Follow me behind the cut for the interview and a look into how art influences games and game writing!
The interview was conducted for my Art History class at Full Sail University. Angel's responses to the questions were thorough and very educational. I really appreciate the time she took out of her busy schedule to talk to me. Now, on to the interview...
What do you see as the role of the visual arts in our mass-mediated world and particularly in your profession?
Our world is changing so quickly, and the visual arts are becoming central to the media we consume. The Internet has increased the amount of media running like a current through our lives.
Print media is still around, but who knows for how much longer. As we move toward digital everything, we have no excuse not to develop the visual arts. A picture is worth a thousand words, after all; and everyone has a camera/video camera on their cell phones. For decades, we've been gradually transitioning from an audio- or text-oriented world to a visually-oriented world.
Because of this, people (our audience members) are developing stricter quality sensibilities. Visual arts in this day and age must be catchy. Any one image must compete with billions of others to gain traction on the audience. People have less and less patience for reading fat blocks of text. They want pictures, moving or otherwise. This has many implications for game designers like me.
In the past, it was the game's mechanics (the game's programming limits, physics, and rules) that drove decisions on all other elements, but this is quickly changing. There's a give and take between the three primary elements (mechanics, art, and story) of game design. This trio works together, each affecting the other in a fine balance, to create the game.
For example, the art schedule often constrains what the other teams can do. If the art team only has time to make 1000 character models, then that's what you have to work with and not more. Simultaneously, if the story dictates that this is a science fiction game, then the art and mechanics teams are limited to that arena. And, if the mechanics dictate a first-person point of view, then both the art and the story teams are affected.
In the best games, the design team makes every effort to make the story, the mechanics, and the art work together as equal partners. This three-way partnership is a growing trend in the games industry.
In truth, however, there is a fourth leg on game design: the player. The games industry (specifically with Massively Multiplayer Online Games—MMOGs) is leading the charge in interactive media. No other medium has the ability to draw the viewer in and give them control over what they do and see. In games, the player is an active participant, not just an observer. Her experience differs based on the choices she makes. You can see some footage of real players interacting with the world of Guild Wars 2, here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0jb2_mM4TM.
In the Manifesto trailer for Guild Wars 2, game designers talk about the interplay of art, mechanics, story, and the player, in the game we're creating: http://youtu.be/bKtGxVj3msM.
With new communications and media technologies, imagery is almost instantly available. Do you believe that this is having a positive or negative influence on the industry (provide example)?
The most obvious example of this that I can think of is the marketing for a game. The audience doesn't want to just hear about a game. They want to see it! That's what gets them excited. This puts the design studio in an awkward position, however, because we may have to reveal visual elements of the game that will change before the final version of the game is released.
This is just one of the drawbacks of a typical game design cycle. We show what we have and hope that our audience understands when things change. The company I work for (ArenaNet) combats this with transparency. We talk to our audience and let them know about the changes we've made and why.
Here is one example of this. The image below is the initial design of our sylvari race:
Whereas, the following image is the final design of the sylvari race:
We took great care to share our process and the reasons why we made the changes we did with our audience so they could become a part of the process. In the games industry, the audience—our adored fans—have far more input into our production processes than in any other. We listen to their feedback, and we often make changes based on what they're telling us. I can think of no other visual arts industry where this is the case.
What popular images do you see that are frequently rechanneled throughout the entertainment industry?
I racked my brain to find something that has spread throughout popular media and that originated in the games industry. The only thing I managed to come up with was the image of a stereotypical gamer. You see "gamers" represented this way in a variety of different media. They're typically seen as male, overweight, inattentive to their daily chores and jobs, and rather unkempt. Here's an example from South Park:
Gamers have been actively fighting this stereotype for some time, and lately, this is a hot topic. It's become obvious that women are also gaming (40% of all gamers are women, according to a recent study). The diversity in the gamer community is a point of pride, perhaps in response to the heavy reliance in other media on the "typical gamer" profile.
There's been a lot of talk lately about this stereotype:
- http://www.shamepile.com/2011/06/defying-gamer-stereotypes.html
- http://gamerstereotype.wordpress.com/
Are there particular images that this industry has popularized, and or created?
The games industry has been around for so long that there are many. Here are just a few that you might recognize:
Furthermore, there's a difference between the visual art in modern games and the visual art in other entertainment media. In 3-D video games, the player explores the art. The viewer chooses what appears in the frame, not the director or artist.
In other entertainment media, like graphic novels and movies, the artist chooses exactly what the viewer sees. They set the scene. They choose the angles and which elements to reveal when and in what order. In many video games (especially MMOGs), the goal is to create a living world that the player can explore and discover at her own whim.
The challenge is, of course, to regularly awe or shock the player when she discovers a corner of the world she hasn't seen before. Many video games utilize a first-person point of view to maximize this impact. It's something that is hard to replicate in other media.
There's also a new trend toward realism in games, as visual arts software becomes more sophisticated, this is increasingly possible.
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvI1l0nAd1c
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H6VTi2QwqG0&feature=related
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aL9wsEFohTw
I am absolutely blown away by the artists I work with at ArenaNet. Daniel Dociu has won so many awards. He is one of our concept artists and the lead on our art team. His vision for our project has been just amazing. He's an artistic genius. You can see more of his work here: http://www.tinfoilgames.com/
Another of my favorites is Daniel's son, Horia. He incorporates a gritty darkness into his work that is extremely evocative. You can see some of his work here: http://badideafactory.blogspot.com/
I love the work of Kekai Kotaki (http://www.kekaiart.com/) who has also been one of the most influential artists on my current project.
The young woman who designed the new look for the sylvari race (see the images above) is Kristen Perry (http://www.merekatcreations.com/), and her work is jaw-droppingly realistic and beautiful.
And last, I have to mention Katy Hargrove, whose art tugs at my heart every time. She is versatile and amazing. You can find her art here: http://tangrala.blogspot.com/
How has your knowledge of famous artworks influenced your creative process?
I can't say that my knowledge of famous artwork has influenced my creative process, no. However, I can say that the art produced by my coworkers definitely has. Whenever a new concept art piece comes through to us, it inspires story and characterization. The artists add elements to character, landscape, or item designs that send ripples throughout the game. They affect choices made by the mechanics team and the writing team.
On those occasions when I've designed a character and the artist has brought that character to life, it's the most incredible feeling I've ever felt. To see a piece of my imagination on the screen is both humbling and moving.
And, I'll leave you with a link to an article you may find interesting: http://xenon.stanford.edu/~geksiong/papers/cs378/cs378paper.pdf. It discusses some of the challenges of visual media in games and some of the special things that happen when the player interacts with the media. Games have the unique ability, for example, of melding the player's mind and muscle memory to what's happening on the screen. The player "becomes" her character to a certain extent, remapping keyboard strokes to physical movements such as jumping, running, shooting, etc.
I can't help but wonder if, in the future, we'll start to see newer ways of storytelling and creating this connection between viewers and the story's characters in other visual media. It's all very cyberpunk, and yet, it's not so far away.
If this interview with Angel piqued your interest, please visit her website and blog at http://www.angelmccoy.com/blog/ for much, much more!
*All images are copyrighted to their prospective owners.
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