Okay, let me tell you about this little project I did, trying to get that ‘2000s model’ vibe going again.
How it Started
So, I was digging through some really old backup drives the other day. Found a folder packed with stuff from way back, maybe around 2003, 2004? Lots of old game screenshots, some early 3D experiments I’d totally forgotten about. Man, it hit me how different things looked back then. Rough, blocky, kinda weird textures, but honestly? It had a certain charm, you know?
That got me thinking. Could I actually recreate that specific look today? Not like, super accurately, but capture the feel of it. Just for kicks, really. A little trip down memory lane using the tools I know now.
Getting Hands Dirty
First thing, I fired up Blender. Yeah, I know, we got all this fancy stuff now, high poly counts, PBR textures, the works. But the goal was to resist all that. I had to intentionally keep things simple, almost fight the urge to add detail.
I started blocking out a basic character shape. Really basic. Think low polygons. Like, count ’em on your fingers low. I was constantly checking the poly count, trying to keep it down, like how they had to back then because the hardware just couldn’t handle much.
- Kept the shapes chunky.
- Avoided smooth curves where possible. Hard edges were the name of the game.
- Focused on the silhouette, making sure it was readable even if super simple.
Getting the shape wasn’t too hard, the real headache was the texturing. That’s where the 2000s look really lives or dies, I reckon. Back then, texture maps were tiny. Like, 256×256 pixels, maybe 512×512 if you were lucky? And often kinda blurry or pixelated in a specific way.
So, I grabbed Krita and started painting textures. I deliberately used a small canvas size. Tried to use colors that felt a bit washed out or overly bright, like you saw in games from that era. Getting the lighting baked into the texture was key too. None of this fancy real-time lighting stuff. I painted in shadows and highlights directly onto the texture map.
It took a few tries. My first attempts just looked… bad. Not charmingly retro, just sloppy. I had to dial it back, study some old game assets more closely. Realized the seams were often pretty obvious, the UV mapping wasn’t always perfect. So, I allowed some of that roughness to creep in. Didn’t try to hide the UV seams too much, let the pixels show a bit.
The Result?
End of the day, I got this model sitting there. It’s definitely not gonna win any awards today. It’s blocky. The texture looks kinda crunchy. But honestly? It feels like something ripped from an old PS2 or Dreamcast game. It’s got that specific flavour.
Was kinda satisfying, really. Not about making something technically impressive, but about chasing a feeling, an aesthetic from a different time. Just a simple exercise messing around with limitations, even if they were self-imposed this time. Good fun.
