Kali (2024)
Gameplay mockup (work in-progress)
Role: Lead Artist
Tools: Aseprite, Jira, Confluence, Figma
Timeline: May-December 2024
OVERVIEW
From May to December 2024, I served as the lead artist for a small hobby group game project. This game, tentatively titled Kali, is a 2D demolition game made in a custom game engine where players will destroy buildings to gather resources in order to survive in a post-apocalyptic world. As the lead artist, I created the buildings and other assets to be used in the game, attended weekly planning meetings, and managed a small team of artists.​
In the game's main 2D side scrolling mode, players will have to demolish large pixel art buildings using a variety of tools such as a pickaxe or drill in order carve out chunks and obtain the raw resources. The buildings will have an inner layer where the player can find items.​
In the game's second top down camera mode, the player will then use the resources they gathered to create different camp buildings. These camp buildings will house other survivors and allow special non-playable characters (NPCs) such as a blacksmith or an inventor to help upgrade the player's tools. The game is also planned to have a story that would be primarily set in this game mode.
Project Origins:
In April 2024, I was approached by a former game jam teammate of mine for the game to help with starting a new game project. After meeting 2 other core team members and deciding a concept, the 4 of us began to work on the game and I was put in charge of creating art for the game using my experience in pixel art. This would later expand to managing a small team of artists.
A test player character that I made during my time on the project
My Contributions:
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​In this project, my main role was that of lead artist, conducting planning meetings with my fellow leads alongside coordinating a small team of 2 artists.
​For the duration of of my time working on the project, I attended weekly meetings to plan and guide the direction of the game with my teammates. I would then make assets and create design documentation on our project's Confluence Page, using Jira to track tasks. Executive decisions I made included deciding a low-scale pixel art resolution and then crafting the setting for the game. One notable design decision was the idea of having the game's world be overgrown and decayed, but not to the point of dullness and depression like most post-apocalyptic games.
​Eventually as our team size grew, I began to supervise and coordinate with a small team of 2 artists. We would meet once every two weeks where I would communicate and plan the art direction of the game. I used a miniature Scrum approach to managing tasks, coming up with a plan for the team to work on over a couple of weeks. I would then gather the deliverables that my team made and present them during the management meetings in order to get feedback. I would then present the feedback to the artist team in another meeting and restart the process.
I would also work on art assets myself with my broader plan being to ​​​create assets for the game so that we could have a strong "vertical slice" (concept preview) of the project. This would allow us to get an idea of how the game would work and use it to gain interest and attention for our work.
Examples of art work for the game's buildings:
Step 1: Create a normal, unbroken building
Step 2: Add decay and plants to the building
Step 3: Create a basic inner layer that will feature props and items for the player to discover
Skills and Tools
Two versions of a wooden building I made in Aseprite (outer and inner layer)
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Documented the art design in Confluence, using it and Jira to communicate ideas to the development team
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Utilized Scrum project methodology to assign and track tasks for the art team
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Created building sprites in Aseprite, making multiple versions of each building
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Created a user interface prototype in Figma in order to draft a design for the top down camp mode
The Challenge
Concept art done in pencil and pixel art for a blacksmith character planned for the game
My main challenge in my management role came from trying to manage expectations from the main development team to the art team. With the top-down game mode, I was missing a lot of design documentation from our programmer (also the designer) on what the gameplay of the mode would look like. This made it difficult to make art plans for the game as I was missing asset specifics.​ I voiced these issues to the others in the development team and was told to develop an art plan independently of the gameplay with plans to design around it.
I disagreed with the idea, as without proper design specification, the art and programming team would both end up working on different assets that would take even more time to synchronize. While it is expected that not all art made during game projects get used, I believed that this approach would make for a very messy project workflow. Despite my disagreement, I did the best I could in making an art design plan based on what I could on Confluence, and then designing a rough mockup in Figma with the basics of the mode.
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On the art side, my initial challenge for the project was beginning to work on larger building assets. In previous projects, I worked primarily on characters as well as less-detailed buildings for backgrounds, so creating larger foreground objects was a new experience for me.
One issue I initially focused on creating usable assets very quickly while the programmer (and later programming team) worked on the custom engine. The idea was to have assets ready so that an alpha could be developed quickly in order to see how the game would roughly play as to attract interest to our project. However, the custom game engine faced delay after delay that wound up making my work less impactful as the management team began to add extra features to our scope before our alpha was done.
While I never doubted the importance of concept art or planning, this project has reinforced the importance of project planning to me. Had we spent more time scoping out the project plan, a lot of the problems the development team fell into could have been avoided. I should have been more assertive in pushing for the design document to be finalized by our programmer, but kept giving into the same feedback he gave in wanting to finish the game's engine first.
Final Reflection
Cropped screenshot from the top down camp game mode mockup I made
Despite the shortcomings I had with the project, I don't regret being a part of it. I learned a great deal from the experience in a couple of areas. I gained valuable experience in leadership as this was one of my first projects where I was in a leadership role, but not the sole director of the project's direction. In terms of tools, I improved my general pixel artistry and learned both Jira and Confluence that I previously did not use before. This would become essential as I soon found a remote job in social media where I would use Confluence very often.
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I chose to leave the project in December 2024 as I gained other responsibilities in previous month and felt that I did not have time anymore for the project. I am however, open to returning to the project after some time if needed, and I do keep in touch with the development group as part of my professional network.