Diablo III Producer on Art Direction
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When I asked lead producer Keith Lee about (Diablo III')s new art style at the Worldwide Invitational in Paris, he explained why Blizzard went in that direction.
Some context first, if you're not familiar with the old (Diablo) titles: they featured dark, shadowy landscapes and dungeons (in which the player-characters needed a radius of light to see), and an overall realistic art style. With (Diablo III,) the environments and textures are noticeably more vibrant and colorful, both inside and outside dungeons. Blaming the influence of (World of Warcraft,) the petitioners complain that the game is too (cartoon'ish) with (unrealistic elements) and (outside scenarios with vivid colors, beautiful forests with colorful vegetation, shinny [sic] and beautiful waterfalls where even rainbows take place.) (The petitioners have a full laundry list of complaints and suggestions here.)
So this is what Lee had to say about the art direction when we spoke in Paris: (One of the things that we considered when we were working on the visuals for '˜Diablo III' is the fact that color is your friend. We feel that color actually helps to create a lot of highlights in the game so that there is contrast. A great analogy is like in '˜Lord of the Rings' not everything is dark. It allows you to see what a creepy dungeon can be like but if everything is dark it doesn't allow you to have a lot of contrast.)
