Top 5: Grass in Gaming - Article
by Joseph Trotter , posted on 25 June 2015 / 11,934 Views
Grass is all around me; in my hair, clothes, shoes, orifices.
Grass is such a token, staple of everyday life that it passes without comment, like an extravagantly rude innuendo or wind in an elevator. Few people look out into their small squares of suburban garden and proclaim ‘children! Wife! Look – the grass is terrific today’.
They might have killed their grass, cleaved it in favour of stones or slabs of concrete best used on a 60s high-rise. Some may have even saved grass, perhaps from their football team's pitch upon a stadium move, and they clutch it at night lightly sobbing, slowly grasping the fact that they are fans of Coventry City. People travel hundreds of miles to see grass without buildings. Grass on hills, next to lakes, sweeping across fields. People love grass, silently. But who says they love grass?
I do! I love grass! Particularly I love digital grass. For me not the soft brush of dirt across my trousers or the crippling hay-fever as I pass yet another field of barley for my work; no, I long for the swathes of pixelated graminoids that glisten in the sun, move entirely unnaturally out of a heavy-footed character and wilt under the hot, hot death of a spaceship's thrusters. Who has ever discussed grass in gaming? No one. Why? Because it would be ridiculous.
AND YET HERE WE ARE.
5) Star Fox Adventures (GameCube)
Star Fox Adventures is famous for two things: featuring characters that posh English people like to chase on horses, and grass. It was the last game developed for a Nintendo home console by Rare before they nestled into the thick, wadded buxom of Microsoft.
The shrubbery wasn’t the only appeal to this game, as alluring as it is, flashing its soft grassy legs under that long, black dress. Star Fox was graphically superb, with dazzling water-effects, character models and luscious worlds. But that grass. Detailed in a way unseen in console gaming at that point, you could see, nay feel the threads of individual leaves thrusting up from the dirt. And thus began my obsession with grass.
4) FIFA 15 (Everything)
How could it not be here, the series that gave to the world such wonderful manicured grass as that found in FIFA 98, FIFA 02, and the seminal FIFA 09. Even forgiving the black-sheep of the series, FIFA Street, which unwisely featured no grass at all, EA Sport's inexplicably popular series has always been at the forefront of quality grass interpretation.
You can almost touch it, smell it, roll around on it twenty times after being kicked by a young millionaire. It looks terrific - like a bowling green. The grass is better presented than the players, grotesque and lifeless as they are.
Sorry, I was getting the game confused with real life again.
3) The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker (GameCube)
Look! It's grass. But not. It looks real, in a cartoon way. Cartoon way. What the fuck Nintendo?
Many hated the new-look Wind Waker when its makeover - videogaming's own take on 'Snog, Marry, Avoid' - was revealed. More were converted when they finally played what was, arguably, the finest Zelda game.
But nobody hated the grass. It came in so many forms; flat, sticking up, slashable. It was filled with money, and sometimes floating hearts. What more can one want from their grass? My grass when I cut it merely results in shorter grass, but Link becomes a millionaire. More importantly, it was beautiful, befitting a beautiful game.
2) Leisure Suit Larry in the Land of the Lounge Lizards (PC)
Leisure Suit Larry was the game every teenage boy in the 80s wanted to make, and wanted to play. I was not alive in the 80s, and my only concern in that hedonistic decade was to be conceived. Eventually.
Leisure Suit Larry, among its many star turns, featured an awful lot of grass as you strolled through his boring, stilted world. Fields. Gardens. Cannabis. Marijuana. It is up there with the Grand Theft Auto series for 'best use of grass in a game.' In-fact, I was so inspired by the exploits of Larry that I visited my finest up-market dealer, which is how we come to this here article.
1) What Were We Talking About Again?
I can hear you all now:
'Wait, I got dragged through that nonsense for an infantile play on words?'
Yes.
Mucho gracias!
Thanks. That's another. I field your pain. Man, these jokes are cutting. Don't be too fore-lawn. Just another mow-tor mouth, right? I hope this ex-seeded your expectations.
I'm here all week. Try the chicken - it's delicious.
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Flower didn't even make it in the top 5 grass in gaming?
This joke article is a joke...
maybe went he post the guy smoke some GRASS before...
Grassgate #Grassmasterrace
Really? An article about grass in video games and Flower isn't in it? How is that even possible?
That's actually the first game I thought of when I read the title of the article.
Love in-depth articles like this one!
Muchas gracias*
Sheesh. I at least expect my jokes with good grammar!
You expect too much.
Grass is so underrated.
Serious lack of Flower in here. The PS4 version looks incredible.
Not sure if serious =D
Not sure if serious =D
Ebin! :-DD
Can Grass became new VGC meem?
Halo 1 has the best grass.
Great shout. I nearly put it in, until I remembered it was a joke article that needed a punchline.
Glad I'm not the only who loves video game grass. I'm really looking forward to Zelda U's grass, it looks amazing in the E3 2014 footage we have.
THE GRASS CORAL!!!!!!!
more articles like this one, pls. awesome.
Glad to see SFA got a mention, I remember being blown away by the grass and water effects when I first played the game with my room mate in college.
Far Cry 3 also had some sweet grass... and you could start brush fires with flaming arrows!
You want to see the best grass in a game? Nothing tops the grass in Flower. Nothing. If you disagree, then quit smoking grass yourself, you effin' loser!!!
You talking to me!!
Grass is the single most demanding object to render in games, bar none. Even smoke is easier than grass.
Oh, and Dat Grass is clearly number 1.
http://static-1.nexusmods.com/15/images/110/5097247-1363377699.jpg
Wow... This site is run by people that weren't even alive in the 1980's...
Crisis 3?
There is a severe lack of Xenoblade grass in this top.
Those grass killed my overkill graphic card. :-P
Late shout out to Viva Pinata for some outstanding grass.
Waiting for Zelda U. :)
So instead of actually updating sales on a site for video game sales you waste time making articles about grass?
pokemon has best grass
Now I want a TOP 20 STONES IN GAMING. No magic/special stones allowed, only regular stones found by the way
No mention of Flower or Skyrim Mods or Nvidia's Gameworks Grass. What total junk from this website.
While scrolling I expected to see Flower at #1. It isn't even there. You guys smoke the wrong grass.
MY DEEZ NUTS !!!
Wind Waker > everything puts on shades
It's "Muchas gracias", not "Mucho gracias"
Crysis 3 had excellent grass on PC.
