Don't really see that many of them. Astro Port obviously seems to have a few standby artists for all their projects who are very experienced, but the average doujin shmup has basically no animation budget.Obscura wrote:2. Doujin developers seem to be able to pump out games with 16-bit quality graphics. I mean, look at Astro Port's library; sure, it may be never-ending mediocrity game-wise, but there's a crap ton of pixel art that's faaaaar beyond the "NES limited" style that's en vogue now. Likewise, I know of at least one indie FPS with a graphical fidelity that, while not "modern AAA" quality, is far beyond the likes of Doom/Build Engine (that game is Wrack, go play it if you haven't, it's amazing).
Wrack probably have a larger and more experienced (in terms of game development) dev team than most doujin or indie arcade style games.
As it stands people go for 8-bit because its simply the realisticly best art style they can go for. 16 bit is ideal and doable imo but it's would probably take a larger team and development cycle than most indie arcade style games.