Honestly, one of the most consistent things I feel like I've learned from researching low-poly modeling (and making a 3D game) is that... the actual geometry being especially cool and elegant is really not relevant to the experience of the game 95% of the time. (1/5)

There's so much going on visually with materials and lighting and rendering plus the fact that the visuals provide information to guide interaction. Overall art direction and design before you get to the modelling stage is much more important (2/5)

That said, an elegant model is fun and satisfying and nice for its own sake! And of course you need low-poly stuff sometimes for performance reasons. But a lot of professional low-poly stuff is pretty straightforward, essentially it's as good as the character designs are. (4/5)

And also a lot of BEAUTIFUL games have some pretty dorky models haha. Like this dude from Panzer Dragoon Saga is nothing to write home about, but this game is incredibly gorgeous thanks to the art direction, design, texturing, etc. (There are also very cool models in this game)

IDK if this is encouraging? Maybe a bit demystifying? 3D modelling software is so complex that it's easy to want to figure out some magical perfect way to model. But with low poly... you can just trust yourself, trust what you see, don't try too hard, and have fun! (5/5)