Games As Art Evaluation

Evaluation

When the Games As Art project began, I started to research games which i found to be unique in their own ways. I looked into: Gone home, Flower, Journey, Neverending Nightmares, Kraven Manor and The Long Dark. Although my ideas didn't link to these games much i still wanted to look into the six games as each one has a very unique and different experience for each person who plays them.

After my research was finished, I thought about what i wanted to be the main experiences for the player. I decided to choose first person experience, freedom to explore, unique antagonist, unknown ending and hidden secrets. The reason why i chose the above experiences is because i think it will give each player a different feeling towards my game and each person will come out with different ideas about what the ending of the game is. Afterwards i began to get story ideas down, I came up with three ideas my first idea was a hostage situation, my second idea was escaping convict/mental asylum and my final idea was missing friend.

I chose to create concept work for my second idea, the reason why i chose this idea over the other two is because I felt I could create something really unique and very different. The other two ideas seemed to predictable for me, and i wanted something more complicated for the player.
Now i had my chosen idea I wanted to put more into the idea itself, this is when i began to think about the antagonist Twitchy. I thought about what could make Twitchy a unique antagonist. I came up with three ideas which could make Twitchy a game mechanic, my first idea was to have him narrate over the game and help the player and give them guidance on where important things may be hiding but i thought this has been done before so I canceled this idea. My second idea was to have Twitchy again narrate over the game but to have him try and make the player do things they shouldn't do, basically give the player a hard time, also this time Twitchy would try and lead the character away from importation areas. I personally really liked this idea. My last idea was to have the player be able to control Twitchy so for example you could command him to open a door, distract a guard, kill somebody etc. Again i did like this idea but i felt like it had already been done. So i chose my second idea as i thought this was best suited and would help make my game unique.

As my game contains a hidden story, I now needed to think about what hidden links I should add to the game. The hidden links are: find out how long you have been in prison, written letters from you sent to your family stored in a file room, Clues which point out that Twitchy isn't real, find out what you did to end up in prison, find clues which point out that you are a patient not a convict, find a key and a riddle. The player will find these links across the playable area but must piece the hidden story together for their self's.

Now my story was coming together, I started to create concept work for Twitchy's bust.



This was my first design of Twitchy, the quick sketch on the left shows how I created the form for the face. I did like this drawing but the nose was to big and not life like at all.

These two were my second and third drawings of Twitchy, I liked the hair on the drawing on the left so I considered to use that hairstyle on my final piece. On the right i tried to create a more slightly overweight version of Twitchy but i didn't like this version as i don't think he looked tough enough to play my antagonist.






I then decided to get some nose practice in, as my previous nose drawings were very poor and didn't consist much form in that area.

These drawings of Twitchy looked slightly better in the shading part of things. But the proportions were still slightly off on the left drawing. But i did like how i created his slightly shut eye, as it gives his name a true meaning. I did like the right drawing but it was to much like Samuel Jackson from Pulp Fiction.

This is my final drawing of Twitchy from the front. I am pleased with the final

drawing, his proportions look a lot better then previous attempts, i would of liked to go back and changed the forehead shape looking at it now but i'm still please with the finished piece.

Once the front of the head was done I moved on to creating the side of the head, as it was my first time drawing the head from a side view, I did some research on ways to draw the head from a side angle to help me.

The research I found pointed me at these two ways of drawing the human head from the side. I found the second way to be more useful as i could add more detail and i could create a more realist form. I think the first way of drawing may be more useful in cartoon drawings.

I then moved onto drawing the head on a bigger scale, i found it to be much easier than the smaller drawing practice above. I just needed to add more detail and create a larger back to the head.

As you can see to the left i lined the eyes and mouth across the cheek and forehead to create the correct size for the ear. I did this because the average human ear should line up with those parts of the face.

My final drawing of the side of the head for Twitchy. I am pleased with the final outcome, i manged to create a detailed inner ear, i also like the shape of the nose i created. Looking at the drawing now i think i should have made the ear just a slight bit bigger.

The side of the head was complete, i now had to create the back of the head.

Here is my first attempt at drawing the back of the head. I was trying to get the right proportions and form right, i think i did okay for my first attempt.

My second attempt at drawing the back of the head, here i think the neck is too long and the trapezius muscle inst raised high enough. 

Here is my final drawing of the back of Twitchys head, I think I did okay, i would of liked to make it look more realistic looking back at it now.

All my traditional drawings were now complete for Twitchy so I decided to create a orthographic of Twitchy's bust on Photoshop. Unfortunately i didn't take screenshots or regular saves of step by step progress of the orthographic so I will try and explain as much as I can how i went about creating the piece.

To create this orthographic, i first went round each imported drawing to get the outline and minor details. I then created a basic light brown color for the base of the skin. I began from the left image, i began by shading in some details such as the wrinkles on the forehead and the cheek bone. After that I did some shading under the jaw line on the neck, i then moved to the nose and created some more shading there. Afterwards i moved to the eye and quickly created a simple looking eye ball. I then moved onto the ear, this took me the longest as the ear can be very detailed with all the different shadows cast in the canal, under the helix and by the concha. I then finished with creating the hair. 

I did the same with the front view except I've just realized I have forgotten to add wrinkles to the head, something i must not forget to do next time.

The back of the head was very simple, i just needed to add tone behind the ears and down each side of the back then create the hair.

Afterwards i began to model a 3D version of Twitchy in Mudbox.

I began my Mudbox model with a basic head to begin with.

I then added a nose to begin with, I did this as its the center of the face and i thought it might be best to build around the center. 

Afterwards i created eye sockets ready for the eye balls to sit in. The sockets on the left is slightly higher as this is the eye that has a constant twitch. 

Here i changed the jaw line of Twitchy.

I then started to create the lips, the lips took my awhile as I am very, very bad at creating the lips so I made sure i took extra long. I also adjusted the nose.

Again i'm still working on the lips and adjusting the nose.

The lips are now finished so I sent the model to Maya to create some eyes, and then sent the eyes to Mudbox.

I then started creating eye lids, I also made a slight change to the chin.

Here is my finished Mudbox model of Twitchy. To finish him off i added his hair, a few wrinkles around his twitchy eye, some chest muscle to make him more masculine and i also raised his trapezius muscle up.

I thought I would take the bust I made for Twitchy into Maya and add some light effects i did a front view with basic light.

What i did here was show his twitchy eye and hide the normal side of his face. I did this to try and show that Twitchy has two personality's one which wants to help and the other which is trying the make the player go somewhere they shouldn't.

I also created four ambient occlusion shots.

Now Twitchy's bust was finished I thought i would create two of my hidden links the first one i created was the key. I began with a few simple drawings and then created my final drawing.

Here are my first three drawings, i liked 1 and 2 the most, 3 was just to sci-fi looking for my game. So i thought i would dismiss idea 3. 

I then created this key, and i liked it that much I decided to have this as my design. It fitted the game perfectly, it looks slightly old which is what i was aiming for. 

Here is the 3D model version of the key. I am happy with the way the key looks. I looks very old and weird, which was the design i was going for.

The second link I wanted to create was the computer. Again i began by creating some simple sketch's.

Here I was just designing what i wanted the monitor, mouse and keyboard to look like.

This is my final drawing for the computer. Its a simple drawing but i'm happy with it.

This is the front view of the computer i created, the screen seems slightly which is something i would like to change in the future.

Here is the side view of the PC i created i think it looks realistic. I'm happy with the outcome.

This is the back of my computer, it looks slightly of balanced but that is because i had to take the picture with my phone as Maya wasn't rendering for me.

I think if i was to do this project again, I would have attempted to texture the two hidden links instead of using Mayas color applicator. I also think I would have tried to create a full body Mudbox model just to see if i was capable of creating something so complex in a short amount of time. Overall I am happy with the outcome of this project and I think i have learnt a lot and will use what I have learnt in future projects.

Chad Greenway.