Over the years, I’ve bought lots of assets from the asset store. Sometimes I see the dreaded words “asset flip!” as I promote my game. I wanted some guidance on if others use Shaders, filters, or post processing to address this and give ‘generic’ assets a unique feel.
I am not even 100% on the difference of what Shader vs Filter and when it’s relevant. It seems to me that many filters end up “making the game look pixelated” and many of the shaders end up “making the game’s colors change”.
Many of my assets use different shaders, so to convert everything into “toon shader” or whatever my artstyle ends up become seems like I may be missing a distinction.
Avoid super common user facing assets and make sure your game has a cohesive and interesting look. Cohesive means choosing the assets you use carefully, or even editing them to look better together.
My thoughts exactly.
If you use Robot Kyle in your published game, anyone recognizes that no matter what you do.
But still, use hundreds of them, ragdoll and all, make a physics sandbox and those complaints will not come or not be relevant because the game stands out.
Above all else, make sure the game‘s appeal isn‘t an instant „poorly crafted“ reaction. Attention to detail and quality are very important distinguishing factors.
What I normally see is that people don’t usually start calling a game an “Asset Flip” until after they realize it’s a scam, fake game.Then they feel angry and deceived because the assets made the game look good in the screenshots.
Having said that, I tend to modify textures of the mesh assets that I use in my project and swap out the materials for my custom shader. It’s not because I’m trying to disguise the asset. Rather, I’m just making sure it’s consistent with my game’s visual style. It’s important to have a cohesive look and not just a hodge-podge of different random styles. In my case, I have a certain, clear idea for how I want my game to look and so I can’t just use the assets as-is most of the time.
You want to have a style that’s distinct, but also supports the game-play, narrative themes, and the type of user experience that you want to create. If you have a clear picture of how you want your game to “feel” then you probably already have an idea of what you’re going for visually. Then you choose assets that go along with that, or that can be altered in order to go along with that.
Also, I feel like “Asset Flip” has morphed into a generic insult at this point (also like “it’s like a ps2 game” which I don’t quite get honestly), I think people use it to mean “it’s a little janky”, so you might hear it about your game regardless of whether your game fits the actual definition, so don’t worry about it all that much.
I’ve seen quite a few games that have a bunch of Synty assets, and am currently working on one. Some of the comments I see of those are a mild “oh, Synty again” but they don’t really go “yuck, asset flip” unless the game is really really weak. A popular example is a party/network game, West Hunt. They have taken a single low-cost Synty asset pack and barely rearranged it into a little town square, and implemented Among Us mechanics onto it. They aren’t hiding how thin the art effort was, but they support the game well and have a big community of players who love it.
