thank god. But seriously, you can hardly even see the Witch Doctor's Nova ability, they blurred Charge out altogether, and seeing as it's only there for a few frames it needs to stand out, blended all the Witch Doc's magic, removed light refraction, added rain, and practically gloated about it despite there already being rain later on, and made the entire screen all sketchy and textured. Look back at Diablo2 spells and effects for a bit. Vibrant red and orange fire spells, fluorescent greens for poisons, bright blues for ice, solid white for lightning and bone spells, coloured Spirits, Skeletons, Golems, traps and auras, colour-fountaining Mercenaries, especially in Act III. Not to mention the red, blue, and yellow Carvers, etc, in each act.

 

My point wasn't about atmosphere itself but about colours. The ghouls have nothing to do with what colours are used.

Nice contradiction in one sentence. If there are light sources everywhere then how would anyone get used to the darkness? Have you ever been in a basement or any other place where you only have a limited light source? You can't see **** where you don't have light because your eyes can't adapt to the quick changes of brightness. So yes, the reduced line of sight makes perfect sense, be it in the shadows or next to a light source.

The minute I see you actually considering what others say and not calling it BS I'll return to a nicer tone.

 

Seeing as I already responded to that...

...It's on to the next point.

Firstly, I never said there were light sources everywhere, I said they were scattered everywhere. Secondly, it's dark. You'd have to be an idiot to say it's not, but the point is that there are still sources of light scattered around the entire room. It's not bathed in light, and it's not pitch black. The result? Your eyes adjust. No contradiction there.

Having a reduced line of sight is just plain stupid, both aesthetically and practically. You're able to appreciate everything so much more if you can actually see it clearly, and it makes playing the game whole lot more enjoyable. Not to mention, as I've already said, that it hinders other in-game effects which add to the atmosphere a heck of a lot more than having less colour would.

I stand by what I said. You don't have to agree, or even be lenient, to have already considered an issue.

 

I'll agree with ItzaHexGor's point about color. In D2 there were a lot of vibrant color to have the creatures and characters stand out. It worked well, why make them all grayed out to add more gloomyness. Diablo 1 & 2 were not like this. Blizzard's trying to keep really close to the minding of D1 & 2 for the next opus.

We just have more emos in the community now

 

You obviously haven't been in a place with limited light source, otherwise you'd know that the light - even if the sources are scattered everywhere - does not light everything evenly. In other words, when you walk and look around, your eyes have to adjust constantly, during which you can't see much.

I think you completely misunderstood the aim of the game. Diablo is about mysterious creatures and places, not about sightseeing. The aim is not to show off how beautiful the world is, the aim is to deny your vision of what's coming up. That suspense adds to the thrill of the game, and that's what the people in favour of the changes miss.

 

The light isn't constantly changing or moving around. It's consistent so your eyes will adapt. I'm in a room like that, only darker, and I can look around and move fine. The only hindrance is the negative you get when looking directly at a light source for a while, which wouldn't effect the gameplay at all. Your eyes don't have to constantly adjust because the fluctuations aren't great enough to do so.

Being able to appreciate everything because you're able to see it clearly is nothing like sightseeing. If Blizzard decided to change the graphics to the extent that the emo 'fans' did, then the mobs on the edges of the screen might as well be done in Atari-style graphics. Being able to see them and see how well they've been modelled and animated is anything but 'sight-seeing', not to mention that it's still following a similar path to Diablo2. They don't need to add pitch black borders to add suspense. You've already got a limited field of vision and now, mobs aren't even confined to entering from the edges of the map. Ambience and, again, in-game events like the Siegebreaker reinforce that strongly.

Again, on the practicality of not having such a hindered field of vision, if the 'fans' did get their way, what the hell would happen to spellcasters and ranged attackers? It's all been fine and dandy to have this for the Barbarian, who only has melee to short-ranged attacks, and the Witch Doctor, who's got pets and mid-ranged spells, but what of the other characters? Why should Barbarians have the perfect field of vision for their style of play but the long-range spellcasters be left to either be swarmed or cast blindly into the shadows?

 

Have you seen this article?
I think this picture shows what you are talking about with limited light sources. As stated by the designer, they mostly didn't do that because they couldn't.

About the second part of your post, imo you're wrong. As stated many times during SC2 developement and now with D3, Blizzard games are everything BUT denying your vision anything. Remember that while they may be focusing on the plot more now than before, Diablo is still hack&slash game at the core, not a thriller and Blizzard puts a lot of effort so you can easily see what is happening on the screen.

Not directing that at you kuvasz, but also most people somehow don't realize that Diablo 2 wasn't nearly as dark as they think. Them wanting D3 to be more like 2 and making everything so dark it's hard to see anything is just weird to me.

 

Dou you think D3 must have darker colors ? The teaser showed a field, a campaign. Why should the environment be darker. Of course inside the "castel" it should be.

 

Originally Posted by Jay Wilson
The key thing to remember here is that this has been Photoshopped. This isn’t created by the engine. Though it looks really cool, it’s almost impossible to do in a 3D engine because you can’t have lighting that smart and run on systems that are reasonable. If we could do that, we probably would in a few of the dungeons.

This being said, Titan Quest was able to do some pretty good lighting work without it interfering with gameplay. Titan Quest is in 3D btw, great game. I'm no graphic architect or anything, but if TQ was able to do it, and my computer can run it, why would computers in 2 years not able to run D3 with better graphic and dynamic lighting?

Again TQ' Engine might have a complete different way of working than Diablo3's engine. Just throwing this exemple in the melee.