Long time no see indeed...

Currently not really working specifically on any games so obviously this blog will probably be at a bit of a standstill. But am still dipping toes in some projects though such as attempting to mount an interactive portfolio/website thingie in flash.

So here's me. Walking. Forever!

At least until I hopefully finish the website or else I really will be walking forever.

Long time no see

As I've been busy with my thesis and my teammate has also been busy with his, Blooning Away hasn't really had an update for a while, although I did update/streamline the look of the objects in the game when I felt like working, but not on the thesis. Here are some before and after animations and why it changed.

BEFORE

Drawn in illustrator using a brush to give it a handdrawn look, which I thought would contrast nicely with the very clean background but also be a quicker artstyle, making production faster.

AFTER

Seeing the handdrawn objects in the build and animated did not satisfy me. The clash between the squeaky clean background lines and the messy handdrawn felt too big and therefore I opted for a cleaner line (it's not pixelated as the gif might suggest) using the pen tool instead. Surprisingly it does not take that much longer to draw and animate with this style.

B'looning Away, background art

Despite taking a break from it for several months now, I'm slowly returning to it. Background art is completely finished but right now I need/want to start some prototyping before moving on to more art.

In the meantime, some cuts of the background art.

 

 

 

B'looning Away, back to work

One month of vacation over and it's back to work. Here's what I slowly managed to finish within the last week (working a bit slowly at the moment, adjusting to not being on holiday anymore). However despite working a bit slowly at the moment, I can see this project finishing for january.

We're moving into space with a space hotel. (Very Jetsons inspired)

In development: B'looning Away (mini-update)

My development frenzy for B'looning Away has kind of died down now after the initial 2-3 weeks of total excitement and now it's down to work. Although in that time I did manage to squeeze out backgrounds for 3 out of 5 levels, so it's been a very productive frenzy.

Here is a shoehouse for the game.

In development: B'looning Away

No rest for the wicked, I've started working on a game again almost right after finishing up all the mandatory semester projects.

The basic concept is the same as Neno from my first semester, however it will be completely redone and all the extra narrative and gameplay stuff that was piled onto the Neno will be stripped off, so it will end up being the concept initially pitched. The reason why it's important for me to remake and work with this concept again is that I feel it has potential to be an interesting experience (although not necessarily a game). There's something very innocent and nostalgic about blowing around a balloon.

The game will now be about a boy who has lost his balloon (so there is no longer a boy from space). The player will then be left to explore the universe and fly higher up or collect things to fly down and reunite the balloon with the boy. The balloon will always be moving upwards in a certain speed unless the player collect things which will weigh it down for a while, and then it starts moving up again. A very simple premise for what is a very simple game.

Although I initially thought I was going to reuse the art assets from Neno, I ended up redoing everything again and it looks much nicer now when there's no time constraint and absolute creative freedom. In fact I am enjoying creating assets for this game so much, that I ended up having made the background for the first level within one week, but there's still a long way to go.

In development: The date

This is second game that I'm working on this semester next to the Octave project. This game is part of a course called Persuasive and Serious Games and therefore must contain some sort of purpose outside the game itself.

The game is called The Date and is about creating awareness around OCD. As it is a disorder that manifests itself in actions, it lends itself well to videogames, as games are mostly about actions.
The premise is: You play as Mark, a little guy just going about his daily business, but as the game progresses you start to do more and more compulsive behavior and in the end the OCD takes over your life.
The most important point to make here is that the player is not told that his character has OCD, but instead it is something the player gradually "gives" his character.

During a game (any game not just this one), so many compulsive actions are being made, and why? Because often we are rewarded with scores which just makes us feel good. They might not contribute to anything but yet we always have an urge to max out the score. This notion is what we build this game on as the player will automatically have an urge to seek out high scores and through that will contribute to his character's OCD. That way we are trying to create a bridge between the character's OCD and the player's compulsive in-game behaviour in an attempt to make an effective game about OCD.

In this project I'm working with three other people and I play the role of designer/writer and artist. This is actually the first game where I am not 100% in charge of art but rather just dealing with the character(s) and GUI, which is really nice. Also it's a new experience trying to blend two artists' styles together, but I think we have managed quite well.

Here's the token one graphic per blogpost, an animated GIF of the walking cycle I did for the main character.

In development: Octave (pt 2)

Pre-production is about to finish (or it actually just finished recently) on the massive game development project for this semester about the mad composer Octave Hertz Hobbman.

The pre-production period can be summed up in three words. No more art (please). As said in the previous post about Octave I was handed a triple role in this production including the role of 2d artist and therefore also designer of characters. I think I might have underestimated the scale of this role a little bit because thinking back on the pre-production I've been drawing A LOT, providing blueprints for the 3D artist, concept art (for something to look at I guess), sketches for all kinds of stuff. So what do you do if work starts to flood over, you delegate the task of designing some assets to the project manager and hey presto! Work has kind of been levelled out again (but not really, I still feel like I'm constantly working).

The art stress is also due to the fact that the design document as well as the narrative had to be pinned down in this period, which is why I really felt the heat. As artist is also my least favourite role and something I had preferred to hand over to someone more capable obviously I feel that it takes up too much of my time. But luckily the design document and narrative is now done and so I can ease a bit on those roles as I head into the production phase as an artist and writer (and UI designer), so hopefully I'll be able to enjoy the role of artist a bit more now.

RANT OVER.

The game feels like it's going to be good and we have a very balanced team (consisting of people who fill out all the roles pretty well). My only doubt right now is concerning the battle mechanic, which consist of a timer wheel where the player has to time mouseclicks with the right parts of the circle. All this is done in real time and from the sound of where the gameplay/level designer is headed, it sounds like there will be a fairly large amount of enemies. I don't like the sound of that because it's sounds like a difficult and frustating game, taking a fairly long amount of time to form a combo in order to battle just one enemies, if there are more of them, well...

But we shall see, scaling the number of enemies down will be easy enough, so might as well stress the engine and run lots of them in the testings, I guess.

Lastly here are some sketches of the combat wheel (cadence wheel as we call it), in case my description didn't make sense:

In development: Octave

Another semester, another game. Actually not only one game, but possibly three games to be handed in at the end of the semester which I'm already starting to stress about a little.

The first one I will introduce here is the biggest project called Octave and developed in a six man (and woman) team. What is the most interesting part about this project compared to the project last semester is that it has to be in 3D and that everyone in the team will have clear roles and responsibilities. A bit like a tiny development studio.


My role in this team is lead designer, writer and 2D artist. I'm quite happy about the first two roles as they were the ones I had originally hoped for and as we didn't have any 2D artists as such in our group, I was handed that role as well.
So responsibilities are mostly write material for the game, including setting up the game narrative, writing dialogue as well as writing in-team communication in regards to the game, in other words I'm responsible for writing almost everything in the development.

We have another designer in the team who is given the task of being both level and gameplay designer meaning that he will handle and produce all the smaller bits of the design and work out how exactly those things communicate with each other. I, as a lead designer on the other hand, have a more overall role of creating and securing a unified look and feel to the game. That is not to say I won't get involved in the other fields, I just won't be responsible for making it function in practical terms.

I predict it will be a gruelling development phase of about 3-4 months, but we'll make work.

Anyway, here is a short description of Octave and a piece of concept art I made:

Travel inside the mind of troubled composer Octave Hertz Hobbman, explore the depths of his creativity and the darkness that hides within it.
Use the unique recital battle system, where you, the player, creates and recites music to combat inner demons and restore the sanity of Hobbman


Octave is a third person action adventure game that places heavy emphasis on the musical world of the main character, Octave Hertz Hobbman. A unique recital system gives the player the opportunity to recreate powerful music to dupe and defeat enemies as well as manipulate the environment.

The dictator (on hold)

I have decided to put the dictator on hold for now. Something that unfortunately happens too often, where I start a project and end up putting it on hold (sometimes definate, sometimes not).

The reason why is mainly that I suddenly got busy with two game projects in spring semester and a programming project (likely also a game). And frankly juggling around four digital games is no fun.
The other reason is my insecurities as an artist. I want this game to look good (better than the ones I've made before) and in order to do that, I either need to find an artist or become a better artist myself, both of which will take time.

It's always a bit of a downer when you have to put a project on hold, especially one where you actually have put in some work rather than just conceptualising. But I am however working on a new and physical game, where my programming skills aren't needed and art consists mainly of graphic design, so this will be a nice break from all the digital games I have to make this semester.

Here are some backgrounds I tried to make for The Dictator:

And a walkcycle for the main character:

In development: The dictator (working title)

So this is the current AGS-project I'm working on at the moment.

The "enigmatic" ruler of a small tropical island banana republic is being overthrown by the people. Apparently they do not understand the true reason why the president has been flushing the state finances, being of course that he has taken it upon himself to personally protect the island assets in case of an emergency. Such as a hack-attack draining the island funds or war.
However the people do not know what is the best for them and is now trying to overthrow the president. Help him out!

The game is a traditional point-and-click adventure and development progress so far is: Design and puzzles are about 100 % complete, however everything else is kind of pending and I haven't started any scripting yet, as I don't have any art yet.

But... here's sketches of the unnamed president.

In development: The balloon game (working title)

So this is the game I'm currently working on at MTG. We're reaching the final stages of development with only about two weeks to go before deadline. The team consists of Jens Højlund Lauridsen, Troels Frostholm Mogensen, Emil Norsk-Nielsen and myself.

Basically it's a browser game about a boy from space who has been left behind on earth, with the help of a balloon and people he meets on the way, he will now try to make his way back to his home planet.

I am completely in charge of art in this game which reflects in a rather childlike and innocent artstyle, taking a bit inspiration from Paper Mario (with the white borders of objects) as well as Yoshi's Story with a fairly flat and significantly different background.

In the earlier concept art, the boy as well as the general look of items had a thick black outline whereas background objects (such as the island beneath) had a watercolor painted style. However the black outline caused problems as the blue background got darker further up making it impossible to see the outline. This is why we/I ended up going for the white paper cut-outs. 

The background also changed from the impressionistic painted to a more stylistic shaded look (compare between the island in picture 2 and the background, picture 4). The reason for this was partly because the new look afforded more detail, I was inspired by drawings from another member of the team and also because I couldn't find the brush I had used earlier for the impressionistic look.

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