The Art of Flip's Adventure - A Post Mortem

Some links for more information regarding the game:

Facebook page


I was tasked to redesign the art about 3 months ago, before the start of the Fall semester. Here's how the game looked before:

To the programmers' credit, they did take the effort to find sprites that sort of fit into 1 theme. I quickly did a few  thumbnail drawings and color tests to see how I can improve the look. They gave me full liberties in terms of art direction, but I did not want to go too far off the original template they present me with.

I won't post any of the subsequent production art as I don't want to spoil anything for the potential players. The game should be out for download sometime between Christmas and the start of 2012, so do check back the Facebook page if you're interested. I shall proceed to share some lessons I've learned during this project.

What Worked


More than 50% of the art assets completed before the start of the semester
Fall 2011 was a relaxed semester, by Digipen's standards. However, I was still busy enough to go through a couple of late nights. That's why it was always good to already have much of the project in progress before the start of the semester. I will like to thank the programming team for spending the Summer holidays looking through and approving the art. Establishing a firm groundwork for the art pipeline is quite crucial, and we were able to start polishing and cleaning up by mid term.

Good communication between artist and coders
I think this is the most important thing to nail when it comes to game production. Very often, the artists don't get along well with the programmers, and it really hurts the production. When working on Flip's Adventures, there were very few instances of me having to go back and forth between my own work and the programming side. Everything seem to flow pretty smoothly, and thus the art production was pretty much on schedule for most of the times. Being on schedule allowed us to polish more and eventually add more stuff into the game (including the game story and achievements).

What did not work

Not enough research

This is the main grip I have with the art produced for the game. I have to admit that I was too eager to jump into production. This is my first game in what- 3 years? I wanted to start immediately, and therefore I skipped the research process entirely. And this mistake really came back and haunt me later on during the production. One main complain about the art was that everything looks too blocky because of the tile-based sprite system that we were using. I really should have surveyed other similar platforming games to see how the professionals deal with this problem.


No clear style
I wanted to follow the somewhat Sci-Fi looking theme originally presented by the programming team, but the end result looked like a mash up between futuristic and steam punk. This, coupled with a generic main character resulted in the programming team having to squeeze their brains to come out with a coherent story that can tie the whole game in. Once again, I blame this on the lack of research on my part. Testers mentioned the lack of a 'wow' factor, in which I totally agree.


In conclusion
This project is by no means a failure. In fact, it is quite well received by the lecturers and my peers. However, I do find a lot of room for improvements on my own part, and I'll definitely work harder on the next game project.

Pokemon

I love Pokemon.

I started playing the Blue version way back in Primary School.I remember skipping meals just to save up money to buy a Gameboy Pocket and the game cartridge. While I did not manage to catch 'em all, I had a lot of fun battling with my friends, with most battles ending in a classic final showdown between Mewtwo and Mewtwo. I did play all the subsequent versions, but the original generation of Red Blue and Yellow holds a special place in my heart.

When I saw this Zelda collage that was created to commemorate the 25th anniversary of that series, I was blown away. This is a piece of Zelda fanart that can end all Zelda fanarts. The sheer amount of details that are crafted into this super awesome artwork is staggering. I can really tell that the artist is an avid fan of the series.

Thus, when my digital painting lecturer called for a personal project as our final assignment, I immediately jumped onto the idea of creating a Pokemon fanart that tries to emulate the epic-ness of the Zelda collage. Multi-figure composition is also another field of study that I hope to explore in. I have always found difficulty trying to portray multiple characters within the same space of the painting, and I was hoping to learn a thing or two when constructing this piece of fanart.

I had several ideas of how the collage piece can look. The original one was to place the characters in a fashion similar to that of the Sistine Chapel ceiling. I remember reading about the Zelda Collage on Kotaku, and one reader commented that if there was a St. Peter's for games, that collage would definitely be on the Sistine Chapel. I played around with the idea a little, but realized that the characters and scenes are too separated, which goes against my multi-figure learning objectives.

The sketch is so rough, that you probably can't tell what's going on

I then proceed to experiment with placing characters like how a Marvel comic book cover would. In this way, I was able to divide and break out the page into individual episodes where I can place different groups of characters together. I settled on this idea, with the page consisting of the gym leaders at the left, elite 4 at the top, team rocket at the right and Ash Ketchum in the center.

I usually start a piece of artwork with very loose and sketching lines. Very often, the only person who knows what is going on in these thumbnails is myself, therefore I rarely, if ever, show these to anyone.

I then go on to refine the drawing until it is the viewer can recognize each character just by the lineart. This is the phase where I try to get all the problem solving done. It is always very difficult to try to correct drawing errors during the painting stage, so I try to minimize that by doing a very clean sketch.

Next, I do a quick color test, slapping in tones to suggest the where the lighting is coming from. I switch back and forth constantly between color and grayscale to check on the tonal values. I also keep another window of the artwork, displaying at a smaller resolution, at the side of the screen to make sure that the entire composition reads. This is important as there are many characters present here, and I want to make sure that Ash is always the center of attention.

And finally, the finished piece

This piece took me more than 40 hours from conception to final realization. While it did not turn out nearly as epic as I would have imagines, I am still quite happy with the results. Next time: All 600+ Pokemons!

The Case Against Video Games

I was reading Digital Art Masters Volume 4 a while ago and came across the article by Weiye Yin for his artwork Fly Together. He was talking about how he was inspired to create the image from a wooden toy from his childhood. As discussed in an earlier post, i believe that inspiration comes from everywhere. But I think that we often get inspired from past experiences and events, particularly from our childhood. And that got me thinking.

Kids this days play a lot of video games, whether it's on a PC, a console or a handheld device. Don't get me wrong, I grew up playing games too and I am glad I did. Video games (or at least, the good ones) transport the player to a brand new fantasy world, thereby stimulating the imagination. The only problem is that the experience is predetermined by someone, often the game designer. This person is the "God" of the universe that takes the player plays in, controlling what can or cannot be done.

This is different when kids interact with a real life toy. They create their own rules. They determine which toy is the protagonist and which is the antagonist. By mixing up the toy components (Lego, anyone?) the player can create their own environments. They are the "Gods" of their own universe. They create their own stories and scenarios. Now you could argue that games these days also encourage user generated content like Little Big Planet, or take a more sandbox approach like Grand Theft Auto where the player can do whatever he wants. But with all due respects to these games, I think it would be hard for a kid to intuitively and quickly establish his or her own world through the medium of video games.

In contrast, the sky is the limit when interacting with real life objects. Back in the day, me and friends could come up with more than a dozen ways to have fun with a ball. Its this kind of limitless possibilities that is lacking with games right now. And it is this factor that really opens up the kid's imagination and cognitive abilities.

I was lucky, growing up in the '90s and getting to experience the best of both worlds. I hope this post isn't one of those "old dude trying to diss at the current generation" rants. But maybe next time you should think twice before introducing that iPad game to your 5 year old cousin.