Games Design - Concept Art

Concept art is a MASSIVE part of the games design process I wish I was good at it and can produce some amazing pieces of work. I absolutely love concept art to be honest. I have a subscription to a monthly magazine about concept art called Imagine FX and every issue is just filled with great work. But back to the main point! Art! Concept art is what game developers will look at and work around for creating characters, levels, in-game objects, vehicles and many other parts of a game. It can vary from small sketches to a fully fledged work of art.

A concept artist's job is to bring the what is in the imagination onto paper and show it to the developers so that the next phase of the game can begin. Artist's wont just make a few sketches of a character and then move on. They will make possibly make 10-15 sketches and drawings of a character because they will take the first drawing to the developer and get feedback and refine it and this process will happen many more times before they come up with the final image.

The image that is above is a piece of art from Guild Wars 2. I cannot put into words how much I love that piece of work. I really can't. I wish that I could draw and paint to that level of skill although I know that it's nigh impossible :c

It is designs like this that will be used for the game and will be taken by the animators, created and rendered and then put into the game. All of this spawns from the image that is given to them by the artist.

Concept art comes in different styles and can vary from landscapes to vehicles to guns to characters to in-game paraphernalia. An artist that I follow on youtube is a guy called Feng Zhu. His work is just fantastic and covers anything from characters to level design. He has a unique style that I really enjoy and the final piece of work really looks spectacular and is something that I'd strive for if I could draw to that standard of work. His work is what I would love to be able to take inspiration from and be able to draw in a similar style. 

Below is just a snapshot of Feng Zhu's work.....its god damn beautiful.

Game Design - Logos

Game Logos

Game logos can be something simple from the good old N64 logo to the memorable Gears of War logo. A logo must be simple yet effective but also memorable versatile but most importantly it must be relevant to the game or company.

A logo will start off by being researched and planned. Artists will sketch and brain storm ideas that will eventually be whittled down into the final product and produced for the game or company.

A logo if done well can be memorable and will be instantly recognisable by players. Just looking at the image below it takes only a glimpse to know what each one of these logos derives from. Just a quick glance and the logos that jump out are the N64, Rockstar, God of War, Diablo and Bioshock. Each of these logos are completely different but just by a quick look each one is identifiable within a flash. The Bioshock logo is just so unique and is so well done because of the art deco style that is used through the game. The Half-Life logo is the lambda symbol and is used in the game as part of the secrets and achievements. Each of these are easy to recognise because of how iconic they are.

All in all a logo if done well will be a symbol that can stand out in the crowd. It will be something that players will look at in 5 or 10 years and still recall the game to memory because it is important that a logo is timeless. That it will stand the test of time and will be remembered for years to come.

Why do we play games?

Why do we play games?

Personally I believe we play games to escape from our daily lives. To find something that we could never experience normally. Look at Skyrim for example. How many of us will go around killing dragons and shooting fireballs out of our hands? Pretty sure no one can. It is this feeling of the surreal that I believe leads us to sit and spend hours immersed in a game chipping away at the story line desperate to know the next part of the adventure. 

We as humans crave the extra ordinary. We love to find new ways of completing tasks or discovering new things because humans an inquisitive by nature. Games nurture this, they help us evolve this understanding and desire for knowledge.  Even on a day to day basis we still make goals for ourselves and gamify things, so to speak. In the gym we try to 'level up' our muscles, in the library we try to 'level up' our intelligence...well this is how I see it but that's cause I am a nerd and enjoy games and putting them into my daily life. Anyway! I believe that games are so popular because they are a release for our creative juices and give us a way to express ourselves in our own little way. There are games that inspire us to go out and try new things, games that help us bond with friends and family, games that make us strive for that perfect 100% score and then there are games that make us want a zombie apocalypse so we can run around with chainsaws and brawling with the undead. Just normal gaming stuff really.

Regardless of what games a person likes they will always find some solitude in sitting there in their own little bubble, away from the world they know, and into their own adventure. This is why we play games. To experience the sensation of being somewhere else, to have the feeling of freedom of creativity and in the end. To have fun!

Games Design - Sound

Sound in a game can be one of the most crucial parts of a game. When talking about sound I mean both the ambient sound, the sound effects and the backing track of the game. Each one of these aspects all are important in their own way. Having good sound effects will make the game more real and believable. If you are playing a first person shooter and machine gun makes a "pew" sound effect then it won't be realistic, unless of course that is the amusing result you are aiming for. 

Sound effects can be simple little things that range from the 'waka waka' of Pacman to the Halo Plasma rifle. Each of these sounds are completely different from each other but each one does the job that is is supposed to do. 

Sound effects can be made with surprising ease, a great example is that sound of flesh being hacked by a sword. Take a cabbage and a big ol' butchers knife and SLAM and you have your sound effect. In a game sound effects that are well recorded and created will make a game more intense, for example if you are playing a zombie game and stab a zombie with a sword you will expect to here a squelch of some sort. If you do hear the gut spilling noise then you will be content and continue swinging but if you here a poor sound effect you won't stop playing the game but you won't get quite as excited at the chance to carve up the undead.

Soundtracks in games are, in my opinion, just as important as a soundtrack to a movie. Imagine watching Lord of The Rings or Star Wars without a soundtrack. Nothing that happened would be as dramatic and emotional. The "Imperial March" for Darth Vader is one of the most recognised piece of music in the film because of how iconic and dramatic it is.

You hear that and you immediately know that the Empire are about to show up on screen. The same ideals apply to a movie apply to a game. Music can make or break a game because having a good soundtrack will be noticed but not as much as if you have a bad soundtrack. The quote that comes to mind to describe this is, rather interestingly, from Futurama:

"When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all." 

A great, if not perfect example of a soundtrack that synchronises well with the game is The Elder Scrolls : Skyrim. The full soundtrack for that game is about 4 hours long (I know because I have it) I can imagine that every single player of Skyrim can recognise the main theme of the game instantly because of how strong a theme it is. The percussion leads in with the choir chanting the language of the dragons. A cresendo then takes the full orchestra into the iconic riff of the full theme and even listening to it in the main menu you feel inspired to fill the shoes of this fictional hero. However ask one of the players to listen to some of the ambient music for a cave and I can take a stab and say that very few of them will be able to guess that it is from Skyrim.

Personally I love a good soundtrack. It doesn't have to be a game soundtrack, it can be a movie soundtrack, a TV series soundtrack or in some cases a musical soundtrack. I can easily spend hours listening to orchestral music because it gives me something that other music can't and that is emotion and feeling. I'm not disputing that some music is sad, happy etc but there is just something about hearing a full symphony orchestra play as one living being that just makes me quite content and happy.