The document provides a history of pixel art games from their origins in the 1970s through to the modern day. It discusses the early years of pixel art from 1972-1983 when technological limitations meant games could only render a few hundred pixels. It then outlines different eras of pixel art as graphics capabilities advanced, including the 8-bit era from 1983-1987, the 16-bit era from 1987-1993, and the decline of pixel art from 1993-2006 as 3D graphics became more popular. However, it notes that pixel art saw a resurgence in popularity from 2006 onward with the success of games like Stardew Valley and Minecraft that utilized the art style.
3. Pixel Art – The early years 1972 - 1983
Pixel art has been around for as long as videogames have been, in fact it was created
because of videogames. It was created in the 1960’s as graphics cards couldn’t render
above a few hundred pixels. The term pixel art was first published by Adele Goldberg and
Robert Flegal of Xerox Palo Alto Research Centre in 1982. Since its creation in the 1960’s,
we have had immense technological advancements, it's amazing to think that the first
game ever created pong used only a few hundred pixels to run now we have next gen
graphics cards and consoles that can run open world and graphically beautiful games.
When pixel was first introduced the games were basics and non-complicated, developers
didn’t have the knowledge of what to do and programming was a brand-new thing, the
only option they had was to learn as they work. Games like Pong, Space Race, Gran Trak 10
and Tank to name a few where the first of their kind, they only existed in arcade form and
until 1972 when The Odyssey the first game console was released with 12 games following
it, Table Tennis, Ski, Simon Says, Analogic, Hockey, Football, Cat and Mouse, Haunted
House, Submarine, Roulette, and States. As time went on arcade games became more
prevalent, with games like Pac-Man, Space-Invaders, Galaga, Street Fighter and Donkey
Kong.
4. Pixel Art – The 8 Bit Era 1983-1987
This era computers were getting more advanced, and developers were starting to
get the hang of programming, this allowed for pixel art to develop and become
more detailed, backgrounds were no longer black, they could have detail and be
relevant to the game. From this characters developed like, Donkey Kong and
Pacman. The art of these characters has been able to evolve over time and with
each game they got more a more detailed as technology advanced. This
development led developers being able to create stories with their characters,
games like Metal Gear, Zelda, The Super Mario Brothers, Mega Man, Final Fantasy
and Castlevania. These are some of the most influential games to this day, games
like the Mario Bros are a worldwide phenomenon and whether you’ve played the
games or not you probably know who they are.
5. Pixel Art – The 16 Bit Era 1987 - 1993
At this point technology has advanced to the point where people don’t need to go
into arcades to play games, consoles have become the new way to game as they
can show exactly what an arcade machine can. Developers were now able to be
more creative, they weren’t confined to an arcades capabilities and could create
worlds and stories on their own terms. At this time 3D rendering was in its early
days and developers used this at times blended with pixel art in their environments
to give them more character and individuality. Games like Super Metroid, Mortal
Kombat 2, Sonic & Knuckles, Super Mario RPG and World, Final Fantasy VI, Legend
of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Chrono Trigger. Games known for their art at this
time were, Sonic the Hedgehog, Ecco the Dolphin and Yoshi’s Island. They used
pixel art to their advantage making really detailed backgrounds that matched the
game well and sprites/characters that stood out and had good animations.
6. Pixel Art - The Slow Downfall of Pixel Art -
1993-2006
As the market and need for videogame grew the want for better looking games
grew alongside it, the want for 3D games was a massive wave and developers
wanted to get more advanced games out there leaving pixel art in the dust. A new
style had emerged, and people wanted a more realistic experience, the demand
subsequently grew. After games got more advanced there not a lot of pixel art
games out there as there was no market for it. Although there were a few
companies who decided to keep making them the old way only to be lost in the sea
of videogame companies doing what the majority wanted. Games that came out
between this divide were: Doom, Heretic, Tekken, Warcraft II, The Need For Speed,
Quake, Final Fantasy VII, Half Life, Unreal, The Sims, Counter Strike, Grand Theft
Auto 1,2 & 3, Max Payne, Halo, Mafia, Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, Far Cry, Elder
Scrolls IV – Oblivion, Prey, The Witcher and Fallout 3. However, in the next section
this all changes.
7. Pixel Art – Modern Day – 2006 – Present Day
The modern game scene is a lot different to what it was 50 years ago, graphics have evolved
to a point where you can barely tell the difference from real life, it's unbelievable how far
they come considering that it was only 1970's when the first game came out. In today's
games world pixel art has made a massive comeback, with games like Stardew Valley,
Minecraft, Dead Cells, Thomas Was Alone and Terraria. The success of these games is getting
people back into the art-style, myself included, and showing how good a game using past
technology can be. Going off of this I think it will make more of comeback aside from these
games, vintage/retro is coming back in style and in general the art style is really nice and with
today's technology and the right story I think games using this style could be as good as some
AAA games. In the article I found that helped me write this section there is a passage at the
end that I think sums this up quite well, "The development of pixel art has always been a
captivating prospect. Though starting as a workaround for technical limitations, it was utilized
and refined to the point that it was ubiquitous in gaming culture. The highs and lows it faced
eventually resulted in developers using pixel art as an artistic choice instead of a shortcut for
primitive tech."
8. Topic Research
The History of Platform Games
In this next branch of research I've taken information from a
article from the RedBull website that talks in detail about the
history of platform games.
https://www.redbull.com/in-en/evolution-of-platformers
9. The First Platformers
In the this first 3 paragraphs the article talks about the first platformer game and how from
that popular games we know today arose, for example The Mario Bros series.
"Space Panic, a 1980s arcade game developed by Universal popularised the platformer
genre. There was no jumping, but players could fall and climb ladders. Platformers at this
point were limited to a single screen – the level wouldn't scroll horizontally or vertically if
you hit the edges.
However, it was a monkey who really set off this revolution. In 1981, Nintendo unveiled
Donkey Kong, which is considered as the first true platformer of all time. Players controlled
Jumpman as he hopped over barrels on a single screen and scaled ladders to rescue his
true love from Donkey Kong.
The game's success resulted in a new franchise with Donkey Kong Jr., Donkey Kong 3 and
eventually Mario Bros, which featured co-op platforming. The single screen formula saw a
few innovations like Activision's Pitfall in 1982 on the Atari 2600. It was renowned for
collecting several single screens together to create wide-ranging levels. Sadly, the
platforming genre was still fairly limited due to the power of consoles at the time."
10. Second Generation
In next 3 paragraphs the article details the next era of platforming games and how they took steps
to what we have today, from Mega- Man to Pac-Land.
"However, Jump Bug in 1981 sought to change that. You controlled a bouncing car that navigated
platforms but this time, the platforms actually scrolled. When the ColecoVision released in 1983, it
featured Quest for Tires, a fairly simple platformer that featured scrolling levels. Other titles like
Pac-Land (1984) made a mark with parallax scrolling, a feature which allowed the background to
move slower than foregrounds, thus creating depth. This would become standard fare in franchises
like Nintendo’s Mario.
In 1985, Super Mario Bros finally came to life on the NES. It brought us side-scrolling levels,
memorable foes, boss battles, secret paths, power-ups and so on. The limited power of the NES only
allowed for horizontal scrolling (as evidenced by going out of bounds causing Mario to disappear
from the screen) but for that time, it was more than enough.
Other titles like Mega Man and Metroid also rose to prominence; the former mixing shooting with
platforming and the latter emphasizing exploration and adventure. Capcom's Bionic Commando
introduced us to the grappling hook and multi-directional scrolling, both of which became staples in
their own right.
11. The Side Scrolling Generation
This next slide will be talking about the 3rd era of platform games which introduced the slide
scrolling mechanics featured in Sonic the Hedgehog and Super Mario World to name a few.
"Sega's Genesis console was out in 1989, two years ahead of Nintendo's Super NES, and had titles
like Capcom's Strider to showcase its power. However, it was Nintendo's Super Mario World which
caught the industry's attention. This new 16-bit era of platforming allowed for all kinds of
innovations, not the least of which included enhanced parallax scrolling, large spanning levels and
more detailed pixel sprites. While Nintendo was basking in the Mario acclaim, Sega realized it
needed something more. It needed a mascot.
Thus, Sonic the Hedgehog was born. Sonic introduced a much faster style of platforming, an attitude
that was “cooler” than Mario and a look that distinguished him from the pack. Naturally, he had his
own set of rip-offs like Bubsy, Aero the Acro-Bat and whatnot but the series continued towards
greater success with Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and 3.
Meanwhile, in the PC space, a little-known start-up called id Software had released Commander
Keen. It was touted as the first PC platformer to have scrolling graphics and inspired other PC titles
like Apogee's Duke Nukem and Epic's Jazz Jackrabbit."
12. The Introduction of 16 Bit
On this slide the article goes into more detail about the popularity of 16 Bit era and how
games companies were trying to keep with the trends.
"This generation is interesting because it featured some of the best platformers of all time.
Capcom's platforming shooter Mega Man had discovered new horizons with the more
mature Mega Man X series on the Super NES. Nintendo further expanded its console's
range of platformers by purchasing Rare Studios. Rare took a big risk at the time by
producing expensive pre-rendered graphics for Donkey Kong Country. Sega was still riding
high on the Hedgehog wave with Sonic and Knuckles. Castlevania took cues from the
Metroid franchise in Symphony of the Night and became an instant hit. Let's not forget
Super Metroid, Rayman, Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island and other classics.
However, 3D was quickly becoming the buzzword for many players. Many titles tried a 2.5D
approach, which used 3D graphics but presented the action on a 2D plane. Sega's
Clockwork Knight, Pandemonium and Klonoa are some of the better-known titles.
Regardless, it was time to innovate and platformers were behind the curve."
13. The Beginnings of 3D Graphics
In this era the first 3D platform games come to light and rise to popularity, along
with a new view style, a 3D perspective with 2D graphics.
"The earliest known efforts at 3D platformers include the aforementioned 2.5D
titles. However, some developers tried another approach – platformers with a 3D
perspective but 2D graphics. These were delivered in an isometric perspective and
included titles like Konami's Antarctic Adventure and Sega's Congo Bongo, both
released in 1983.
Christopher de Dinechin's Alpha Waves for the PC is considered the earliest 3D
platformer, incorporating a camera, full 3D movement and graphics. Sega further
followed up its efforts with Bug on the 32-bit Sega Saturn console but it lacked true
freedom across all axes. Naughty Dog's Crash Bandicoot was perhaps the real
surprise at this time. Despite staying on linear paths for most of its levels, the Crash
Bandicoot series mixed vehicles, split-second platforming and an irreverent art-
style to become successful."
14. 3D Graphics in Platformers
These next 2 paragraph talk about how the genre experienced a massive shift in
graphics when 3D was introduced.
"The real paradigm shift came in 1996 with Super Mario 64. In 1991, Mario creator
Shigeru Miyamoto was working out the specifics for a 3D platformer. The
technology was subsequently implemented in Nintendo's (and the world's) first 64-
bit console, the Nintendo 64. Super Mario 64 launched for the same and set the
standard for all 3D platformers. Levels were open-ended, encouraging exploration
and choosing one's own path. The camera was relatively easy to use, and controls
were buttery smooth.
Things only got better for Nintendo when Banjo-Kazooie and Donkey Kong 64
entered the fray, the former earns acclaim for its detailed level design and puzzles.
Not to be outdone, Sony elevated the Tomb Raider franchise to become one of the
best-selling franchises on the PlayStation One. To her credit, Lara Croft introduced a
different kind of 3D platforming system, one intermixed with gun play and deep
puzzle solving. Of course, her overall look didn't hurt either."
15. The Fight for the Top
In these next few paragraphs, the article talks about how companies fought to be a top of this genre, each of
them coming out games to rival the one before it.
"Even though Sony was off to a rough start with the PlayStation 2 in 2000, it became famous for introducing a
new breed of 3D platformers. Sucker Punch brought us stealth mechanics with Sly Cooper; Naughty Dog
diversified into open world gameplay with Jak and Daxter while Insomniac introduced combat-oriented
platforming in Ratchet and Clank. If nothing else, this era marked the diversification of platformers into
numerous other genres.
Sega was somewhat lost in the shuffle. Sonic 3D Blast was an attempt at an isometric 3D platformer that de-
emphasized the hedgehog's speed. Nights Into Dreams was a clever little Sega Saturn game but its lack of
depth and on-rails gameplay didn't help.
In 1999, however, Sega unleashed the Dreamcast, the first 128-bit home console. Sonic Adventure was a
launch title and featured a successful transition of the Genesis era's breakneck speed into 3D. Future titles like
Jet Set Radio, Rayman 2 and Sonic Adventure 2 established Sega as a force to reckon with. Unfortunately, due
to huge losses faced by the failure of the Saturn and mounting competition from Sony, Sega bowed out of the
console business for good.
As for Nintendo, it was busy with its new GameCube console and only Super Mario Sunshine released for the
same in 2002. The Metroid series, dormant since the SNES days, returned with Metroid Prime introducing a
first-person shooter perspective for the first time."
16. The AAA Era
This next section talks about a new era of platform games that essentially modernised the genre, this includes
games like Little Big Planet and the first Uncharted games.
"For better or worse, platformers in this era weren't exactly ground-breaking. Nintendo introduced the Wii
with its motion controls but the Super Mario Galaxy series was fun because of its levels and gameplay. Ratchet
and Clank went bigger with the Future series while Electronic Arts experimented with first person platforming
in Mirror's Edge. Seeing the world through the eyes of parkour runner Faith was different, if still traditionally
closer to an FPS.
Naughty Dog had moved on from the cartoon confines of Crash Bandicoot to create the Uncharted series,
which mixed cinematic story-telling with third person shooting and platforming. With the PlayStation 3
established, Sony tapped Media Molecule to develop LittleBigPlanet, a cutesy platformer with an extensive
tool-set for players to create their own little experiences. Oh, and did we mention that Lara Croft made a
comeback as well?
Sega's descent into mediocrity continued, unfortunately. Despite becoming a third party software developer
and bringing Sonic to other platforms, the quality of the games declined. Sonic 2006, Sonic Unleashed, Sonic
and the Black Knight, the list just goes on. Even with bigger budgets, there was no guarantee of great games.
There was one bright spot with Sonic Generations but for the most part, our favourite hedgehog had seen
better days"
17. Platformers Today and The Revival of Retro
Games
The end of the article talks about where we are today and how games have gone back in time to the old ways
of platform games and how the Indie genre has thrived because of it. Games like Super Meat Boy and Cuphead
are mentioned.
"Somewhere during the AAA era, numerous indie developers debuted with games that called back to the 2D
platformers of old. Jonathan Blow's Braid, Phil Fish's Fez, Team Meat's Super Meat Boy and Playdead's Limbo
popularized indie development as a whole, proving to be strong successes.
Nintendo went back to its roots with the New Super Mario Bros series on 3DS, delivering 3D visuals on a 2D
plane. It brought the series to the Wii and Wii U, experiencing similar levels of success. However, a myriad of
indie developers were creating memorable old-school 2D platformers. Owlboy, Hollow Knight, Axiom Verge,
Giana Sisters, Inside, Spelunky, Cuphead and so much more have taken to delivering high-quality platformers
with solid mechanics over the past few years.
The future looks especially bright for platforming with a wide range of upcoming titles. Yooka-Laylee is a
spiritual successor to Banjo-Kazooie and Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night carries on the legacy of Castlevania:
Symphony of the Night. Super Mario Odyssey on Nintendo's newest console, the Switch, will see Mario go
open world while Sonic Mania features returns to the franchise's 2D platforming roots.
Though platformers have grown exponentially over the decades, they still provide some of the most accessible
entertainment for many a gamer. There's no telling which direction platformers will go, but they'll always be
there, letting us hop and bop on enemies as we please."
19. Production Research - Animation
Unfortunately, I don’t have a lot of production research to do as I am doing an
animation and there isn't a lot to research in my opinion, despite this I don’t know
how to animate a few things so it's important that I use this time to look at how to
draw certain sequences.
For my animation I'm challenging myself to animate certain movements that I'm
not sure how to do so, I'm going to look on YouTube and view tutorials on how to
do them, for example a running cycle. I have experience with walking cycles but not
with a fighting sequence for example so it's imperative I learn how to animate them
if I want to the end product to be as I envisioned it. I also am going to look at
Stardew Valley animations as they are use the same art style as me and I think that
will be useful to look at.
I'm aiming to look at 3 specific animations, running cycle, a jumping animation and
a punching sequence. This is because they are the main 3 movements that I will use
the most and any other movements will be in cutscenes and most likely only be
used once.
20. Running Cycles
https://youtu.be/jggdbxTJPG4
In this video by AlanBeckerTutorials on YouTube, he details how to do a run cycle and the
different ways you can go about doing them, the first thing he talks about the 2 main ways
of doing them, the old version and the new version. In the images on the right, you can see
two images, the top one is the old version and bottom one is the new version. In the old
version there is 4 key frames to the animation, contact, down, passing and up. There is also
less emphasis on the contact with the ground before the front leg does down, whereas on
the new version animators tend to combine the passing and down keyframes and instead
opt to using a new 4th keyframe which is called up, but the jump has more height to it and
the up keyframe changes slightly to look like it's about to jump and is called kick-off. he
also talks about the arm movements and how they should look and correlate with the rest
of the frame which I found really useful as that wasn’t something I had thought of. He also
talks extensively about how to plan the movements by drawing circles where the
characters feet will land so you can better determine where the rest of the sequence will
go. He also talks about a skipping cycle and giving personality to the run, but I don’t think
this will be need for my animation as it doesn’t relate to the character and the animation
as a whole. This video makes it really easy to do the cycle, you can quite easily copy what's
on screen and transfer it into your own work, which will be especially beneficial to me as I
don’t have a lot of time to figure out what each frame needs to look like, having this video
will increase my work efficiency and hopefully allow me to get more work done.
I think in order to make what I'm looking at more relatable to my choice of art style it's
important that I look at what pixel art run cycle looks like, to do this I've looked up a basic
Stardew Valley of the character running, I then as its on YouTube, decreased the playback
speed to 0.25 and took pictures of each of the frames. I think doing this along with the
knowledge I've gained from the other video I have a really good idea of how to animate
this cycle and will be able to make really good experiments from it.
21. Jumping Animation
https://youtu.be/lCuXCLX1UHs
Jumping is a pivotal part to a platform game and in my opinion is the main way to
traverse the game, so it's pretty important and I want to get it right, otherwise the
whole trailer will look weird and it wont turn out how I imagined it. To start my
research into jumping animation is found that most of them were for adobe animate,
3D animation or I had to pay for a course to able to learn it until I found this video,
it's by Flipastick on YouTube and details a pretty basic and easy jumping cycle, they
also show how to animate it properly which I think was very useful and did give me
an idea for what I could do. However, I think I want mine to be a bit more detailed, I
think this video is a really good starting point and if I need to, I could definitely use
this as base and then add other things on to it. Despite this I decided to look further
into it on YouTube and found a video animating a run and jump by narris on YouTube.
(https://youtu.be/_PttirihJKE )I thought this fit perfectly into what I was looking for, I
decided to look at only the part where they jump because I already know how to do
a run cycle and it didn’t seem necessary to do it again. The animator shows separate
frames for each of the movements which will be useful as it will make it easier to
transfer it into my own work. Unfortunately, there isn't any talking in the video, but I
think just having the keyframes to work from will be enough and I will be able to
make a pretty decent jump from this, I'm relived I found this as I was scrolling for
longer than usual trying to find a video on how to do this.
Unfortunately, there isn't any jumping in Stardew Valley, so I am not able to refer to
that, but I think what I have so far is good and enough for me to create what I need.
22. Fighting Animation
https://youtu.be/CQV6pQOvfQ0
So, for this animation I had no idea what I was doing going into it as I've never drawn let
alone animated fighting before, so I was pretty nervous when I started my research, I think I
was afraid it was going to be incredibly difficult but thankfully I came across a video that was
perfect for what I needed, its only 5 frames and looks fairly easy to animate, its again by
Flipastick on YouTube. As I've not animated fighting before I thought I'd go easy on myself
and not push myself to do something unachievable. I decided on punching as her fighting
technique. I think that punching is the most reasonable way to fight considering my
characters origin, general know how and accessibility to certain weapons, this because she's
not going to have access to a gun, and she doesn’t really seem like the type to know how to
use a weapon anyway. At the start of the video, they show the five key frames, standing, in-
between, anticipation, punch and after effect. Throughout the video the author
demonstrates how to do each step live so you can see how each section is done, I found this
really helpful as I said before I'm not used to animating these sort of sequences so having it
explained thoroughly helped a lot. They start by drawing the first frame and then the 3rd one
to make it easier to draw the second one later, then the 4th, the 5th and finally the 2nd one.
I think that doing it this way will help a lot and am glad they suggested doing it that way.
There is no talking on the video, but they do include text prompts which does the same job
and gets across what they are doing well and makes it clear what steps to take to create the
animation.
Unfortunately, again there is no punching in Stardew Valley so I wasn’t able to add in any
input from that but think what I've got from this video is enough and will allow me to create
the animation I want.
23. Bibliography
• Wikipedia. (2022). Pixel artist. [online] Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixel_artist#:~:text=Computer%20art%20started%20in%201960s
[Accessed 10 Mar. 2022].
• The Factory Times. (n.d.). The History Of Pixel Art. [online] Available at: http://www.thefactorytimes.com/factory-times/2018/9/27/the-history-of-
pixel-art.
• Techopedia.com. (2019). What is Pixel Art? - Definition from Techopedia. [online] Available at: https://www.techopedia.com/definition/8884/pixel-art.
• Ettleman, T. (2018). 8 Best Games of the Year…1987. [online] Medium. Available at: https://trettleman.medium.com/8-best-games-of-the-year-1987-
39f6145b10b4 [Accessed 10 Mar. 2022].
• TV Tropes. (n.d.). The 16-bit Era of Console Video Games / Useful Notes. [online] Available at:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/UsefulNotes/The16bitEraOfConsoleVideoGames.
• www.pcworld.idg.com.au. (n.d.). The 10 best 16-Bit games ever! - Slideshow - PC World Australia. [online] Available at:
https://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/slideshow/317712/10-best-16-bit-games-ever/ [Accessed 10 Mar. 2022].
• www.youtube.com. (n.d.). ALAN BECKER - Animating Run Cycles - YouTube. [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/jggdbxTJPG4.
• www.youtube.com. (n.d.). The EASIEST Jump Animation Tutorial (Flipaclip 2021). [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/lCuXCLX1UHs [Accessed 14
Apr. 2022].
• www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Run and Jump Animation | Timelapse | Krita. [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/_PttirihJKE [Accessed 14 Apr. 2022].
• www.youtube.com. (n.d.). Punch Tutorial in 5 Frames! (Stickman Animation 2021). [online] Available at: https://youtu.be/CQV6pQOvfQ0 [Accessed 14
Apr. 2022].
