I know *s* I’ve mentioned how much I’ve enjoyed gaming recently. Part of what I enjoy, aside from the challenge of levelling up a character, is just the gorgeous scenery. All of the areas in Warcraft are different, and intricately detailed. I’ve spent ages just sightseeing, looking at the scenery and exploring. Today I was running through a snowy mountain field and I saw a snow leopard chasing down a rabbit. Characters like the succubus will sigh in boredom, standing hipshot, inspect her nails, and then stretch her arm out in front of her with her fingers spread so she can see them from a different angle. I go in people’s houses, and look at beds and bookselves and dressers covered with perfume bottles and brushes. The night elves’ areas are gorgeous, very Tolkien, while the dwarves’ cities are very mechanical and industrial, lit by molten metal, with odd mechanical beasties. I’ve been in museums and read the placards on all of the exhibits. The level of detail, the sheer beauty of it, never ceases to amaze me.
Just wait until I get my horse. :)
People have races here, they have fairs where they entertain and tell stories and sell things that they’ve made in booths. They can go fishing.
Fishing. Sitting on a bank, fishing, in a virtual world. Amazing.
The MMPORPG I play (MapleStory) isn’t quite so artistic as Warcraft but for a cartoony world, it’s also very detailed. I enjoy sometimes just looking around at the environment while I’m playing, it’s a lot of fun. In the early days of gaming I thought that game artists were probably people who couldn’t get graphic design jobs anywhere useful but nowadways I think there are an awful of truly brilliant artists working in games.
I agree! Every time I look at the simplest, smallest thing in WOW, I am amazed by the sheer amount of 1) programming time, and 2) artistic work that goes into something that most people won’t even notice, aside from subliminally. For instance, cloth. Flags, etc., drift and furl naturally in the wind – how much time and work goes into just doing that?