Valorant Art Style Analysis

 VALORANT Art Style Analysis ₊✩‧₊˚౨ৎ˚₊✩‧₊   

The hit game VALORANT made by Riot Games has a very distinct art style that you can recognize from a mile away. The VALORANT art style has a very clean version of stylized realism that is very easy to read what is going on. They use slightly exaggerated shapes, blockish rendering, and simplified details to make the character silhouettes more clear, using bold colors, and defined outlines so players can recognize the character straight away. 

To achieve this art style, you don't want to go full realistic. The artists of VALORANT use smoothing shading mixed with bold shapes which simplify details to make the characters recognizable. Instead of realistic skin textures and complex lightings like splash arts in League Of Legends use, they take a different approach. They use soft gradients and very sharp highlights which keeps the drawing clean and readable on a small screen. Usually there is two light sources, one is a very bright and sharp light source while the other one is a natural light source hitting the face directly and not from the side. 

Each portrait focuses on the characters face and expression to show their personality, for example, Clove has a lot of bright colors on her, with a soft smiling expression while on the other hand, Yoru, has his eyebrows furrowed with a mean expression. The artists will exaggerate small things like eyebrows, eye shapes, and posture so people can understand the characters personality.

Back to the lighting and colors, the artists will use strong lighting and color contrast to separate  the character from the background. Backgrounds in VALORANT are usually simple gradients to match the character. For example, darker or purpler tones are used for characters like Omen, while brighter and warmer tones are used for a character like Phoenix.