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It depends in what way you talk about 2 or 3D. For example, R-Type Delta (a remake of the original R-Type) has 3D graphics - but the gameworld is very much 2D...
Cell-shading pretty much takes the opposite approach - it's takes a 3D gameworld and makes it look 2D..
When 2D is mentioned, I immediately tend to think of sprites/bitmaps, but this is not necessarily true. Is the original Tekken a 3D beat-em-up? Not really when you compare it to Soul Calibur. Tekken only allowed you to fight on 1 plane - it was a 2D gameworld, rendered using polygons (3D) whereas SC allows you to move in all directions...
I don't think 2D gameworlds will ever die, there are some genres (shoot-em-ups being the most obvious) that work best as 2D games. However, traditional 2D sprites/bitmaps are definitely on the way out - but with cell-shading, is that really a great loss?
- S
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