Listen, I’m right there with you. I love roleplaying games. Big fan of these Dragon Quests. I first fell in love with them back when everything was pixel art. Of course, at that time, it wasn’t really called ‘pixel art’ so much as just ‘art,’ but you get what I mean. We didn’t know that we were going to fondly look back on those days and pray for their recreation to remind us – even if for the briefest of moments – of when our brains weren’t full of rot.
So when HD-2D games like Octopath Traveler and Triangle Strategy started hitting the market, I was thrilled. Pixel art was back, baby, and now it moves like Paper Mario! We did it. But, after years of this stuff, after an endless onslaught of identical looking games, I think we’re all set for the HD-2D style for a while. We can put a pause on it. We have enough.
HD-2D Games Are The Latest Trend That Needs To End
As I said, I’ve got no beef with the HD-2D style. It looks cool to me. I do appreciate that it manages to create sprites that look like they’re from the 16-bit era while introducing lighting effects and a greater sense of physicality. Understood. Love it. Cool. It’s a great way to mash fans’ nostalgia button for the good old days* (*it still sucked) without having to sacrifice some of the cooler improvements of technology born after 1992. It’s almost like a strange time warp remix in which we get multiple different RPG eras at once, all blended together. Who wouldn’t want that?
Except the problem with a blender is that it, you know, blends everything. And now it feels like every HD-2D game blends the hell together. Outside of battle scenes, a lot of these games look exactly alike. Worse, they look like they’re all trying to imitate the exact same style because it’s worked once. Remember when Final Fantasy 7 came out and suddenly there were instantly a dozen different PS1 roleplaying games that used similar-looking blocky polygonal characters and pre-rendered backgrounds?
Even if you don’t, buddy, that’s what happened. Shadow Madness isn’t a bad game, but it sure as hell looks like a Temu version of FF7. Playing it gives less of a sense of adventure and more of a sense of developers being huge fans of a game and hoping they can make huge money off its popularity.
That said, I know HD-2D isn’t exactly the same as the glut of Final Fantasy 7 wannabes. While they’re not exclusively coming from Square Enix, most of them definitely are. And, like I said, it was cool when the trend started. And then they did it again. And then again. And then a new series with the same style. And then in a remake. And then in a different remake.
Even the remaster of Final Fantasy 6 features a few cutscenes in the HD-2D style. And while I know that last one has been the dream of fans – and a lot of folks are salivating over a full remake in the style – it just makes it feel all the more generic. With the current style, Final Fantasy 6 in HD-2D will probably look like a nothing, mashed potatoes RPG.
The 2D-HD Style Is Starting To Look Cheap
Maybe that’s what I’m circling: HD-2D games are starting to look so generic. And maybe even less appealing, they look cheap. What was once Square Enix’s way of showing something was a new, experimental idea has become Square Enix’s way of showing they weren’t spending much money on this project.
They might as well be called AA-HD-2D games because they sure as hell aren’t putting the big swings in the format. They’re not quite indie games, but they’re not quite the games that Square Enix puts hundreds of millions of dollars into and then does a stockholder report about why it failed either.
What makes it all annoying is that it’s not even the fact we’re mixing pixel art with 3D graphics. Games have been doing that forever. Hell, Dragon Quest remakes alone have been doing something sort of, kind of like it since the Nintendo DS era. But for the love of God, we could change up the style a bit. Just because we all love Final Fantasy 6 doesn’t mean that every game needs to look like it.
What about a HD-2D game in the style of Final Fantasy 4 with cheaper, worse graphics? Or, hell, a HD-2D remake of Dragon Quest in its original NES form. I know emulators like 3dSen can sort of do this, but I’m more interested in some real style variation, folks. And if we’re not doing that, then maybe… stop for a while until we figure that one out?
To be clear, I don’t want every game to look like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 just as much as I don’t want every game to look like the remaster of Dragon Quest 1 & 2. I’m not annoyed by the style, I’m annoyed by seeing the style pop up again and again – first in Square Enix games and then in others that Steam won’t stop recommending to me because, clearly, I’m part of the problem and I’ve bought too many.
I’m more than happy with nostalgic visuals, but let’s try to remember that games made in the ‘80s and ‘90s didn’t all look the same. And let’s try to remember that a style should be used to push the emotions of the game, not as a signpost to let us know this isn’t one you’re putting a lot of energy into.
- Released
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December 4, 2025
- ESRB
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T For Teen // Blood, Fantasy Violence, Language, Suggestive Themes
- Franchise
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Octopath Traveler
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