First quarter of 2010 = videogame overload

Do you think that now that the Black Friday rush is over no more good videogames are coming out for a while? HA! Think again. If anything, X-Mas 09 is going to get obliterated by the amount of quality software released January trough March of 2010.

The following games will ship in that time period that I would like to purchase. Bolded are "must-haves" for me. Usually I buy a game or two per month, by the way (as I'm still catching on with my backlog)

Bayonetta

No More Heroes 2

Tatsunoko Versus Capcom

Dark Void

Mass Effect 2

Lost Planet 2

Bioshock 2

White Knight Chronicles

Miles Edgeworth: Ace Attorney Investigations

Heavy Rain

Resident Evil 5 Gold Edition (didn't purchase the original)

Yakuza 3

Final Fantasy XIII

God of War 3

Monster Hunter Tri

Split Second

Sin and Punishment 2

Megaman 10

...

..

That is amazing! I don't remember any early season with that many releases. Final Fantasy XIII is THE BIG ONE, but after that? Monster Hunter and Heavy Rain are games that I've been looking forward to for a very long time. Heck, the game that I care about the least in that list is Dark Void and I've been following its development for 2 years already.

Notable games also shipping in that time period that I wont be buying but I know that other people will go :O for:

Darksiders

Red Steel 2

Splinter Cell Conviction

Star Trek Online (might buy it if friends play)

Blur

Battlefield Bad Company 2

Just Cause 2

Pokemon DS remakes

I am thankful for my EA discount in these dire financial times!

Chrono Trigger - Black Tyrano Fight wip

Not a whole lot yet, its only a few minutes of work ... but I'm trying to figure out basic values and composition.

For those not familiar, it'll be a re-imagining of this shot:

Nerf 2 N-Strike Elite Character Concepts

Usually I like to start with a picture, but I want some context this time around :)

Nerf 2 N-Strike Elite launched recently. Its a decent on-rails shooter for the Wii and outstandingly better than the first game. I worked on it as a concept artist for a brief time before being moved to other projects. If you have kids and want to play a shooting game with them that its very age appropriate, I would totally recommend it.

Aight, having said that. At the stage that I was involved with we were re-thinking the characters from the ground up. Shane was initially concepted in-house but the rest of the characters were outsourced and that was a pretty big sore spot for the whole concept team, so we took it upon ourselves to make these kids not suck.

Below was my final take. Its not what we ended up using and like I mentioned, I left the project early on, but I really like were these pieces ended up. I wanted each character to have their own distinct color palette (while mixing in some very NERF colors, like oranges and blues) as well as silhouettes that would be easy to read and would tell you something about the character (Jackal looking like a preppy spoiled kid, Raven is a sniper so I see her in need of protection since shes on the ground all the time, Tango having a sporty, athletic look, etc) Please click on the images to see the large version, as I have to keep the previews small so that Blogger doesn't act weird and mess up the formatting.

From left to right: Jackal, Komodo, Shane, Raven and Tango

These designs went over well with my Art Director, but at the time we were experienced with a more "Saturday Morning Cartoon" look and feel, so I was asked to provide the same designs with a more cartoony exaggerated look, I was happy to oblige since its important to show a range of styles.

Eventually, we had to tone it all down and go with a style reminiscent of the previous game ... which was a huge shame in my opinion but publishing was afraid to make a big departure with "established characters" and preferred to play it safe. At least we can look back at what could have been and hope that the next go around we can push the envelope a little farther.

Old Nerf N-Strike work

I never got around to putting much Nerf work after the games release. Truth be told, it wasn't the best project ever so I was looking at my body of work I produced for it with a vast amount of scorn.

Some time has passed however, and now I'm looking at some of the pieces I made ... and while they're certainly a little old I do like that they show a different style from what is currently on my portfolio. I'm looking trough the archives now and see what I like and possibly give a revamp to some of the illustrations because while I like the layout and detail, the color work could use some overhauls ... youll see when I post them :) I also have to go to work and see what I like from the recently released Nerf 2 N-Strike Elite.

About this character stuff. The only character in the final game that I designed from top to bottom was Shane. The characters on the right: Jackal, Komodo and Tango were outsourced and then given to us ... so while the drawings are mine, the designs are not. For Shane I seriously must have made about 100 different designs for him, but these are my favorites, specially the more Mignola esque black and white ones. His design is definitely kind of generic and I accept that, but this character was a prime example of overdesign and one million thousand eyes worth of micromanaging. Everybody had an opinion and designing a "regular white American boy" is a huge challenge, because youre tasked with designing something bland that doesnt offend anybody (meaning anything like a rip on the jeans was considered "too edgy"). Long story short, if you don't like him, thats cool, I dont like him either, but Im still attached to the kid. Hopefully in future entries we get to flesh him out and make him more interesting.

Ah, now that I'm on the subject of Nerf. My friend, co-worker and amazing artist Brandon Dayton recently wrote a blog post about his character designs for Nerf 2 N-Strike Elite. He gave the whole cast a redesign and did a hell of a job given the severe limitations he was given (my favorites are his earliest takes, but publishing had a hard time making an extreme stylistic departure, their loss!)

Art Order Challenge: Hurakan, God of storms ... Finished?

My good friend Robert Whitaker gave me some pointers on value and contrast concerning this piece, so I took his advice to heart and went back to Photoshop to give this a second look. Much easier to look at now, I think. Thanks Rob!

Art Order Challenge: Hurakan, God of storms Finished *

I added a version on my site that has the silhouettes and thumbnails collaged together, you can see it here. (It was a little too wide for the blog format)

Really happy with this overall design, mostly cause I did the whole process from the beginning, and thats something I really wanted for the portfolio. The asterisk is there because Im not really finished as the Art Order challenge requires one more piece that, unfortunately, I wont be able to finish (other stuff has to get done first! See my to-do list a few posts back)

By the way, I just received a copy of The Art of Guild Wars 2 and its tremendous. Buy it!

yum

What I played in THREE DAYS! OMG

Uncharted was the first "next-gen" game I played. By that I dont mean it was the first game I played on the PS3 or 360, I mean that it was the first game that actually pulled off an experience that wasn't possible previously. It was well told, gorgeously made, extremely well paced and I thoroughly enjoyed the characters and setting (Im a big Indiana Jones fan, and I tend to dislike anything "Tomb Raider")

This brings us to its sequel, the game of the generation

Uncharted 2 (PS3)

Naughty Dog "gets it"

Watching the "making of" videos in the sequel, the developers talk about the first Uncharted as "brain surgery with a chainsaw", whereas the sequel is closer to precision surgery with the right tools. I'd say the got the gist of it. This is a game that anybody that gives a shit about audiovisual entertainment needs to spend ten hours of their life into, even if its just to watch somebody else play. It deftly redefines what a videogame "is" and what it "can be".

Technically its incredible and thats plain to see. In the first game you were kept in a jungle and an assortment of ruins/temples. In this game the full spectrum is blown off. We have full cities, villages, snowy mountains, museums ... it all feels fresh, charming, enchanting while retaining an extremely photoreal look that manages to feel anything but photoreal ... Im even having a hard time explaining it, but to put it in simple terms: Holy shit.

I work in an environment where every-single-fucking-game we bring to the studio is scrutinized to the point of mockery. Us game developers are inherently cocky, dismissive of the competition and insecure ... so well take any chance to shit on a good/great game, Shadow Complex being the latest example I can think of. A brilliant game in every sense of the word and when we were playing it in the studio we kept having people come in while were playing, say a smartass comment, talk shit about it, then leave. I don't like attitudes like that, its pathetic. As a game developer you don't need to validate how awesome you are by talking shit on the competition.

With that in mind, Uncharted 2, its the ONLY game (with the exception of Street Fighter IV) that people watch us play at work, come in, stay for ten seconds and either praise it (and stay to watch!) or give a small nod and walk away. That is amazing. The amount of care that Naughty Dog has pout into their product is palpable to anybody that sees this game in motion and it forces us to stop what we're doing and pay attention.

All in all, I cant sit here and type all the things this game does right. As far as negatives I could mention a thing or two but when games today can ship halfway made (NBA 2K) and Day One DLC is fucking everything up (Dragon Age) its so, so nice to have a game that works, that doesnt need patches, that doesnt require me to pay extra for shit, that has unlockables that are fair, that offers replay value, that has an Online Multiplayer, that has a great 10 hour campaign that redefines then genre ... when a game does so many things right ... I'm sorry but I'm not gonna shit on it.

Do yourself a favor, buy this game.