I am curious to find out what everyone thinks is more important. Is game play more important than the artwork of the game or is the artwork more important? If you had a slider and one end is game play and the other end is artwork/visual effects, what percentages would you give each?  I personally would do 65% artwork and 35% game play.

I am not including story or plot in my game play percentage.

Modern games have this slider.

Old games don't. The best games are scoring high in both.

Taking for granted you can't have good gameplay without sacrificing quality of graphics is ludicrous. It is simply that most game developers don't care anymore.

I tend to see a lot of really visually striking games where the artwork is phenomenal like something out of an art museum, but then once I start playing, the game play loses me within 5 to 10 minutes or so, whether it be the physics of the game (the jump and moving controls seem to be sticky or not fluid) or just the objective or game itself is boring.

One series that is very well done I feel is the Fancy Pants Adventure series.
I am a traditional animator and can appreciate well animated sprites paired with fun game play.

I've said this before in another thread, but here goes again.

You can have the most beautiful cake in the world, but if it tastes like crap no one is going to want it.

If I had a slider that -had- to go to some percentage between the two, I would just go 100% gameplay. By definition, the game would then be an awesome game even if it looked crappy.

Taking for granted you can't have good gameplay without sacrificing quality of graphics is ludicrous. It is simply that most game developers don't care anymore.

I don't think it's that they don't care, I think it's that there's now an expectation that games have to look super-good. The first thing I almost always hear about a game is either, "It has amazing graphics" or "the graphics suck" as if that's all anyone cares about.

Blame the consumer, since the masses get all hyped up about pretty games, the actual gameplay isn't a priority so long as they can awe people into buying it.

If it were the original Donkey Kong game and... let's say Halo 3, I would most definitely pick Donkey Kong because it is a fun game. About any Halo game, to me, is total crap.

If it were the original Donkey Kong game and... let's say Halo 3, I would most definitely pick Donkey Kong because it is a fun game. About any Halo game, to me, is total crap.

Technically, it has great graphics and great gameplay.

I would most likely go with either. I just love staring at those little people fighting on strategy games. But at the same time, I want to be that awesome bad@$$ that flips through the battlefield and shoots everyone.

Obviously gameplay is more important than artwork, but if you're capable of making a great game you're usually capable of making great graphics.

I work for Game Informer and i can tell you from an experts stand point, and i call myself an expert because im paid to rate and test games, that game-play will always out weigh graphics and artwork, but artwork can make or brake mediocre game-play. For instance lets say call of duty decided to dumb down on there graphics but kept the same gunplay(which is the best gunplay available) you may be less happy with the game but it will still be a good game as a whole. Lets have Call of duty keep its graphics and make the gunplay sloppy, o crap your game just took a dump.

Kasic be preaching the truth

I am much more into gameplay...one of my favorite games of all time is Pong, and it's artwork isn't amazing...but man I can get stuck playing that game for hours

Definitely gameplay. To make a game with great artwork with bad gameplay is a waste.

Gameplay has definitely taken the lead here. A good example of a well blend is Portal and Portal 2. Intuitive, unique gameplay surrounded by the detail and graphics needed to get the feel and mood of the game across. I don't have a fancy PC so for those games I needed to dumb down the graphics quite a bit. Even so, the gameplay kept me enthralled for hours.

Is it possible to make a game surround a core art style beginning with the art of the game itself and building the game from there? If so, can you give me some examples? I'm curious to see which games were created with this approach.