Creating a low-poly scene (Unity)

Art styles in video games

To say that a game's art style is important would be a colossal understatement. It's often the first thing a player experiences when playing a game for the first time. Entire series have been built around a certain style, such as the famous Borderlands cartoon look that defines the franchise:

Borderlands creates this iconic art style by using a very heavy outline around major features of the characters and models.

Other games such as Assassin's Creed strive to achieve photorealism, meaning that they try to mimic reality as closely as possible. This approach wasn't feasible for the majority of video game history, as it was too computationally intense on computers at the time. However, as hardware and game engines became faster and more efficient, photorealism rose to the top to become a very popular art style - especially in large companies that can spare the extra effort required to achieve the effect.

A showcase of Epic Games' Unreal Engine 5 - a leader in photorealistic graphics.

However, one art style always interested me above the rest: low-poly. Low-poly stands for "low-polygon". 3D modelers intentionally limit the number of polygons of their models to achieve the look.

I love this art style for two reasons. First, it's able to create extremely "cute" scenes. It's hard to explain exactly how it makes me feel, but I think the low-poly models remind me of when life was simple. It has a relaxing aura which isn't found in many other art styles.

Secondly, it's significantly easier to implement compared to other styles. Models can be made extremely quickly, which allows the artists to spend their valuable time on other aspects of the game. And for someone with very little experience in 3D art, I love that it's fairly easy to get started creating low-poly models.

I wish I could think of a better word than "cute" to describe this scene, but it's the only word that fits in my mind.

Anatomy of a visual scene

When creating a scene, there are three main things I like to consider:

1. The models and environment. These are the actual objects usually supplied to you by your art team.

2. The lighting and feel. Placing your objects into the scene and calling it a day isn't a good enough. Playing around with different lighting setups, post-processing effects (like the slight blur around nearby objects as seen above), and different rendering settings often has as large an impact as the source objects themselves.

3. The story. Why are the objects placed where they are? Does the scene make me want to explore and learn more? This is often overlooked, but can elevate your level from a good scene to a great scene. It's also the aspect I have the least experience with (as you'll see).

Of course, there are lots of other factors that influence a player's experience in the world. Music and ambient sounds have a tremendous impact on the feel of a scene as a whole. But for simplicity's sake, I'll just be focusing on the visual side of things for this project.

For the models, I used an asset pack I bought a few years ago from Polygon. It includes a bunch of great low-poly models for a nature scene. Here's a screenshot from their website showing off some of the models:

Obviously this looks amazing - and a lot of people would say I'm "cheating" by using such a polished asset pack. However, it's naïve to think that game designers should create everything themselves - there would be way too much work for even the smallest games. Additionally, I think if I can use this pack to create a completely new scene of my own - I'll learn valuable lessons about implementing assets into a game world.

My take

My idea was simple: use the nature asset pack to create a spooky night-time scene. I wanted the following features in the scene:

1. A look that says "right after sundown"

2. A campfire

3. Assets placed so that the environment could fit in a small forest

4. A sci-fy element to give meaning to the scene

With these elements in mind, I started creating the environment. The first order of business was to create the terrain underfoot. Next, I added some rocks and trees to make the scene feel like a forest.

The scene looks properly scary to me, but it's too dark to see what is going on. I'll add the previously mentioned campfire to brighten things up. I'll also add in a few plants and rocks to keep it interesting.

Looking back, it's still too dark. It's a stylistic choice - dark games have an innate sense of fear built into them. But too much darkness can lead to frustration for the player.

I could keep adding small details like rocks and plants to the scene, but I don't have as much time this week to work on the project. So I'm skipping the small details for now and moving onto the sci-fy element. I've got a neat idea that I think will add a sense of mystery to the scene.

Maybe this astronaut is cryogenically frozen - and could wake up at any moment

I'll be the first to admit it looks a little silly. If I had more time this week, I would've added some more details to the scene and improved the models surrounding the astronaut. But I think the general idea is there: by utilizing a consistent art style and the tools modern game engines give you, you can create some pretty fascinating worlds.