Perspective + Announcement

The announcement is going to be pretty short. Here is the lowdown: I'm going to GDC. That's right--in 2 days I'll be heading on over to SF and taking in all the things the annual event has to offer!

That's all, as far as announcements go. Now for the real topic of conversation--

Perspective

In a small studio, most people wear multiple hats during the development process. For teams of less than 10 people, game design is often a decision made by multiple members, not all of whom hold the title "game designer." Similarly, a small studio may not hire a specific person to deal with all PR material--it may be a joint venture by some programmers and artists. This is perfectly acceptable given a lack of resources and time. But visual and sound artists as well as programmers have decisions to make too. So why aren't things like game architecture or implementation decisions discussed with people not in the discipline? I believe we can attribute this to a lack of perspective.

In a game jam I recently participated in, I had my first real experience with a game engine (Unity, to be specific). I had written 2 games before

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Thinking about Character Design

     I'm currently taking a Digital Animation course at Berkeley, in which I am learning 3D modeling and animation in Maya. I feel it is actually geared a little more towards understanding the pipeline for movie development (“Frozen” like stuff), but much of the pipeline is the same for game development (modeling, rigging, UV mapping/texturing, animation, to name of few parts). However, I want to discuss one specific aspect of the pipeline that I feel sometimes gets overlooked in the game dev world, especially when on an indie budget—character design.

     A few weeks ago I went to a character design seminar the class set up to learn more about how professional artists create characters for Disney and other film studios, and how I can apply these concepts to my own characters (specifically, for the short our class is required to make). I want to share what I learned with you as well as examine other character designs, so you can learn how to create a character that burns its own image into the minds of your players.

     Keep in mind that what I know

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