Game design: Drawing influences/ingredients from the past
Posted: Tue Mar 15, 2016 1:08 am
I started out making maps in strategy games like age of empires but I could never get anyone to play on the maps I made. Eventually I went on to tinkering around with two Unreal tournament game mods other guys had given up on. They stopped development and gave away all their code & models to the public to play with. One guy showed how to compile his source code which allowed me to tinker then recompile it to see what the changes did. Eventually using my native programming knowledge as a base I learned how to code in unreal script by using that method.
I grew up on anime and like stuff like cowboy bebop, ghost in a shell, boogiepop phantom, samurai champloo, vampire hunter D, etc.
That said I've become really self conscious of where my influences come from and try to keep them in check. After working with other people I've noticed that people have a tendency to draw heavily from what they already know and normalize it as though there isn't anything else. I've made a conscious decision to look at lots of traditional games and art styles throughout the "African World"
Games
Art
There is a rich visual aesthetic history to draw from and I've been big into drawing as much in as possible. Ernie Barnes is my favorite right now because it's so distinct. When you see anime you know what it is because it's visually so distinct and Ernie Barnes art work is distinct as well.
I'm strongly thinking about an HTML5/PHP(so anyone around the world can play it) 2D game that's based in Africa and I'm thinking "man how am I going to build that from the ground up". I'm just so used to 3D now. I'm thinking about building the environments in 3D using Unreal engine then making 2sec gifs out of the environments to use in the back drop with static 2D images as an overlay for characters and to signify their actions
Costume & Dress
It was my reading of history, folklore, Nigerian village movies, etc that made me realize how different it was to a lot of the themes in western media. You had the same elements(we're all human) but they were used different ...especially not as much violence for the sake of violence. Most of the stories have to do with society and community with action used more as a utility that moves the society one way or the other. It's a means to an end instead of an end unto itself I.E drama & violence merely for the sake of entertainment.
A lot of people think their idea's are just something they thought of out of thin air; like they haven't been influenced by their life's experiences (which are often "Eurocentric" in nature) That said I get annoyed that we are placed(by no fault of our own) in a position to embrace other peoples tradition/culture not so much purely out of genuine interest but also because we didn't have adequate access to our own heritage(which was/is caused by those same Europeans). But that's a whole nother topic so...
I grew up on anime and like stuff like cowboy bebop, ghost in a shell, boogiepop phantom, samurai champloo, vampire hunter D, etc.
That said I've become really self conscious of where my influences come from and try to keep them in check. After working with other people I've noticed that people have a tendency to draw heavily from what they already know and normalize it as though there isn't anything else. I've made a conscious decision to look at lots of traditional games and art styles throughout the "African World"
Games
Art
There is a rich visual aesthetic history to draw from and I've been big into drawing as much in as possible. Ernie Barnes is my favorite right now because it's so distinct. When you see anime you know what it is because it's visually so distinct and Ernie Barnes art work is distinct as well.
I'm strongly thinking about an HTML5/PHP(so anyone around the world can play it) 2D game that's based in Africa and I'm thinking "man how am I going to build that from the ground up". I'm just so used to 3D now. I'm thinking about building the environments in 3D using Unreal engine then making 2sec gifs out of the environments to use in the back drop with static 2D images as an overlay for characters and to signify their actions
Costume & Dress
It was my reading of history, folklore, Nigerian village movies, etc that made me realize how different it was to a lot of the themes in western media. You had the same elements(we're all human) but they were used different ...especially not as much violence for the sake of violence. Most of the stories have to do with society and community with action used more as a utility that moves the society one way or the other. It's a means to an end instead of an end unto itself I.E drama & violence merely for the sake of entertainment.
A lot of people think their idea's are just something they thought of out of thin air; like they haven't been influenced by their life's experiences (which are often "Eurocentric" in nature) That said I get annoyed that we are placed(by no fault of our own) in a position to embrace other peoples tradition/culture not so much purely out of genuine interest but also because we didn't have adequate access to our own heritage(which was/is caused by those same Europeans). But that's a whole nother topic so...