Cell shading first appeared in the Jet Set Radio Series of games, to much fan fare. It was followed by titles like Auto Modellista, Viewtiful Joe, Robotech: Battlecry, and The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker. Many said that it was a gimmick used mostly on mediocre titles to help them sell. The games coming out this console generation using Cel-shading may cause many to rethink this opinion.

Cel-shading was a technic used to give 3D objects a flat cartoon like appearance. In the past this was done by giving each object a basic texture, often a solid block of color. A texture might have very minor details, but they almost always look like they are in pristine condition.

The latest technics in cel-shading throw this simplicity out of the window. The latest Prince of Persia due out this December on Xbox 360 & PS3 goes way beyond the simple textures.

While the textures are not photo-realistic they are not the South Parkesque graphics we are used to seeing coming from the cel-shading corner. Ubisoft Montreal has been able to turn a technique once used for cartoony graphics into something that is highly stylized. Gone are the solid blocks of color, in their place are highly detailed textures showing off wear and tear, stains and other such conditions. One thing that hasn’t changed with cel-shading is the thick outlines that maintain the hand drawn look. One thing is clear, cel-shading has most definitely moved out of the gimmick category. Hats off to Ubisoft Montreal for what it has done with cel-shading. Lets hope that more developers choose to use stylized graphics rather than trying to achieve photo quality realism.