Learning to Paint...Digitally.

I have some aptitude in a number of artistic mediums; pencils, ink, soft pastels, oil pastels and even charcoal (to a degree) but painting is not a skill I've acquired and in my own foolishness, have avoided for years and years. It's come back to bite me on the ass though as my BA Game Art degree at De Montfort University requires you to have skill in painting both traditionally and digitally. I've heard mutterings that often people can do one and not the other (at least not easily), so where does that leave me as I have skill in neither!

Well let me tell you: BONED. That's where.

I splashed out with as much money as I could afford and bought myself a Waccom Intuos4 with some student loan money and have immediately begun using it in an attempt to do what everyone who is an artist of any calibre tells you to do - Draw, Draw, Draw.

Unfortunately I don't have the time to solely dedicate to just digital painting, but I am attempting to do at least one a day, even if it's just something small. My first attempt was this rather shoddy excuse for a painting:-

I wasn't pleased with how this turned out, so I went in search of some tutorials and posted on DMUGA facebook for some crits, went away today, after watching a great video tutorial (which can be found here: http://vimeo.com/1715081) and painted this:-

I rather thought it was an improvement and rather pleased with my second ever digital painting. Inspired and pleased that I'm getting to grips with my tablet and Photoshop CS5 as a painting package and not just a photo manipulator and processing package I began my first landscape. Here is the final piece!

I was really very pleased with the result after struggling to decided what to do with the initial bare background . It was fun to work on and probably took about 5-6 hours altogether in the end. Upon completing that I decided to use this medium to complete some more final pieces for Visual Design in this way:-

My tutor thinks my work is coming along, I just need to work at getting faster and do "more, more, more!" I have over Christmas to prove myself. Drawings everyday, 2-3 still life's a week and a design project whereby we've to create a vehicle of our own imagination that can hold 2 people.  Bought the layout pad already, lets start referencing!

Games, Previews, Reviews, Commentary and Lies: Redundant?

Before I was given this blog task to write about Game Journalism, I can’t say I’d spent a lot of time being involved with it; mostly because I find regular Journalism to be twisted and uninteresting at the best of times, why should I expect Game Journalism to be any better?

After a few hours reading articles on-line by several writers, arguing back and forth about New Games Journalism and whether or not it’s even still viable anymore (already!) I discovered that my enthusiasm for such things remains very much in the indifferent category.

The only ‘game reviewer/journalist’ I have followed religiously for a few years now is ‘Ben Croshaw’ and it’s purely to listen to him say amusing things at lightning speed, mostly negative things. I’m not really all that interested in whether he even likes or dislikes the game. Is that bad? I guess that will depend on whether you think Games Journalism is good or bad.

Personally I’m in the ‘bad’ camp…I think (or would be if I really cared enough) but for the sake of this blog post I’ll say, bad.

NGJ is a term coined by Kieron Gillen, it’s supposed to encourage reviewers to be subjective in their writing to make the reader feel like their living the experience with the journalist or something, however, it’s argued that this ‘writing movement’ is dead by writer Chris Lepine of ‘The Artful Gamer’ and that 'New New Games Journalism' is the path to salvation. This is said to be what Kieron Gillen was originally elbowing writers towards and not the the snooty, pretentious, self-indulgent stuff that it did spawn. 

I'm taking a step back because I enjoy reading long-winded, rambling about nothing in particular when I'm idling at my PC, half dead from a super caffeine overdose and 2 hours sleep a week (which I get on my commute). Sarcasm and snide remarks amuse me; it's entertainment, I don't take it seriously and have issues with being easily influenced, so I don't really get much out of it either way.

When I set out to buy a game, I rarely buy a new release unless it's an Indie title that strikes my fancy and any big name games I wait for the inevitable price drop in a few months or one of Steam's many sales before I buy. It’s not reviews I read that influence what and when I buy stuff either. I watch trailers and generally give things a go because I like to be open minded and I tend to know what types of game I’ll enjoy and those which I won’t.

As the years go on I’ve definitely found myself shifting away from mainstream games like “Grand Theft Auto”, “Call of Duty”, “Final Fantasy” etc and slipped into the warm embrace of upbeat little indie titles which are full of good fun, quirky characters and difficulties to master old skool gaming.

In my opinion, reviewers struggle to be objective when talking about a game’s qualities and this is because it’s very difficult to do. As I mentioned previously, for entertainment value it’s great, but if you’re using it as a sole basis for whether or not you buy a game? No wonder publishers are afraid to let development houses be creative! Then you end up with a bunch of clones (much like the market today) and THEN reviews just become wars about which Realistic War FPS is more realistic and blah, blah, blah. Comparisons.

My idea of what a 9/10 game is, is almost certainly going to be different from yours, therefor that method of game critique is useless and will result in MANY disgruntled consumers who expect their ideal game for that score, but that’s obviously going to be quite different from yours or my ideal game.

I think we should all be able to get a little demo of every release…oh wait, we can: At least on a good portion of titles. We should decide for ourselves whether the games are worth buying by playing a snippet, you never know, having the opportunity to download something in a genre you've never played before may just open up a whole new gaming experience for you.

A Personal Gaming History - Emma McConnellogue

Being a child of the 80’s I was lucky enough to be in on what’s affectionately coined the ‘Golden Age of Gaming’ and at 4 years old owned my first games console; The Sega Master System 2! It was something I took too immediately and my mother was forever saying “I wish I’d never bloody bought that thing! Go outside, it’s lovely!” to deaf ears as I encouraged Sonic The Hedgehog to speed roll through another wall and bounce to new heights collecting as many rings as possible, before inevitably landing on hidden spikes, and losing them all or similarly urging good old Alex Kidd to do my bidding . I was in love; with the 8 bit repetitive sounds, psychedelic colour pallets and whacky characters I had endless control over.

My best friend at the time, and next door neighbour,  happened to have the Nintendo Entertainment System, so after I’d discovered my love for all things computer game, we spent all day in one or the other’s house playing with Mario and his brother Luigi and their little sidekick Yoshi or Sonic and Tails taking on Dr Robotnik. In time Sega released their next gen console, the Sega Mega Drive and true to form my mum got me that and my best friend’s mum bought him the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.

I then went through a number of years without owning either a computer or a console of my own though did play the Playstation, N64, PS2 and Xbox before getting my own Xbox 360 a couple of years ago and a laptop with which I started to play PC games. We now have a PS3 in our home as well as Nintendo DS.

The first game I ever played in my life was Alex Kidd in Miracle World and it was HARD (not like most games today!) Alex was killed in one hit from a bad guy, there was no save options and when you lost all 3 of your lives it was game over (unless you knew the cheat!) IT was a platformer primarily but featured a reasonable amount of roleplaying and strategy. The only move Alex had was punching (though could sometimes find items or purchase items that gave him range)and boss fights were unusual as there weren’t all that many but you played ‘rock, paper, scissors’ to beat them… To this DAY I can remember the bloody tune and find myself humming it as I type and now you will too!

It’s a toss-up between that and Teddy Boy being my most memorable games. Both were bright, had funky music and infinite play time hours. Teddy Boy had 100 levels + bonus rounds! The object of that game was to kill spawning monsters from dice and then collect them when they turned into little balls. If you didn’t they turned into time eating bugs and if you touched them you died. The levels were platform, looping, mazes which never ended.  Here’s an example level.

What makes these games memorable was probably the amount of hours I dedicated to completing them, the difficulty of both games, the music (!!) and quirky game-play.

Personally I’d like to see games return to this. Nowadays games are made easier and easier because of the ever increasing amount of moaning done by little twits who are way too spoilt and can’t be bothered to actually work hard to earn anything worthwhile. I find very little satisfaction in completing mainstream games these days and miss the none save systems and one hit kills and spending hours trying to jump the same gap over and over and over and over and…you get the point. Indie developers are where it’s at if you want games with a reasonable difficulty setting – Take Super Meat Boy for example!

I’m quite a fan of gesture based gaming and hope this continues as I believe it could be more immersive, even if it’s not quite at that stage right now. Some things it works really well for, like dance games, some sports; tennis, golf, bowling etc. Things like Guitar Hero and Rock Band are pretty cool as the peripherals are interesting and fun and are immersive, however, more action based games which have your character run around on rails whilst you use your hands to cast spells or open doors etc isn’t quite as immersive as it is trying to be.

I’m a massive fan of Role Playing Games. I love games like Final Fantasy, Elder Scrolls, Mass Effect series, Resident Evil and I’d love those games to include gesture based gameplay and 3D environments where you feel like you’re actually in the game with the characters – THAT would be immersive!

Computer Game History: 2000 – Present.

Modern gaming history to present introduces a number of interesting developments technologically and some steps backward into the 80’s with regards game clones saturating the market and publishing house problems.

In the last 10 years or so we’ve seen the Xbox 360, PS3 and Wii all have their hour of glory and interesting features highlighted; Wii had a motion sensitive remote that began a revolution of gesture based gaming, the PS3 had a built in Blue-Ray Player and the Xbox 360 promoted an add-on HD disk drive. The Wii was different and offered original games where you have to move around with your whole body to play games such as; golf, tennis and bowling. This brought attention to the fact that gaming could be a method of keeping children and adults alike fit and active. Microsoft and Sony cottoned on to this success and shortly after brought their own versions of gesture based gaming technology to the market; Kinect for Xbox 360 and Move for the PS3. The Kinect is completely different from the Wii Remote in that it is a stationary device which scans your entire body whilst you play and projects your image on screen and the Move is a combination of the two: It’s a remote with an accelerometer which is then tracked by a stationary device known as the PSEye.

Another technological advancement is that of 3D gaming. This idea and implementation has been around since the late 80’s with specially coded games for the ‘Sega Master System’ and the use of 3D glasses; it wasn’t until relatively recently that it was revised and revived by NVidia 3D Vision followed by Nintendo into their handheld Nintendo DS systems; Nintendo 3DS.  The current problem with developing such technology for console systems is that consumers would need the 3D TV setups at home in order to view the games in 3D, which don’t seem to be all the popular at the moment and might never be…

Finally, technologically, I wanted to talk about the biggest step in gaming evolution; On Live. This is a mass audience, cloud-based, streaming, online gaming platform. It is essentially a delivery mechanism system that will allow consumers to have instant access to games on almost any “PC/Mac, Ipad or TV” – onlive.co.uk: Games on demand. Will there be a need for consoles in the future? Will streaming technology and server stability and structure be stable enough to deliver such a system without major lag issues, buffering and server crashes? The answers to these questions are apparently yes! Initial testing has had surprising results in its closed beta testing stages and appears to work as advertised. The revolutionary idea is that not only will consumers have instant access to triple A titles and more at their fingertips the technology is being dubbed as “future-proof”. This means that instead of the consumer having to update their systems and technology to stay up to date with games ever increasing demand for more power, the on-live system will be updated with new technology, more servers, more power, all at the back end. For this system you’re looking to pay a one of for controller(s) and possibly a small device to plug into a tv then a monthly subscription charge for the service. It’s said that additional charges may be incurred if a player decides to buy games to play frequently, but there will be free to play one-offs and free demos to try before you buy. Xbox Live could really suffer from this business model.

Each of these developments would mean any game developer in the industry, current or up-and-coming, would have certain considerations to make when developing in-game assets, particularly UI artists who have functionality and ease-of-use considerations to keep in mind when developing for gesture based gaming and 3D allows artists other areas to explore with regards spatial-awareness, depth of field and even some very creative UI work for those UI artists as well.

Although technology has advanced and allowed for some creative and innovative designs to break through and continue to evolve and enhance the consumers gaming experience there are still a number of issues within the industry that publishers and developers haven’t really learned from.

The most obvious of which is the number of cloned titles on the market today; Call of Duty being a prime example. Every release is the same game with a few tweaks and more recently recycling the same assets from the game before! We buy this? Apparently people do…Why? Mostly because people like “familiarity” and playing it safe. Publishing houses rake in a lot of cash for selling big franchises because they know they can sell them and refuse to take risks in case they don’t get back their investment plus profits. It’s a disgusting practice that’s beginning to stifle the creativity in big development teams. I mean, the consumer claims to want familiarity then when they get their Call of Duty 96 cry about how it didn’t live up to the last one and they might as well not have bothered…Confused yet? Operation Flashpoint Red River was Codemasters recent title, along with Bodycount, did so badly that Guildford Studio has closed and focusing solely on their racing teams. 

If the AAA title isn’t a short-term, instant success, it may as well be a failure to what Kieron Gillan called ‘money-men’. Games like Titan Quest have sold millions and millions of copies over a number of years, but the game isn’t well known or thought to be a great success because it wasn’t immediate, yet the people involved in the development of that game are still making money today from the sales.

Computer Game History: 1980 – 1999.

The late 80’s onwards is my main area of interest in gaming history as it’s my era; the time when I got my first console and became enveloped in the digital world. However, in the early 80’s, before I was born, the gaming industry developed some problems as it was around this time that publishers came into practice and are said to make developers roles more difficult by enforcing tight, strict deadlines and limited budgets upon them, which still goes on to this day.

The 80’s were not all bad however, as the low costs set by the publishing houses allowed for more innovative games to be created rather than more clones of existing titles. Genres were born such as; action/adventure, beat ‘em up, scrolling platformers, isometric platformers, real-time strategy, and many, many more.

In 1983 the computer game industry experienced it’s second ‘crash’, much more severe than the one in ‘77’ and is known as “The Crash”. This saw the demise of several companies and the end of what is known as “second gen console gaming”. Part of this problem was due to ‘market saturation’. Between ‘83-‘84 there were so many consoles brought to market with too little innovative and new software to sustain them. Seemingly only consoles suffered in this time where home personal computers thrived as they became affordable and were of more use than console systems as they had multiple purposes.

By the 90’s console gaming was back on track and saw the change to 3D graphics from raster 2D and ensured further game genre development and progressed to mainstream entertainment in the home for many. With this progress bigger budgets were available for game development, meaning bigger and better games, technology developments, bigger development teams and thus the continued cycle of sales and further development.

The 90’s fourth generation of consoles ended with the discontinuation of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in 1999 and saw the rise of more technologically advanced systems such as the Playstation in 1995.

In short, some of the major gaming developments of the 80’s and 90’s include;

·         The shift from 2D to 3D graphics.

·         The decline of Arcade gaming and incline of home console systems and PC’s.

·         The transition from cartridges to optical media which could hold significantly more data and cheaper to produce, but led to an increase in game piracy.

·         The rise of handheld, portable consoles such as; Gameboy and Game Gear.

·         Online gaming rose to prominence.

·         Publishing houses gradually increased in size, bringing the gaming industry into a corporate business venture.

To Be Continued...

Computer Game History: 2000 - Present.

Computer Game History: 1950 – 1979.

Almost everyone today, in the modern world, has played, seen or heard of computer games/video games, but this was not so 60-70 years ago as this was roughly the time when computer games were first being realised.

Where it all began is up for debate, largely due to the undecided definition of the term “video game”,, but for me it was ‘Goldsmith Jr ‘ and ‘Ray Mann’ who created a missile simulator game in the late 1940’s using a Cathode Ray Tube.

Thomas T. Goldsmith was a Physics Professor at Furman University and a TV technology pioneer only passed away relatively recently in 2009 at the age of 99. His work with Estel Ray Mann on creating a computer game which was inspired by the radars used in WW2, which he and ‘DuMont’ shared their knowledge of with various companies for using Cathode Ray Tubes in Radar Displays: After the war they went on to share their knowledge on Picture Tube Displays, creating a number of manufacturing and engineering techniques that would make it possible for televisions to be made on a mass commercial basis. It’s unfortunate that “Goldsmith” and “Ray Mann” couldn’t take their game any further than the patent stage as they didn’t have the financial means with which to do so.

Games produced in this time period were not commercially available until  the early 70’s and were generally found on company mainframe systems, but the development of arcade video game machines began to change all that. ‘Pong’ was the most wide spreading title of its time and inspired a number of clones throughout gaming history which made their way onto a number of console platforms which brought about the first game industry crash in 1977.

After the crash came a Golden Age for arcade machines when Taito released ‘Space Invaders’; This inspired a number of game manufacturers with games such as ‘Asteroids’, ‘Pac-Man’ and ‘Galaxian’. The coin slot machines spread like wildfire and could be found everywhere from convenience stores and shopping centres to restaurants! This boom in the games industry generated revenue of up to $8 billion, which surpassed both pop music and the film industry at that time by significant amounts in North America alone!

To be continued…

Computer Game History: 1980 -1999

An Introduction.

Hi Folks! 

I’m Emma but my friends call me Emmo. I’m 25 years old, birthstone is Amethyst and I am a born and bred Glaswegian; though I’m often told I don’t sound anything like a “Weeji”.

I recently moved from Scotland to Nottingham to live with boyfriend, which was convenient for attending De Montfort University to study my Game Art Degree. I commute daily by train which takes between 22-46 mins depending on which train I catch.

My reasons for choosing De Montfort to study began by looking at prospectuses where I became enamoured with the course structure and the appealing idea of working/studying abroad on exchange/work experience. At my interview I was further impressed with the work students produced, the numerous skills which the lecturers themselves had, right down to the basic feel of the campus.

What made me choose to study in the field of Game Art? It’s reasonably simple: 1) I can draw and have been doing it all my life and 2) I am a gamer. I started drawing before I could talk and never really stopped. There was a brief period in my life where I was depressed because of my disability, disenchanted with life and uninspired, but I got through it and out the other side and here I am!

Gaming I’ve been doing that for some time as well. My first console was the Sega Master System back when I was 5-6 years old? I was a casual gamer right up until that period in my life I mentioned previously and I got myself a laptop and began PC gaming too.

My aim on this course is to gain vital skills and experience which will prepare me for working in the industry, and developing my artistic skills to a competitively high level in hopes of gaining full-time employment by the end of my degree. I’m still undecided on a career path as yet, though, areas of interest lie in Concept Artist, Character Designer & 3D Modelling. Each of these career paths require different skill-sets and some examples of current vacancies in these areas and the requirements of each position would be;

Gameloft: Concept Artist - http://www.gamesjobsdirect.com/jobs/688753/concept-artist.asp

Main tasks and responsibilities

• Creation of humanoid and non-humanoids characters concepts
• Creation of environment concepts
• Over concept drawing in close collaboration with level designer

Skills and Profile

• Experienced an creative profile
• Excellent skills with Photoshop and/or Painter
• Exceptional understanding of humanoid and non humanoid anatomy
• Keen eye towards form, shape, structure, silhouette, light, value, composition, color, staging
• Ability to carry an idea form the conceptual phase to the finished illustration
• Strong foundation in the traditional arts
• Good interpersonal and communication skills
• Ability to work independently

• Basic writing English an asset
• Understanding of Max modelling and texture tools an asset
• Shipment of AAA game titles as concept artist an asset

Gameloft: 3D Graphic Designer Character – http://www.gamesjobsdirect.com/jobs/688733/3d-graphic-designer-character.asp

Main tasks and responsibilities

• Modelling of humanoid and non-humanoid characters in high and low resolutions 
• Textures creation adapted for both high and low resolution

Skills and Profile

• Excellent understanding of human anatomy and motion
• Excellent understanding of design basics (relief, lighting, composition, perspective, colours, etc.)
• Excellent knowledge of 3DS MAX (experience in Character Studio), Z-Brush, Body Paint 
• Strong knowledge of Photoshop
• Demonstration of creativity
• Adaptability to different games and graphic styles (pixel, cartoon, realistic, illustration, etc.)
• Knowledgeable in contemporary media (Web, games, comics, film, animation, etc.)
• Open-minded and outward-looking
• Organized and efficient

• Degree in 3D, Arts, or equivalent production experience an asset

iD Software: 3D modeller – http://www.gamesjobsdirect.com/jobs/687602/3d-modeler-at-id-software.asp

Responsibilities

Work collaboratively with art director, concept artists and environment artists to create the 3D models, objects, and set pieces that define and populate the game environments
Requirements

• 2+ years of game or film industry experience as 3D artist
• Substantial examples of current and past work demonstrating a strong understanding of shape, perspective, texture, color, and lighting.
• Extensive experience and proficiency with relevant 3D and 2D toolsets.
• Self-motivated, but able to take feedback and criticism and properly reflect comments in work
• Excellent team player with very strong work ethic and a collaborative/cooperative attitude
• Passion for games and gaming
• Good time management skills and efficient development processes, and the ability to apply those principles towards effectively meeting schedules and deadlines
• Excellent oral and written communication skills