The Making of a Strategy Game Art Guide a Case Study
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The making of a strategy game art guide A case study Historisk-filosofiska fakulteten Institutionen för speldesign Cecilia Bexander Kandidatuppsats inom Speldesign, 15hp Speldesign och Grafik Handledare: Adam Mayes & Stellan Sundh Examinator: Iwona Hrynczenko Januari, 2014 Index 1 Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 3 1.1 Aims and Purposes ............................................................................................................................... 3 1.2 Background and purpose ..................................................................................................................... 3 1.3 Research Question ............................................................................................................................... 4 1.4 Previous research ................................................................................................................................. 4 1.5 Method ................................................................................................................................................. 5 2 Working Process ..................................................................................................................................... 7 2.1 Structure and Outline ........................................................................................................................... 7 2.2 Development of the art guide ............................................................................................................ 10 3 Analysis ................................................................................................................................................. 11 3.1 Project outline .................................................................................................................................... 11 3.2 Choice of layout .................................................................................................................................. 12 3.3 Diary ................................................................................................................................................... 14 3.4 Feedback ............................................................................................................................................ 15 4 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 16 4.1 The Artwork ........................................................................................................................................ 16 4.2 The Art Guide ..................................................................................................................................... 16 4.3 Work challenges ................................................................................................................................. 17 4.4 Feedback ............................................................................................................................................ 17 4.5 Reflection ........................................................................................................................................... 18 4.6 Further research ................................................................................................................................. 18 5 References ............................................................................................................................................ 19 5.1 Imagery .............................................................................................................................................. 20 6 Appendix ............................................................................................................................................... 20 Abstract Literature and teaching books about how to make art for games have been accessible but the area lacked covering of genre-specific game art. Game genres require different solutions for the art in order to aid playability of the final product. My game project, called DOMAINS was made with an outside team. The project together with my first art guide about the cinematic platformer genre provided materials for the writing of the next game art guide. The old art guide was used as a template for the new guide, which focused on the strategy game genre. This report contains the description of the process of making my second art guide, and the whole The Strategy Game Art Guide itself. It reviews both the successful and less successful implements in the game and will walk the reader through how the prior decisions were made and the consequences. It targets beginners in the game development world. Keywords: Game design, art guide, how to guide, book outline, game art, 2D graphics, strategy game. Cecilia Bexander[SIM3] Page 2 of 20 [email protected] 1 Introduction It is strongly recommended that you first read The Strategy Game Art Guide (Bexander 2012 a), included in the appendix, before you proceed. 1.1 Aims and Purposes There are two goals for this project. 1. The first goal of the project is to produce all the pixel art for a strategy game called DOMAINS. Pixel art is a form of digital art using raster images, and is edited on the pixel level. Pixels appear as tiny cubes in an extremely enlarged image. What the game required is a battle field, objects in the landscape such as boulders and trees. We have two teams with units (soldiers) with different characteristics units and a GUI, Graphic User interface. The art should in the end provide immersion and enhance the experience of the game for the player. 2. The second goal is to document the process of making the art and to create a pedagogical art guide with focus on the game genre named strategy. In other words, to create a helpful guide. The guide, The Strategy Game Art Guide, is meant to discuss implementing game design choices in concept art, illustrations and graphics. The goal of the guide itself is to show how to make game art as easy as possible to understand and appealing for the end users. Also to show the reader one way how to design for an interactive audience in mind and for a specific genre. 1.2 Background and purpose When I was new to the world of game design, I could not find strong visual instruction books for my skill level in the art of making graphics for games. To learn how to use the computer tools is one thing and often well-described in literature. But to understand how to graphically represent the game design in an effective way requires either experience or in depth instructions. At least I would have been greatly helped if I could have read an art guide before and during the production of my graphics for the game. I saw a need for literature about making specific game art. At 2011 I was approached by a group of young programmers (Plasma Cod Entertainment) who were looking for a graphic artist in order to make their game “DOMAINS” fully functional and enjoyable. At that time I could not set aside time to help them full time. My exam project gave an opportunity to help them and to use their enthusiastic endeavour and combine their work with mine to produce something playable. I also wanted to see if I could successfully use my previously written art guide (Bexander 2012 b) as a template for making a new one for another genre. This was the original idea at the start. Cecilia Bexander[SIM3] Page 3 of 20 [email protected] Much time could be saved in future artwork if artists can find effective ways of producing creative output. It should not be necessary to “re-invent the wheel” every time. The main contribution to this academic field of research with this report is therefore the description and completion of the art guide aimed for game developers on a beginner’s level. 1.3 Research Question During my education in Campus Gotland, few of my course literature were theories and practical hand-on instructions about how to make genre-specific game art. The knowledge itself seems to exist in the industry, because games sharing the same genre seem to follow the same visual pattern. But I was unable to find books about genre specific art in the bookstore and libraries. Theories and practical hands-on instructions about how to make genre-specific game art are a minority in bookstores and libraries. Even if the knowledge itself exists, not many industrial people had sat down and written books about it. What I witnessed was the existence of tutorials for art in general, which mainly focused on mimicking art styles and techniques and not instructing on how to adapt art to the gameplay and game design. An example when designing art with game design in mind is; if it is top down perspective, the art design should focus on what the player will see inside the game (top-down perspective show heads, and shoulders of the characters etc). Game art have multiple design goals in mind: Providing information about the game to the player Be appealing. I sense there is an unexploited market for game genre-specific art tutorials for beginners. I wanted to create the book I wish I had when I was about to work with my exam work, the DOMAINS game project. My research question is: How to combine a game project so it also results in a pedagogical guide for game genre-specialized graphics? 1.4 Previous research 1.4.1 Light composition When it comes to the knowledge