Graphics = Money

Of course, indie developers doesn't have the budget to make "AAA" graphics, that's is why I understand the "normal" graphics. That's why I prefer gameplay over that. For example, right now, I'm really enjoying the game "Bunny Must Die!" (you can find it on Desura). It looks good, not great, the game is like Castlevania SOTN (a Metrovania style), and also it has a good story, gameplay, music, and it's really fun... also, hard as hell :P

Others Indie games I enjoy are Limbo, Beat Hazard, Gundemonium series, etc... and all of them added something different, or special. Like Gemini Rue or the Blackwell series, from the same developers/publishers, their strong points are the story, and not the graphics.

And I do agree -at least- that more than 50% of the indie games are really, really, not that good. But 95% is kind of much... :P Have some faith, there are really some good indie games out there! ;)

Can I ask is there a game you like because of the Graphics, to me for FPSes Its a tie between

Far Cry 3
http://fcsvk.sk/galerie/1.jpg

Battlefield 3
http://i.imgur.com/KCXk0.jpg

Arma 3
http://media.pcgamer.com/files/2012/02/Arma3_screenshot_1202_27.jpg

I think you're confusing some things. Having "retro" graphics doesn't equal having crappy graphics. Pixel art can be a work of art and [url=http://www.bugpixel.com/ENTER.gif]cool [url=http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs49/f/2009/175/8/0/Crocktown_by_fool.png]beautiful stuff. And the work it requires is anything but lazy, even if it doen't look as appealing like Retro City Rampage. That game's art is the result of a design decision, not lazyness. How much of that decision was affected by limited resoources, I don't know. (I'm ignoring 2D art in general 'cause I consider you do [url=http://supergiantgames.com/site/wp-content/uploads/Bastion_E32011_0004.jpg] that stuff).

And yes, being indie does justify having crappy graphics, hiring an artist can be expensive, so if you don't have a real artist in your team or you can't procure one that will work for peanuts, then your game will have to do with "programmer art". And that's for 2D art, where you may pull it off with just one artist, when it comes to 3D games you need several dudes to produce 3D meshes, 2D textures and bump maps, level design and placement and a whole lot of shit.

Then also comes the fact that a simple indie game may not have beautiful art but can still have very nice art direction. Games like Skyrim have mediocre art direction, and its getting worse and worse with developers just shoving us scenes completely devoid of contrast, colors, lighting interplay or anything that constitutes average art direction and design. Skyrim does have all that stuff but it still suffers from it all being one giant generic setting that looks all the same, all the cities look the same. All the ruins look the same. You should check Morrowind, it's a game FULL of contrasts and differing architectures, and it managed to do it within a desert island, not a lush northern forest.

OP didn't say so. He just said that it often feels like the "retro" is an excuse. And also among "retro style" games there's huge differences in quality standards.

I'm tired of indie games in the spirit of old console titles. Seriously, these game were limited for a reason. It wasn't on purpose. I don't want to play Super Jump Boy, or Dick Craft, or FEZ. They look backward and retarded. Their creators can suck my fat dick. Move the fuck on and join a team who makes real games. You fucking emo hacks.

They may be right, but they're also talking about a very specific genre. Roguelike games are perhaps synonymous with ASCII. Indie games, however, are not. Indie isn't even a genre of anything, it's merely a reference to what type of enterprise made it. For a "genre" of games that speaks nothing of their actual content, retro aesthetic and gameplay is grossly over-used despite there being no mandate to do so.

3D models are technically lazier than pixel art sprites. Look at Project Zomboid. The developers switched away from sprites sheets because it's a pain in the ass to animated with them.

Kind of reminds me of Quake, great gameplay, but the aesthetic values were terrible. Granted part of the problem was the fight between designers about what the aesthetic was going to be, medieval, or dystopian future, apparently at one point Aztec.

Games like that never age well in terms of the visuals. Quake 2 was less problematic in that regard, but look how much better Unreal looks, and it's not just a matter of the polygon count either, play both of those with acceleration off and see what looks better.

One of the problems that game designers often forget is that a quality aesthetic can leave a game looking quite good years later, even if a bit more pixelated and less sophisticated than newer games. Zeliard still looks fairly good despite the low resolution, because the developers chose wisely when it came to their designs.

Most of what I have to say probably has already been stated in one form or another...

As some have touched on, cutting edge graphics cost money. Cutting edge graphics do not mean a pretty game. The biggest thing I can say is that artistic taste and preference is an objective thing, and everyone will have their favorites. One will think a game is pretty, and another will say it's the ugliest thing ever created.

Generally, there are three general categories that I see in games that grab people's attention:
1) Gameplay
2) Story
3) Graphics

The difficult thing is to create a balance of all three. Even big name companies with major budgets fail on one or another. The key to being a "classic" is mastering a balance of those with the target audience, or creating something that excells in one and meets or exceeds general expectations of similar games (once again, the target market).

Look back at your favorite games. Look at what you remember about it and why they are your favorites. See how they fit in those three categories. Now look at the games out right now- you're bound to be more inclined enjoy games that have similar ratings in those things.

As with the money thing, Indie developers have many choices to make. What are they gonna focus on? What aspects are okay to "downgrade" in the final release? What can they afford to do?

Lastly... How long are they willing to work on the project? To point towards something off topic to make a point... Look at Black Mesa. To my understanding, legally they couldn't have funding, couldn't sell the game, etc. And in order to bring their interpretation forward, they targeted to hit the 3 areas them in the same way the original Halflife game did.

... It also took 8 years to make.

Not every game will be a classic. Not every developer is willing to take a decade to create a game (and if they are, by the time of full developement ends, will it still be to the current standards?). And lastly, there comes a point of profitability, since often the goal is to have a sellable product. This all comes to my final statement to address the original question:

"Indie" game doesn't mean, nor excuse crappy graphics. Nor does it excuse crappy game mechanics, or bad story. It simply means they have to set their game's boundries and expect to meet an end product without a budget comparable to the big name companies.

... One last side note... I believe a lot of "indie" developers are people learning their craft and getting experience. Many of the members of indie teams are trying to show what they can do. Animators animate. Writers make stories. Voice actors do voices. Coders code. "Indie" is showing what the team members can do well. And often, what they can't.

Id suggest being AAA is an excuse for crappy gameplay.

I think Skyrim's ugly aside from actors, does that count?

My thought on this:

A lot of people want 8bit graphics. I see people on forums talking about the great 8bit graphics of some Kickstarter or Greenlight game and I look at it and thing "that's ugly". Since there's enough demand, and it's easier to create 8bit graphics, I can see why indies would go that way.

I also happen to hate the Braid art style but think that the MacGuffin's Curse one is okay, so a lot is personal taste. So I wouldn't go starting to put down games for their graphics. Many have a target audience which thinks it looks good even though many other people won't think so.

Many indie devs create a concept based game. They have an idea and they want that executed. Great art is secondary. It's not that easy to find great artists who will satisfy most people, and it can be even harder getting that art into a game. If your sprites are well drawn, people also expect better animation, etc., and it ends up being time consuming to produce the art and program the support for it.

There's a saying in Dutch that translates as: "the eyes wants something" meaning that everyone likes to see something to look good. Now, what "good" means is subjective but in general, it has to be satisfying to watch and also complement the gameplay by being visual enough.

A lot of the old Atari 2600 games, for example, were greatly limited by technical constraints and because of that, a lot of the games had very unrecognisable elements. If it wasn't for the manual explaining what each element was, it would just be one blob shooting another blob.

And then 8bit and 16bit games came along and they finally were able to use proper 2D art to make gorgeous looking games that oozed atmosphere.

...

And now 20 years later, we have lazy ass indie devs who can't be bothered to find someone to make good pixel art so just stick with horrible looking shit that would even embarrass an Atari ST dev. I actually made a topic about this on GOG before and yeah, it pisses me off to see so many good games being off-putting by graphics that a toddler could come up with. Seriously - as good as gameplay can be, there's no excuse for shoddy graphics when the devs don't have the excuse of technical limitations to fall back on. The whole "retro indie art" thing smells of laziness and for most people I know, the late 80's and early 90's were a far more enjoyable period so why don't we see more indie games like Gemini Rue which does it the right way? VGA drawn backdrops and proper animation?

If a 2-3 person team could do it in 1988, why can't people do it today? There's tons of art students these days too, or are they too busy wanking over their iPad that they can't be bothered to make good and honest pixel art? *rant over*

Sometimes it is. But who cares about the graphics? If I wanted graphics, I'd buy AAA title.

What I seek in indie gaming is artistic integrity. Graphics from Lone Survivor look beautiful to me. Same goes for La Mulana.