I like the graphic style too.  Its fresh and clean and leaves a lot to the imagination.  One quibble-I hope the roads to not retain that look.  I too thought they were power lines.  Now that I know they are fences, all I can think of is why?  To keep deer off the road?  To keep the elite troop of blind death knights from attaching the fields?  To keep the beer wagons from going into the ditch?

ok enough

ZING!

That's a very interesting direction!

Sorry, couldn't resist...

Maybe they're very small walls...  If you think about it, historically many city walls were between 10-40' high (a few were higher).  There's quite a few trees taller than that, especially in older forests.  It's one reason people put cities and especially fortresses on high ground, and why you add towers: it lets you see threats further out.

Question! Question! Oh, oh, me, me! Question!

Do we need to put walls around our cities? I've always preferred my cities wall-less, except maybe the inner courtyards or a keep. Or is it a 'building' like any other? The cities in my heartlands rarely have walls unless absolutely necessary.

And no, anyone that's thinking about ever meeting me in a multiplayer match didn't just hear that.

With the obvious exception of very specific temple cities and such. But those aren't 'real' cities.

And no matter what, wheter those walls came to be around a castle on a hilltop or a city that grew in the middle of a bloody forest, you cleared all trees around it. For obvious reasons. So the height of trees then or now is irrelevant.

I think this sounds absurd, but according to wikipedia, pines grow to between 3-80m. Yes. It actually says 80m. I first thought it was a typo for 8, but then it says that the average height of most species of pine is 15-45m. So yes.

Pines are huge.

Edit: They also live for a thousand years. Bastards.

We have cut down less trees than most of the world     That is why we have the redwoods.   we should be pointing our fingers at the germans that have been taking trees from the black forests for thousands of years.  (actually we shouldn't be pointing our fingers at anybody and just make a joined effort to perserve our old trees.  We are all guilty of destroying our environment)

Many pines I've lived around were pretty big, so I didn't question it.  They are still shorter than that wizard tower (I assume its a wizard tower.)

Its an early render so obviously the ending product will be different, but while we are in nit-picky zone of scale.  Why is the most important looking structure on the outside of the enclosed space.  I'd put my shiny white building at least near the center of the wall so that it had some protection.  I guess this particular place is very protective of what looks like a big thatched roof hut.

Ok, so I stopped reading after page one and apparently I'm NOT in the minority. =P

Keep it close to this, guys.  This art style might seem primitive, but it's a winner.  I've never liked how modern companies put too much emphasis on making EVERYTHING "3D" - it more often than not just ends up looking ugly. 

Look to the beautiful games of old for your inspiration, art team!

I really like the art direction. Clear and leaves room for imagination.

Still its all about the gameplay, but I guess that's somewhat hard to show off with a screenshot. Looking forward to the beta test! 

I ought to say that I LOVE the art direction in this game!

The consistency of the art through the game is so much more important than just getting the concept art done.

lol april 15th-aug 26. Quite a necro post. Looking at the new screens im glad they are improving, but im with everyone else here - style is better than polygon count.

I believe the reason the trees look different from the rest of the objects on the map is because the trees are Part of the map while the other black outlined objects were "placed" on the map.

I think youll find that the game will look much much different when the 3D engine is implemented. Like almost nothing like this. You can only see the artistic style from this.