Why 2D gaming died?

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

It would be about 10 minutes work to move a tree in 2D.

And about 8 of it would be deciding where to move it to.

I would agree with this if you design your composition with layers, and thereby can more easily remove something from an image and relocate or redraw it elsewhere.  For more traditional artists, removing a house from a scene (let's say the director decided it needed to be relocated, rather than there being a visual issue with the background) meant hours of additional effort before layering support, or you'd scrap the image entirely and start over.  Add to this the additional effort caused by traditional handpainted artwork being scanned and tweaked and you've got a considerable amount of work to do to fix a problem that is fairly trivial in 3D.  Even if you are using layers, in 2D you'd most likely need to redraw the house to fit the new perspective, whereas with 3D you could rotate and adjust it until it matches the preferred orientation.  3D is much, much more user-friendly and forgiving in this regard.

[InCreator]

Probably because 2d is much easier to think in.

Producing 2D is much cheaper. To make a decent 2D game with beautiful animations and backgrounds, all you need is a talented artist and a program.

To make same in 3D, you expenses vary from texturer to moddeller to live actors & motion capture equipment (COSTLY!!!) or multiple animators to studio to photographer to different programs to keep it all together etc

Of course this is graphics only. Both would also need sound effects, live actors for speech, music, programmers, testers, etc. So before this huge load of expenses, going 2D is a considerable save on budget.

[rbaleksandar]

  I do believe 2D didn't and will never die. Not only because of the total awesomeness of 2D games and that I am a HUGE fan of 2D and 2.5D games , but for the fact that many people (mostly from older generations, played them and will always remember what it was to play them. Even now there are many companies that make 2D games (occasionally though). 2D are:

1)Cheaper to produce.
2)Still have lots of fans all around the world.
3)You don't need (usally) a couple of GHz and GBs to run them.
4)I can't remember what I was going to add in the list lol

  3D was just the next obvious step although I do think that at the time first 3D games showed up, 2D was at its culmination. Amazingly drawn 2D pixel art, innovative gameplay, cool stories. As most of you might have noticed playing some new 3D shiny games, old things have been remade only visually. Back in the old times when 2D gaming was so popular, there were dozens of unbelievably fun and thrilling games. 90% and maybe more of the "new" 3D stuff is a 2D stuff + 1 dimension as a bonus No new ideas. Stories are as good as the same in every second game (zombies, US soldiers rescuing the human race from vicious aliens etc. etc.) Kind of boring. Games nowadays are like a balloon - shiny and cool to watch, but with nothing in there as substance.

[Dudeman Thingface]

Games nowadays are like a balloon - shiny and cool to watch, but with nothing in there as substance.

Clearly, you've never played and finished Kane and Lynch (and finished it with the good ending). It's got an excellent story about a broken man fighting to protect those he loves, and the ending is just a perfect fulfilling end to it.
Also, Far Cry 2's main antagonist (the Jackal) is what makes the story of Far Cry 2. Admittedly, the game itself isn't as heavy as K&L, but the Jackal brings to it a uniqueness that is starting to be found in videogames.

What I'm trying to say is that games 'were' like a balloon, and all though there are still plenty that are just like that, not all are as stale as you make out. There are some ones that shine, and their numbers are increasing.

[Oliwerko]

To me it seems that the golden age of PC gaming was somewhere between '98 and '03-'04.
Some cool games were coming out back then, true games made not only to shine with their marvelous xyz super-hyper-engine and super-hyper-effects. The vast majority of games I play comes from that period. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but to me it really seems that nowadays, it's not what it used to be back then.

[deltoran]

why that is not true, like some people have already said, there's gameboy and ds games and there's also the xbox360 arcade games some of them a must admit are just 3d but put side ways. but i mean there's games like worm's on the xb360 and there also streetfighter i think. also there ton's of flash games. :o

but i supose there are less 2d games being made commercialy these days. :'(

[ThreeOhFour]

To me it seems that the golden age of PC gaming was somewhere between '98 and '03-'04.
Some cool games were coming out back then, true games made not only to shine with their marvelous xyz super-hyper-engine and super-hyper-effects. The vast majority of games I play comes from that period. I don't know, maybe it's just me, but to me it really seems that nowadays, it's not what it used to be back then.

This is pretty funny because I personally feel that this mystical "golden age" of gaming was between 1995 and 2001 - which is kinda funny because that's roughly 3 years earlier than your "golden age" of gaming, and I am 3 years older than you judging by your age thingo.

Maybe that's just an age where we find ourselves particularly impressionable?

It'd be interested to hear whether people who are 3 years older than me thought that the golden age was between '92 and '97 and whether people 3 years younger than you find it is between 01 and 06 

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

Oddly enough, I don't really consider there to have been a golden age of gaming.  Maybe a golden age of console wars-style gaming, when Nintendo and Sega went at it and really fought for your money.  PC gaming has always been hit and miss, with some brilliant games and lots of really mediocre ones. 

[Ghost]

It'd be interested to hear whether people who are 3 years older than me thought that the golden age was between '92 and '97 and whether people 3 years younger than you find it is between 01 and 06 

As far as I'm concerned the "golden age" was from about 89 to 99, and thus I prove your point in a way. But it's only logical that we remember games from our youth as extremely impressive- when we saw them they were novel, we had little to compare them to, and over the time we paint layer after layer of nostalgica over it. I always jump a little when I reinstall Lemmings and see how simple the graphics are, compared to what I see in the theatre of my mind.

Progz: I agree that there's always been a lot of average stuff especially for the PC, but there was a time when so many titles were released that you could, on a monthly base, count for at least three or five games that were to your liking. More mediocre stuff as well, but also more "good 'uns".

For me the "golden age" was when I could walk in any store and select from a large number of budget games that were not that old, and I still had to hardware to run them.
Heck, I even played Forsaken. 

[ThreeOhFour]

ProgZ: I have to agree with you, there were a LOT of really, really crap games in my 'golden age' that I listed, but it was the period where the games that I find the most inspirational come from. Sure, there were a lot of turds in between the gems, but the gems back during that period shine brighter than what some people consider the gems today.

There's still a lot of games around today that I really enjoy, and there are a lot of games back then that sucked, but almost all of the games that made me say "I wanna make games!" come from that time period.

Ghost: Yeah, nostalgia is often a depressing thing. A few months back I reinstalled Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2 (which was my entire life for a disturbingly long period of time) and... wow, the graphics kinda sucked. And the physics kinda sucked. And some of those levels were hard - frustratingly hard, but somehow back then I had the determination to sit there and replay over and over until I got it.

Then again, the original Simon the Sorceror will never cease to amaze me with it's visuals, so I guess nostalgia ain't all bad

[Oliwerko]

I never stop to wonder how good are the old games I found good back then. NFS 5 or Thief always fills me with joy of that feeling.

[rbaleksandar]

Games nowadays are like a balloon - shiny and cool to watch, but with nothing in there as substance.

Clearly, you've never played ...
What I'm trying to say is that games 'were' like a balloon, and all though there are still plenty that are just like that, not all are as stale as you make out. There are some ones that shine, and their numbers are increasing.

I answer only with a quote from my post:

90% and maybe more of the "new" 3D stuff is a 2D stuff + 1 dimension as a bonus No new ideas.

I have also 3D games that I love to play (like Freelancer, which whoever played it, will agree has a story worthy of being filmed (hope this sentence doesn't have that many mistakes as I think it has ). Call of Duty is again one of my favourite 3D games. Story is good and the action is non-stop

  My favourite game for all times is AOE 2 (with the expansion). Single campaign - great, multi - can't live without it once you've started it

But you have to admit that most 3D games nowadays are stealing with full hands from their older pioneer 2D brothers. And since visual effects can't make want to play a game, there's nothing to offer. One gets tiered of the same stories coming again and again with the only difference - visuals.

PS: I'll try the first game you wrote about. Hope there's a demo

[Dudeman Thingface]

But you have to admit that most 3D games nowadays are stealing with full hands from their older pioneer 2D brothers. And since visual effects can't make want to play a game, there's nothing to offer. One gets tiered of the same stories coming again and again with the only difference - visuals.

I do not understand your point. Could you please give me examples of some modern (maybe even next gen) 3d games that are clearly stealing from older "pioneer" 2d games.

If what your saying is that 3d games are stealing from 2d games because 3d came second, then that's like saying all movies now are stealing from the first few silent movies. There have to be similarities, because it's a form of media, but that doesn't make it outright copying.

[Arboris]

Just bought Street Fighter 4 for the PS3. It might be 3d rendered, but it's still as old school as the 'true' 2D beat em ups. Just the way I like it.

[InCreator]

I truly miss isometric graphics and tycoon games.

Last one I played and loved was Rollecoaster tycoon... ages ago. Well, SimCity 4000 was about okay too. Nothing great but better than the last leftovers of genre and style.
Nothing playable after this. Tried this and that, and no, nothing.

Also, where's deep technical turn-based strategies?

Jagged Alliance 2 + half-assed expansions, that 3D game about WWII with robots that started to suck quickly - Silent Storm - and... end of the genre?
Russian enthusiasts, keepers of the genre - pump out Jagged Alliance inspired games all the time (including mentioned Silent Storm), but they rarely reach quality of western ones and translations are almost always terrible.

For example, how come no one hasn't made decent XCOM sequel yet? Microprose, releasing that awful UFO 3 (XCom: Apocalypse) seems to have killed its own franchise or cursed it... even though I know that there's LOADS of hardcore fans for this insult of a game too.

If someone can prove me wrong and name some gems, please do!

[voh]

Just bought Street Fighter 4 for the PS3. It might be 3d rendered, but it's still as old school as the 'true' 2D beat em ups. Just the way I like it.

I was about to mention Street Fighter IV as a good example of a game that 'gets' it. 3D fighting games are what they are, but the 'real' Street Fighter experience is on a 2D playing field. 3D or 2D don't make the game. The artstyle itself does, and the gameplay does.

If a game isn't fun, I don't care how many dimensions it has. It can have all 5 of them, but if it ain't fun, it ain't gonna be played by me.

And there was no 'golden age' of gaming as far as I'm concerned. There have always been good games and terrible games, as well as all the options in between. This will never change.

[zabnat]

Producing 2D is much cheaper. To make a decent 2D game with beautiful animations and backgrounds, all you need is a talented artist and a program.

To make same in 3D, you expenses vary from texturer to moddeller to live actors & motion capture equipment (COSTLY!!!) or multiple animators to studio to photographer to different programs to keep it all together etc

Why can't you make 3D with just a talented artist and a program?

And on the other hand you can make 2D with concept artist(s), character artist(s), background artist(s), character animator(s), background animator(s). And maybe if you decided to use rotoscoping you would also need live actors (when your animators are not talented enough).

So with these arguments the cost comes pretty much from the scale of the production?