Too many graphical effects?

[Korten12]

Though I am using my project as an example, it is something that probably more general. 

So I was working on my game, and you know I looked at some screenshots of other projects and thought I can improve my own.

So in this image alone I have... 

1. Khas Lighting Effect dimming and brightening the screen among other effects.

2. Victor's Fog effect

3. Picture for sun ray effect (Thinking of a way to make it look like the rays are moving...)

4. MOG's Weather Script

And for a bit, I was entertaining the thought of having some sort of reflection script (though scrapped, at least for now.) Even without it, I ponder if I have too much.

Really this made me think, is it possible to have too many graphical effects? At what point do you think it just becomes too much? Probably a good discussion to have since no doubt

sometimes people like to just put in as many effects as much as possible.

 

[ElementalLight]

I dont think water reflection would be to much for the show scene however yes there can be to much if the player is to drawn into looking around instead of playing i dont think thatsvery good 

 

[seita]

a few things you may want to consider:

Consistency. If you can't be consistent with your effects throughout your game, you may want to consider having only enough effects that are reasonable to work with.

Lag. Depending on what you have on screen, how big your map is and what extra scripts or events you have running in the map scene, lag may be the bottleneck for the effects. It may not be a problem here in this forest map but once you enter a different area it may have a much larger impact.

 

[Ms Littlefish]

While I do believe in "less is more" for many facets of an art form; as long as the combination of effects serve a purpose and are not distracting, obstructive, or exhausting to look at; it will likely be OK. If they do not get in the way of navigating your way around the map or distinguishing what objects are I think the majority will not find it too cumbersome. 

However, with digital mediums, we can luckily change things very easily.

Edit: Now that I think about it. For this particular map, it probably doesn't make sense to have sun rays and tree shadows at the same time. The tree cover probably obscures too much light for it to beam down like that.

 

[EternalShadow]

What does it look like without the white lighting overlay thing?

 

[Kes]

I think a prime criterion is: how do all these effects work together?   For example, in your map you have white sun rays coming down.  Light that has been filtered through trees is not going to be bright white like that, but softer, much more intermittent.  And so in this context I would use a screen tint rather than a sun overlay.  Certainly have a wide variety of light effects to hand, but only use the effects from your store which fit the particular map.

 

[Korten12]

What does it look like without the white lighting overlay thing?

Since you asked:

Though I will admit, since posting that picture, I actually did add some stuff. Though they may not be obvious. Khas's lighting effects are awesome, and I may remove

them once he updates. But I actually added in hand-drawn shadows to some parts of the map.

 

[EternalShadow]

That looks nice. Very serene, ghostly, middle-of-the-day-like. You probably don't need the falling leaves though.

 

[Missile]

Agree with others that the sun rays might be a bit much. Also think the shadows could be blurred a bit, since the hard edges can make it tough to see differences in tiles at a glance.

Also, maybe instead of sparkles on the water, you could try a faux-light reflection? Something like this (whipped up in a couple seconds): http://i.imgur.com/SrQ78KM.png (just set to stepping animation over water).

 

[Jesse - PVGames]

Honestly, if the graphical effects help you set the scene and tell the story, then go for it. If they are just there for no reason other than eye candy, and/or cause lag, then you do not need them.