Turbine Nation
Rockton and the other artists are busily at work expanding the eye candy of the game, over and above all the hard work they put in for "small" additions such as the dozens of quest related and rare items added on a regular basis. Turbine Nation gave us a sneak peek at some of what they have done and what they are currently working on. It also gave us some insight on the real variety of their job.
Well, the first things we were shown were some of the new creatures in the process of creation. An interesting little story was told concerning one of them, but we'll get to that.
The above little cutie on the left and center above is the Dragdog. He's a while away from joining us. This is a good example of finalized concept art. It will start as a Black and White sketch, like the grievver to the right. Once it reaches a stage where it is looking good, the artist will draw a full color version for final approval before starting to work on producing it in electronically. If I remember my history, Maya has been the program used for AC2 modelling since the T2 engine was just an infant, so that would probably be the program used for the next step.
Here are a couple of interesting pics. The one on the left is identified as a Wharu, which is a spirit of decay, according to lore. The one on the right is the Spirit of Tanae, summonable by invokers following their re-write in the August patch. Quite the resemblance, eh?
This is an interesting bull of a creature. Referred to by the Live Team as a "Rhino", this creature has been modelled and is ready in some ways for insertion into the game. What is it still lacking? Animations, so that it can move and attack and growl fiercely. We may see this guy pretty soon, though...nobody thought to ask whether they were already in process of animation...we were happy enough to see the model that we forgot to ask. So don't be surprised when this guy comes running up to you down a dark, dank hallway and turns you into ribbons.
Recognize this cute little gal? Yes, she's the Olthoi Queen, dressed for a night on the town. Don't worry, though, she's not going to show up for her date tomorrow. Rockton, the lead artist for AC2 has informed us that she has not had any animation done yet. Breathe easily. Besides, Keth says he doesn't want her to show up until they have sliced us all to ribbons with Eviscerators. Well, I don't think he said the part about slicing us to ribbons, but I could read the gleam in his eyes when he said he wanted those in first.
Now the best part, according to Rockton, of being a game artist is the sheer variety of work every day. As you can see, just working on a creature can involve pencil sketching, full color art, graphic modelling, or animation design. On top of that, there are weapons to design, icons for everything new introduced and, eventually, armor to model and animate for all of us. Although, as I've said in previous articles, that will take some time to add. Here are a portion of the new weapon designs almost ready to come into game.
The artists are also the interior decorators of AC2 for the upcoming buildings. While the content designers figure out how to get in and what to do there, Rockton and his team get to figure out what it looks like. Which brings us to another point Rockton made. The members of the dev team feed off each other's ideas. A Content designer will come with a vague description of what (s)he wants something to look like and it will bounce back and forth until both are happy. Or an artist will come in with a random sketch that will suddenly become a great idea for a new item. It is all about synergy.
We'll leave you now with some of the concept art developed for Building Interiors. And we'll leave Rockton happily at his desk, being generally artistic for our pleasure. :)
