Thoughts on art direction...

I just read the November founders PDF and have a few thoughts/concerns on the art direction.

One of the stated goals is that Frogboy doesn't want to go "too realistic" with the art or aliens. I'm concerned by this, because the concept art I'm seeing in the first download skews very Pixar/Dreamworks with hints of Spore (e.g. Tywom_max_render.jpg or the planet concepts). This absolutely positively is not a direction I've ever associated with Star Control... which is sometimes silly and absurd, but always in a grounded, believable way. But more than that, as a kid, the aliens in Star Control freaked me out with their alien-ness.

So while I applaud the goal of keeping the aliens very alien (or "non-humanoid" as the PDF says)... I want to be weirded out by Star Control's new aliens, and outright disturbed by others.

I would strongly encourage you do push things more toward the realistic end of the style spectrum. We have enough cartoony games, and I'd very much prefer something that skews more realistic but with a strong sense of style and a penchant for the strange, bizarre, and wildly alien. For instance, the rejected alien in the PDF is definitely too human (no arguing that)... but I otherwise love the realism in that piece, and would very, very, very much prefer that style. Doubly so since I think freakish alien realism would be a great match for quirky gameplay and storytelling (very Hitchhiker's Guide, if you will).

P.S. As controversial as this opinion may be, I loathe the Tywom_Max_render.jpg artwork in the November download as much as I love Star Control 3's freakish claymation aliens (gameplay notwithstanding). IMO, we have enough cartoony, excessively-stylized sci-fi games. I'd love something that pushes realism while wholeheartedly embracing the strange, bizarre, and quirky.

What do you other Founders think? Do you agree or am I in the minority here?