Amano or Nomura?

Who do you like better, Amano or Nomura?

  • Amano ftw

    Votes: 18 47.4%

  • Nomura is better

    Votes: 8 21.1%

  • I like them both equally

    Votes: 12 31.6%
  • Total voters
    38
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Rockman X

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Who do you like better and why?

I like Amano much better. I think his artwork style is alot more detailed and takes more skill. To me, Nomura's artwork is generic anime crap.
 
Wow, I wonder how many responses this will get given the amount of basic knowledge you have to have to answer with. You might consider linking to Wikipedia pages or something. lol On that note, Amano is the main character designer for almost every Final Fantasy. Starting right around the time of Final Fantasy VIII, Nomura started becoming a lead character designer within Square. So probably everything from that point on has a little bit of his influence in him.

Eh, it's hard for me to say. They're both talented. Amano has been involved with every single Final Fantasy game since it's original conception. Amano is almost 20 years older than Nomura, giving him much more time to hone is craft. If I had to choose, I'd definitely sway toward Amano but I don't think what Nomura has done is necessarily bad.

He did help heavily with the character designs for Final Fantasy VIII though... which makes him a little hard to defend. Although Nomura's best work is probably in the Kingdom Hearts series, so if your a fan of Sora's, moreso than any other SE character, your probably more of a fan of Nomura's.

The one thing I will add though is that there are a couple of designs of Amano's that I just flat out don't like. IE - Gogo's look in FFVI. Some of his designs are really just so overly artistic that they don't translate well to "real" people in the games.
 
I find Amano's work to be much more magnificent than Nomura's. All of Nomura's products could be easily recreated via digital art shops, and are very similar in design to typical cartoon designs.

Amano is a master. I'd like to see anyone try to recreate Amano's style with traditional tools. I have idolized his artwork since the day I realized his existence. It's incomparable. Unlike conventional artists, he captures his subjects in a different motion; hence why they call his women figures "water ladies". His paintings have a special "flow" about them.
 
Aztec Triogal said:
Yea, I know what you mean. Designs like Chaos and Ex-Death are absolutely amazing... but others like Cid in FFVI just remind me of this Wedding Crasher's quote.
Click to expand...

lmfao.

That pic of Cid reminds me of a condom <.<

I think Nomura is good, but not very unique. Anyone can draw in anime style, just go to the bookstore and pick up a "how to draw anime" book and there ya go. Amano's art flows, as Rhea mentioned, and it reminds me more of traditional Japanese and Chinese art.

And frankly, it's always a breath of fresh air to see art in a Japanese game that isnt anime.
 
lmao, that was blunt.

I was kinda looking for people to say the why to their opinions, but okay xD

Akihiko Yoshida is pretty good, however, his characters generally dont end up too in depth (or in the case of Tactics, things were deep to the point of being confusing)
 
I'm going for Nomura here because I love his drawings and they're something different from what I usually see.
 
I like them both, though for different reasons. I think Nomura's work being much more mainstream in terms of the Japanese gaming industry, yet still distinctly his own style, makes him a powerful figure as one who can cater to the masses.

However, I admire Amano because he has diverged from the Japanese group style of anime (so in a sense, he has broken a subtle cultural boundary), although it must also be noted that he obviously still takes much inspiration from East Asian art.

In other words, Nomura wins as a pop designer, Amano wins as an artist.
 
VengefulRonin said:
lmao, that was blunt.

I was kinda looking for people to say the why to their opinions, but okay xD

Akihiko Yoshida is pretty good, however, his characters generally dont end up too in depth (or in the case of Tactics, things were deep to the point of being confusing)
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He's only responsible for the character designs though, not the characters themselves. Nomura occasionally writes his own characters while otherwise only acting as a character designer but I'm pretty sure Yoshida and Amano leave that up to the concept designers.

As for my reasoning, Nomura tends to draw pretty stock anime characters which were alright when it wasn't possible to render particularly detailed polygons but now days they're beginning to look pretty lackluster. Amano is a fantastic artist but his whimsical watercolor style is impractical for video game design. Pretty much all of his character designs have had to be completely re-drawn for the games themselves. Yoshida has the annoying habit of drawing the same blank expressions on all his preliminary designs but the intricate detail he puts into the characters actually makes it into the games he's working on. Even his chibi-fied sprites in FFT are pretty dead on when compared to the preliminary designs for each. He's pretty much the best of both worlds in comparison to the other two.
 
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ThroneofDravaris said:
He's only responsible for the character designs though, not the characters themselves. Nomura occasionally writes his own characters while otherwise only acting as a character designer but I'm pretty sure Yoshida and Amano leave that up to the concept designers.

As for my reasoning, Nomura tends to draw pretty stock anime characters which were alright when it wasn't possible to render particularly detailed polygons but now days they're beginning to look pretty lackluster. Amano is a fantastic artist but his whimsical watercolor style is impractical for video game design. Pretty much all of his character designs have had to be completely re-drawn for the games themselves. Yoshida has the annoying habit of drawing the same blank expressions on all his preliminary designs but the intricate detail he puts into the characters actually makes it into the games he's working on. Even his chibi-fied sprites in FFT are pretty dead on when compared to the preliminary designs for each. He's pretty much the best of both worlds in comparison to the other two.
Click to expand...

True, it's really up to other people whether good character designs get much in the way of personality.

Nomura makes cool looking characters, unfortunately, i could turn on anime show and see characters that looked just the same cool. Amano...yes, his designs always have to be redrawn. I think a game would look pretty funny if they kept his designs...it'd be hard to do too. I just love Amano's drawing as art in itself though ^_^ I think the best Yoshida work i've seen though hasnt been in a direct FF, but was in Vagrant Story. Now his art for that game was damn impressive.
 
I think both of them are very talented, but each one has a unique style. Nomura's designs are much more anime like, while Amano's are more artistic. But they both have their good points and bad points. Good points of Nomura: FFX and VII. Bad points of Nomura: FF X-2. Good points of Amano: Many like Ex-death and Chaos as Aztec pointed out. Bad points: whoever said Cid looked like a condom, I couldn't agree more. They both have their hits and misses.
 
I'm going for Nomura because his characters which he has designed have been rather symbolic of the major Final Fantasy games and the best remembered. The designs for most of the FFVII characters were unusual and not seen for it time but now most anime and manga characters have been blatantly ripped off by his original creations thats why they look generic now.
 
eisprinz said:
I like them both, though for different reasons. I think Nomura's work being much more mainstream in terms of the Japanese gaming industry, yet still distinctly his own style, makes him a powerful figure as one who can cater to the masses.

However, I admire Amano because he has diverged from the Japanese group style of anime (so in a sense, he has broken a subtle cultural boundary), although it must also be noted that he obviously still takes much inspiration from East Asian art.

In other words, Nomura wins as a pop designer, Amano wins as an artist.
Click to expand...

....read my mind X__X
I respect Amano's work as an artist. Its different and he has a unique style.
But Nomura's aesthetics appeal to my more mainstream/anime eye.
 
Well… Both are actually very good, but distinctly different in their style of art. I do admire Amano for his talent, but I favor Namura’s artwork a whole lot more in the later games.
 
Damn it, i just started an exact same thread.....i didnt realise there already was one.......
*sighs*
I dont think im gonna bother posting another thread, ever...
 
Cactuar said:
Damn it, i just started an exact same thread.....i didnt realise there already was one.......
*sighs*
I dont think im gonna bother posting another thread, ever...
Click to expand...

Haha, see that's why it's a good idea to always do a search for a thread topic before you post one to make sure one doesn't already exist.

Alrighty, time for a new question if you guys are interested. Based on sketches, what are your favorite Amano FFs and what are your favorite Nomura FFs? Not talking storyline, just the drawings.

I'd say my favorite Amano FFs are III, V and IX. My favorite Nomura FFs is VII. The characters just look cooler than his others.

Oh and on a side note, i think Yusuke Naora deserves alot of credit for his X environments. His drawings capture the beauty and mystique of the locations much better than the actual game does: http://www.finalfantasytr.com/artwork/naora-ff10.htm
 
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