For this assignment, we were placed into groups with some students from the games course. I ended up in Group F with Joyce, Logan, Cathal, Cliodhna, Jack and Kaitlin. Once we were grouped up, we were then split into subgroups and given the task to come up with 10 game ideas that related to the word “Unstable”. Once we had these ten ideas then we had to regroup into our main group and pick our favourite 3.
The three ideas that were presented were “Dragon Fight”, “Airplane Crash” and “Malfunctioning Robot escape”. I wasn’t really a fan of these ideas as I felt that they didn’t relate back to “Unstable” much and were also things that we were told not to think about. After we had presented these ideas, we realised these weren’t the best so Joyce and I suggested to the others that we each come up with a new game idea and see if we liked any.
For my game idea, I created a google slide about a 2.5D tower defence game. In this game you would play as a knight protecting your town and castle by building walls and defences that would keep enemies at bay and deal damage.
In the end, only Joyce and I had come up with ideas for the new game. Joyce had sent our pitches to lectures for feedback. The feedback we received was more in favour of Joyce’s pitch so we decided to go with that.
After we had an idea, we decided on what roles we wanted to do. Joyce and Kaitlin chose to work on characters and I decided to work on props and environment. I chose to do these two as I felt that doing the characters is a lot of work and I wanted to even the workload.
The games students at this point had not responded in the group chat that we had and had been leaving early before we could discuss things so began to just work as a smaller group while still sending in our progress and posting into the discord (with little to no response).
Once we had our roles, we created a Miro board to compile all our ideas and mood boards. For my mood boards, I gathered some style examples that I thought were good for a 2.5D game. I also gathered reference for the style that we had decided for our game and location references that I could use for the environment.
Art Research Activity
For one of our classes, we split into our small groups and dissected some art styles for 3 shows/movies/games of our choice. For our group we chose to do Klaus, Don’t Starve and Gravity Falls.
Gravity falls
Target audience– TVY7 (7 and up) but is more geared towards older audiences, such as tweens and teens.
Key influences – The Simpsons, Calarts Art style, easy to animate art style, Similar to Adventure time and Regular Show which were airing at the same time.
What mood is it trying to convey through its art style? – Misleading ( Looks like a kids cartoon but show is kinda dark), Comedic/lighthearted,
Describe how you think the art compliments the storytelling in the piece – Misleading – art style is cheery in contrast to the storytelling/plot. Lot’s of unexpected events / plot twists. Backgrounds are quite muted which help showcase that the characters are in a rather boring and empty place. You can tell that the story if from the Twins pov due to the artstyle (quite rounded and friend shaped)
What does this piece do better than similar pieces? What does it do worse? – They have a better believable setting that is easy to get immersed in when compared to shows like Adventure time which was airing around the same time.
Come up with 3 Rules for this art style – Round eyes that are always stuck together and connected to the nose, use circular/ rounded shapes for the head and faces, avoid sharp edges; make them rounded.
Klaus
Targets audience – Aged 7 and Up, Families, can be enjoyed by all but most aimed towards a younger audience
Key influences– Anatomy is inspired by Despicable me proportions, the style seems to be inspired by a kids story book with its shading style and character shapes. It seems to have also taken inspiration with its style from the short film “Paperman” which was released in 2012 by Disney.
What mood is it trying to convey through its art style – Uplifting, Comfy, Cozy, from the lighting and atmosphere; it showcases that they are in a small town which they are.
Describe how you think the art compliments the storytelling in the piece – The shapes and designs of the townspeople help make Klaus look friendly and kinder in comparison. They heavily pushed the shape language in the character designs.
What does this piece do better than similar pieces? What does it do worse? When compared to Song Of the Sea, Klaus used lighting better to capture emotions and push the narratives. Klaus also has a wide variety of body shapes when compared to Song of the sea which only has a few.
Come up with 3 Rules for this art style: Lots of contrast in anatomy; big bodies/small limbs, long bodies/lanky skinny limbs, Play with shape language,
Don’t Starve
Targets audience – 13+, older audiences
Key influences– Tim Burton, expressionism (e.g The Scream)
What mood is it trying to convey through its art style– Spooky, Scary, Dark, Dreary, Vintage,
Describe how you think the art compliments the storytelling in the piece– the art compliments the time where the game takes place (1910-ish), it’s like watching old videos from that time, character style is more related to modern times. The character designs all look rather ghoulish and frail which sets the tone of the game which is about surviving in the dark.
What does this piece do better than similar pieces? What does it do worse? When compared to “our darker purpose”, Don’t Starve has limited body variation and doesn’t play with shapes as much. Don’t Starve however, captures textures better through their linework.
Style Guides
Using what little the games students posted in the Miro board, I created some 2D assets of the props that they had listed. They mentioned about the tools upgrading so I created a poor version and an upgraded version that was more inspired by the fish theme.
Once I had the tools done I photobashed some images to make environment concepts for the levels. I thought that caves would fit the inside of a whale rather well as they rather closed off.