Behind the Scenes :: Critter Exploration

Life's been...well...life, as is often the case, but I have managed to put in a little time recently for some concept development.  Thought it might be fun to share, so here we go.

I've had a running idea in my head of the various kinds of bugs that will assail the player(s) as they try and reap the rewards of the planet's mineralogy, but none of the concepts were very fine-tuned.  I'm sure of the behaviors I want them to express, but their actual appearance is in that "perfect in my head, undefined on paper" kind of state.

The following, therefore, is what my visual exploration and refinement process looks like for one of the first bug types the player will meet.

(click to enlarge)

 
I knew that I wanted a pack-critter, something that roamed in small-to-large groups and harassed the players due to their speed and melee preference.  I had initially thought to try and model the bug off a dog's anatomy, but those all channeled a little too much Skagg (of Borderlands fame) so I kept digging.  The end result was more of a rabbit-insect hybrid, and I've been happy with how that's coming out.

As these are all roughs, I'll put up a "final pass" of this fella in a more formal spotlighting post, much like our heroes and any supporting cast.  I'll make sure to save the bigger/rarer creatures' reveal for the game itself, but these guys will be roaming around on the intro level, so guilt-free: it's not much of a spoiler. :)

Meet the Cast: Episode 1

Meet Nero:

Half of the two-person team that take us through the game's storyline, and one of the playable options.  I wanted to post both of the playable characters as a pair, but her cohort is still half-finished, and since I made mention of the fact that I'd have some art to show people, I'll just leave her solo for now.

What she's wearing is part of the standard-issue gear for all new employees of the RATE (Resource Acquisition & Territorial Expansion) program, the meal ticket that brings both of our heroes to the shores of the game's home planet.  If you're familiar with US history, it's similar to the deals handed out to homesteaders that pushed westward from the Mississippi, only...in space.

Stay tuned for Episode 2, where we meet her cavalier red-headed team mate, and learn more about what waits for players in this backwoods corner of the galaxy!

In search of an enemy

Having run into a couple code hiccups in a row with some of my final missing pieces of graphics rendering (I'll get you sooner or later, skybox!) I took a little break from left-brain land to try and nail down the visual style of my "bugs".

The player is going to control a character on a future distant planet in a sort of techno-gold-rush after the discovery of some very useful elements.  Almost immediately (as the central conflict of gameplay will rely on it) player(s) will discover that certain properties of this element make it very attractive to the insect-like species that already lives on this new frontier, especially when put through the stressful mining process that converts it into portable material.

Short version: mining this stuff will bring bugs down on the player.  The more precious the resource, the stronger the draw on local bug swarms.

At any rate, I want the species to have some cohesive style elements that help sell the fact they're all from the same origin species and can be controlled by a singular hive "overmind" (lets just step in as many sci-fi tropes and starcraft references as we can, I haven't come up with fun IP-unique names for this stuff yet).

I also want them to be fun to hate.  Hence, bugs.  Barring collections of entomologists and the odd monk, I think almost everyone can agree bugs are better off squished.  At least when they're human-sized and packing ranged chemical weaponry.

Finally hit on something I'm happy with (yay for lunch breaks): this is the first pass at the standard "soldier" bug.  (The head in my logo is an older concept for the same critter).  More specialized variants will round out the swarms, but there needed to be a grunt that could serve as a mirror unit to players: someone standing behind alien cover on the other side of a battle line aiming alien weapons back at the human element.

This'll definitely require normals maps, I'm not fielding dozens of 250k-poly grunts...

I'll have to clean him up and draw the full front/side/detail orthographic view before I model 'im.  Drawing concept art for yourself is kind of odd: there's still a few rounds of "nah, I like this part, but the rest needs to be better" but all 'parties' are already working from the same singular vision.  Jury's out on whether or not that's a good thing.

Just remember: if it has 6 eyes, you should probably shoot it.