2024 Game Art Year in Review: Five Visual Trends from Black Myth: Wukong to The Game Awards

Current Observation

In December 2024, gaming’s “Oscars” The Game Awards 2024 concluded.

Looking back at this year, game art shows historic transformations:

🎨 Black Myth: Wukong showed the world Chinese art’s stunning power
🎮 Indie games beat AAA titles with minimalist styles
🌍 Cross-cultural aesthetics became new selling points
🤖 AI-assisted tools began penetrating production pipelines
💰 Cost pressures forced smarter art strategies

What trends hide behind these phenomena?

Let’s summarize game art’s five major trends from 2024’s hot titles.

This isn’t just an annual summary, but a future guide for creators.

Background Analysis

2024 Game Art Landscape

Market reality:

💸 Development costs soaring: AAA budgets breaking $200M becoming normal
⏱️ Production cycles extending: 5-7 year development increasingly common
🎯 Player expectations rising: “Bad graphics, won’t play”
🌐 Global competition: Chinese, Korean game art rising

Technical evolution:

✅ Unreal Engine 5: Nanite, Lumen becoming standard
✅ AI tools: Material generation, concept art assistance
✅ Real-time ray tracing: RTX popularization, more realistic visuals
✅ Procedural generation: Houdini, PCG tools maturing

Result: Art is no longer just “beautiful,” but “competitive differentiation.”

TGA 2024 Nominees and Winners (Art Perspective)

AAA titles:

Black Myth: Wukong - Chinese mythology art
Final Fantasy VII Rebirth - Japanese fantasy realism
Dragon’s Dogma 2 - Western fantasy style
Hellblade II - Hyper-realistic Norse mythology

Indie games:

Animal Well - Pixel + lighting magic
Lorelei and the Laser Eyes - Black-white geometric aesthetics
Balatro - Minimalist card design
Small studio stylized works

Common features:

✅ All have strong visual identity
✅ Art serves gameplay and narrative
✅ Find unique expression within technical constraints

Impact Assessment

Trend 1: Eastern Aesthetics Global Breakthrough

Phenomenon:

In August 2024, Black Myth: Wukong sold 10M copies in 3 days, shocking the world.

Not just sales, but visual cultural export:

🏯 Precise recreation of Chinese traditional architecture (temples, grottos)
🎭 Modern interpretation of Peking opera masks, mythological characters
🌸 Ink wash, gongbi painting styles integrated into 3D scenes
🔥 Eastern fantasy’s “xianxia feel” vs Western “magical feel”

Technical implementation:

Used UE5 Nanite to present ultra-high precision stone carvings, architecture
Lumen global illumination gives scenes “ink wash gradient feel”
Motion capture + manual adjustment preserves Peking opera postures

Impact:

Before: “Eastern themes” = niche market
Now: Global players accept and appreciate Eastern aesthetics

Insight for creators:

Cultural distinctiveness is differentiating advantage
No need to deliberately “Westernize” - preserving local style has market
Technology serves culture, not culture compromising for technology

Trend 2: “Hand-drawn Feel” Returns in 3D Era

Phenomenon:

More 3D games pursuing “looks hand-drawn”:

Dragon’s Dogma 2 uses NPR (Non-Photorealistic Rendering) for oil painting texture
Indie games use shaders simulating watercolor, sketch effects
2D animation techniques integrated into 3D (like Spider-Verse influence)

Why?

Player aesthetic fatigue:

Too much hyper-realism feels “cold”
Hand-drawn style has “warmth,” “personality”

Technical maturity:

Shader Graph (Unreal, Unity) makes stylization easier
AI assistance can quickly generate stylized materials
Performance improvements enable complex rendering

Case: Outline revival

Before: Toon rendering = low-end
Now: Genshin Impact, Star Rail prove “cel-shading can be high-end”

Technical points:

Use Post-processing for outlines
Multi-level shadows (not just black-white, with gradation)
Hand-drawn highlights (not physically correct, use artistic beauty)

Insight for creators:

Realism isn’t the only choice
Stylization can create unique visuals with fewer resources
Hand-drawn feel = humanity, more precious in AI era

Trend 3: Minimalism’s “Less is More”

Phenomenon:

Balatro (poker Roguelike) used minimalist UI and color scheme, became 2024 dark horse.

Features:

🎴 Only cards, numbers, minimal effects
🎨 Simple colors (black, red, gold)
✨ But every detail carefully designed (fonts, animation, sound sync)

Why minimalism trending?

1. Low development cost:

Small teams can afford
Focus on core gameplay, don’t waste resources on “decoration”

2. High readability:

Players quickly understand game
Not distracted by excessive visual information

3. Distinctive style:

More memorable than “has everything” games
Like Apple’s design philosophy

Comparison:

Complex art:

Cyberpunk 2077 - Neon, ads, dirty aesthetics (information overload)

Minimalist art:

Inside (Playdead) - Black-white-gray, minimal scenes (but atmosphere perfect)

Both can succeed, key is “consistency”.

Insight for creators:

Not “few resources = bad art”
Restrained design actually more powerful
Subtraction art: Cut until can’t cut more, every element meaningful

Trend 4: Environmental Storytelling Replaces Dialogue

Phenomenon:

More games use scene design to tell stories, not relying on text, dialogue.

Case: Hellblade II

Almost no UI
Environmental details hint at plot (skeleton placement, rune carvings)
Lighting, tone create emotions (oppression, fear, hope)

Technical implementation:

1. Show, Don’t Tell design:

Don’t say “battle happened here” → Scene has damaged armor, blood, weapons
Don’t say “character lonely” → Use empty scenes, cold tones, distant figures

2. Visual guidance:

Use lighting to guide player vision (Valve’s “lighting grammar”)
Use color contrast to mark priorities
Use depth of field to create layers

3. Detail density gradation:

Main path: High detail (players will look)
Background: Appropriately simplified (save resources)

Insight for creators:

Scenes aren’t just “background” but “narrative tools”
Every object placement has meaning
Learn cinema’s “mise-en-scène”

Environmental storytelling design Hellblade II

Trend 5: Sustainable Art Pipeline

Phenomenon:

Development costs soaring, studios pursuing reusable, modular art assets.

Strategies:

1. Modular design:

Don’t make unique assets, make combinable components
E.g.: 10 wall modules → combine into 100 buildings

2. Procedural generation:

Use Houdini for terrain, vegetation, architecture
Use PCG (Procedural Content Generation) to auto-place objects

3. AI assistance:

AI generates material variants
AI accelerates concept art exploration

Case: Starfield

1000+ planets using procedural generation
Base modules handcrafted, variants auto-generated
Problem: Players felt “cookie-cutter”

Lesson: Procedural needs manual adjustment, otherwise lacks “humanity.”

Insight for creators:

Small teams should leverage procedural tools more
But core scenes, key moments need manual refinement
80% automation + 20% manual = balance point

Future Outlook

TGA 2024 Art Award Results Review

Actual Winners:

Best Art Direction:

Black Myth: Wukong won with Eastern aesthetics + UE5 technical excellence, becoming the first Chinese game to receive this honor

Best Independent Game:

Multiple minimalist style works nominated, proving “less is more” strategy successful

Judge Preferences Validated:

✅ Technical innovation + artistic expression
✅ Cultural depth + global appeal
✅ Unique style + memorable

2024’s winners perfectly validated these trends.

Outlook for 2025-2026

Short-term (2025-2026):

More Eastern-themed games (Chinese, Japanese, Indian mythology)
More hand-drawn style 3D games
AI tools becoming standard (but controversy continues)

Mid-term (2027-2028):

VR/AR game art language matures
Real-time cinematic quality becomes AAA standard
Indie games use minimalism against AAA

Long-term (2030+):

AI generates real-time scenes (player says “I want snow mountain,” game generates instantly)
Player UGC (User Generated Content) art tools popularize
Game and film art boundaries blur

Unchanged: Good art design always technology + art + emotion combined.

Practical Application

Advice for Indie Developers

1. Find Your Visual Identity

Don’t imitate AAA, find style only you can create:

What’s your cultural background? (Taiwanese temples, indigenous totems?)
What are you good at? (Hand-drawn, pixel, 3D?)
What’s your game’s emotion? (Horror, cozy, comedy?)

Case: Detention used 1960s Taiwan campus art → globally unique

2. Pragmatic Technology Choices

Don’t: Chase latest tech (Nanite, Lumen) with only 3-person team
Do: Use mature tools (Unity, Godot) + stylized shaders

Cost-saving strategies:

Use Asset Store for base assets, change colors/materials for uniqueness
Use procedural tools (like Substance Designer) for materials
Mix 2D art with 3D (like Dave the Diver)

3. Learn Environmental Storytelling

Exercise: Tell a 5-minute story with scenes, no text.

Tools:

Color psychology (red=danger, blue=calm)
Light guidance (bright=goal, dark=danger)
Object language (blood=battle, toy=child was here)

Advice for Art Professionals

1. Embrace But Don’t Depend on AI

Good usage:

Use AI for early concept exploration (quickly test 10 styles)
Use AI to generate material variants (save time)

Bad usage:

Directly use AI images as final assets (copyright risk, lack consistency)

Key: AI is assistant, not replacement.

2. Cross-cultural Learning

Not just Western art history, also learn:

Eastern: Chinese ink wash, Japanese ukiyo-e, Indian miniature
African: Tribal totems, geometric aesthetics
Middle Eastern: Islamic geometry, Persian miniature

Why? Global market needs diverse perspectives.

3. Build Personal Portfolio

Key isn’t “many works” but “representative”:

3-5 complete projects (concept to finish)
Show thought process (why designed this way?)
Include technical notes (tools used, workflow?)

Goal: Make people say “this person has unique perspective.”

Personal Perspective

My biggest feeling observing 2024 game art:

Technology is no longer the barrier, culture and creativity are.

10 years ago, realistic graphics needed top technology.
Now, UE5 is free, anyone can make “decent” visuals.

But between “good-looking” and “stunning,” what’s the difference?

Cultural depth, emotional resonance, unique perspective.

Black Myth: Wukong isn’t just “good graphics,” but first time global players truly saw Chinese mythology’s visual charm.

To all creators:

Don’t chase “latest tech” or “most realistic graphics.”

Ask yourself:

“What unique visual experience does my game give players?”

If answer is “similar to other games” → Go back and rethink.

If answer is “only I can create this feel” → That’s right.

Technology becomes obsolete, but culture and creativity always scarce.

In AI-can-generate-anything future, “why draw this way” matters more than “how to draw”.

Conclusion

2024 game art’s five major trends:

✅ Eastern aesthetics globalization - Cultural confidence is competitiveness
✅ Hand-drawn feel returns - Warmth beats realism
✅ Minimalism - Less is more
✅ Environmental storytelling - Scenes tell stories
✅ Sustainable development - Modular, procedural, AI-assisted

TGA 2024 Results Validated These Trends:

Black Myth: Wukong won Best Art Direction, proving Eastern aesthetics + technical excellence successful
Multiple minimalist indie games nominated, validating “less is more” strategy

Core advice for creators:

Don’t ask “what technology is most advanced”
Ask “what style best fits my game”

Technology is a tool, culture and creativity are the soul.

2024 has proven these trends will continue shaping 2025-2026 game art development.

Good art is never “showing off tech,” but “touching hearts”.

Related Resources:

The Game Awards Official - 2024 winners list and review
Unreal Engine 5 - Next-gen game engine
ArtStation Challenges - Game art competition platform
80 Level - Game art in-depth interviews
Game Developer - Industry trends coverage

Tags: #GameArt #IndustryTrends #TheGameAwards #VisualDesign #IndustryNews #IndustryAnalysis