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Customize It All

Thursday, June 6, 2013

Rambling

This post is also from my website

Remember a long time ago, I said I was going to have a programing/character artist job? Well this was for a video game company with a about five people. The company does have an official and licensed name but the members hardly come together to work on anything. The only activities that ever happen are meetings where game ideas and design theories are discussed, then months later a tiny bit of actual game development (from anyone other than myself) is produced.
If anyone wants to start a game company with more than one or two people, I suggest finding some REALLY motivated people.  People who are willing to make time for a project is always cool.  When I was in charge of a small game project at ECPI, the guys who were extremely busy with work and family managed to produce a lot more work than the guys who could not imagine spending five or twenty minutes on a concept sketch after school.  These guys no family or even a job to worry about.   I noticed when some people barely have any free time, they tend to work harder on a project.
With the situation in mind with the game company, working on my own is starting to look really promising, rather than a depressing path. I have used Unity and Flash in the past and would love to make point and click adventure games or some other story based games with those engines in the future. I have found a few friends who are willing to beta test my game and help improve my writing skills.  Just a few days ago, one of my friends improved my website’s design. I am a game developer, not a web developer.
I need to sit down and devote a lot of time to finishing this game.  A few days ago, I spoke with a guy who started a lot of web comics and video game projects but never finished them.  He knew he would get a lot more people to his deviantart if he finished his projects but just does not finish them. I don’t want to be that guy.
Ranting aside, it is always nice to see what people have to say about my ideas. Long ago I technically made my first ren’py game based off of a tutorial.  A lot of people seemed to like it.
That game didn't take that long to make since I used a lot of images from Google and the sprites from the tutorial.  The only time I will be through Google for my ren’py game, would be for scenery references when I start drawing my scenery.  I can also draw and write so no more borrowing sprites for me.
Speaking of people’s opinions, there are people who do let’s plays of ren’py games youtube.  Some people do play ren’py games for fun and others play ren’py because of the “wonderful” repetition that most ren’py games have.  One such let’s player is named oddscuff . I’m not sure if he is picking the game’s randomly or if he is picking a certain game because there was something interesting about it.  Either way, I find some of his videos humorous and they give me an idea on how some people view ren’py games.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Trapped Update: Sprite Sketches


This is a short update.  I sat down and designed the remaining sprites for Trapped.  Unfortunately I drew the sprites out on paper.  This visual novel has a total of 8 sprites (main character, two love interests, five side characters).  I would like to get the hang of drawing completely on the computer someday, instead of starting first with paper.   When I am at a friend’s house, I often bring my sketchbook and not my computer.  The majority of my digital artwork is done at home.
Here are the two love interests that will be in Trapped:
Trapped 001 Trapped Update: Sprite Sketches
A human scientist who works in the lab as an assistant scientist
Trapped 003 Trapped Update: Sprite Sketches
A merman who has been stuck inside the underwater laboratory for a few months.
I will be working on these two for the next few days.

Sunday, March 31, 2013

Unette's Sprite is Done

Just finished another sprite today. I am getting used to working in Photoshop Creative Suite 6. I am still going to look at few Photoshop and line art tutorials before working on the next sprite.


Emotions left to right are outraged, angry, shock, sad, happy, and default (neutral).
Unette is the foster mother of the protagonist Amenti.  Unette is a workaholic and willingly devotes most of her time to her job than her foster daughter.
Up next is one of the possible love interests, a human scientist in training named Bryan.

Thursday, March 28, 2013

Facebook Page and Other Social Networking Sites

I just made a Facebook page today while doing sprite work.  On this Facebook page there will be folders (rough sketches, sprites, etc) for each visual novel I am currently working on, posts from my newly created Youtube account, and posts sharing what I am doing at the moment.

Why did I make a Facebook page?  Well there are people who like going to Facebook.  These people might not like Blogger.  I'm building my audience while I start young.

You can click here to go to my Facebook page.

Other places I am using:

My website
http://darksirengames.com

Youtube 
http://www.youtube.com/user/darksirengames
Google plus 
https://plus.google.com/u/0/109872889681791527789/about
Deviantart
http://darksirenftw.deviantart.com/
pixiv.net
http://www.pixiv.net/member.php?id=5665087
zazzle 
http://www.zazzle.com/darksirengames



Saturday, March 16, 2013

Working on Second Sprite of Trapped


It is a nice feeling going deeper into developing Trapped, my first visual novel.
The second sprite’s name is Unette and she is the adoptive mother of the main character Amenti.  Her emotions will be…
  • Defualt
  • Mad
  • Outraged
  • Sad
  • Embarrassed
  • Happy
I think I a satisfied wit the website to stop messing around the design.  I ditched the bubble background I used to have. The website can be viewed through this link.

Monday, March 11, 2013

My Wordpress Site is Up and is in Work in Progress

Hi guys!

My site is currently up and running. I just wanted to let everyone know while I am building on the site. You can go to the website through this link here.

I'm happy I got this far. I would need to work more on my visual novel so I will be working on my visual novel first before the website. The first post can be viewed here. There will be posts that are different there than here. Of course I will be still on Blogger since some people might be more comfortable on Blogger than going to a website.

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

One Sprite Finished, Five More to Go

So Im finally on the road to finishing this visual novel. My first visual novel with all original artwork (about a year ago I made The Coin with the help of a tutorial and pictures from Google). The sprites will hopefully be all done in photoshop and the scenery line work in manga studio. I was using manga studio for a friend so I guess I'll keep up with the software through my visual novel development.

Below is Amenti, the main character of Trapped and her emotions. This visual novel is not going to be a long one so the emotions: default, happy, mad, sad, shock, blush (probably won't be used for her), and eyes closed. So far each character will have a sprite that the other characters do not. Amenti may not have a blush sprite but Bryan will have one.



Before there was Remember Me, The Walking Dead (game) and Assissian's Creed (Vita) I used to wonder about the lack of dark skinned characters or characters of African decent in video games. There is still a chance I will get to work at a mainstream video game company someday. I know most mainstream companies are concerned with what sells so most video game characters are made with safe designs in mind. Of course I know the importance of making money but it feels nice being able to experiment.