- Nov 1, 2018
- 9
- 9
Hi all, I'm Wheels, head dev at UHF. I've come to talk a bit about X-Gen.
What is X-Gen?
X-Gen is a trainer-centric adventure point and click based in an alternate universe of the classic X-Men: Evolution cartoon, built from the ground up as a fun and immersive experience for fans of the franchise and newcomers alike. It is being developed (exclusively) by the UHF team.
Embody the newest student to arrive at the Xavier Institute, and use your nullification powers to help unveil a conspiracy involving time-travel and multiple realities, all the while interacting with your peers and exploring a fully realized Bayville (at three different points in time), with a myriad of venues and secrets to be found -- ready to react to your decisions.
Characters, Setting, Style and Brand
As a below-average artist it's all too easy to simply copy through Steven E. Gordon's original artwork -- thankfully, 1:1 copy of the original X:EVO design would neither fit nor work with what's expected of an adult game. Finding the sweet spot between the necessary adjustments while keeping up with that style in a recognizable way has been both fun and hellish. Any short amount of breaks from constant artwork means I need to go back and grind the skill back into some semblance of sharpness.
...But this is by no means a blog post, let us talk about work (It gets technical). Designing a character from the show for the game begins with a short study of forms, playing out a few poses and proportions. While this is fairly straightforward for the sprites each character has obvious morphological differences that go beyond skin color and shading, and that I try to keep on the back of my head constantly.
Rogue, for example has a bigger set of breasts than most other girls, bigger biceps, slightly defined tummy, round ass and an "outie" -- these elements translate directly into other poses and keeping both internal consistency between two (let alone a dozen) versions of the same character (in different perspectives) and the same poses for different characters (we don't do recolor) is paramount.
While the sprites are under the spotlight 99% of the player's time, backgrounds still received some love, although the idea of simplicity AND substance over quality and detail is the ruling metric in my head when working on these. Sharp edges, easily identifiable zones and times of day with detail sprinkled in, anything else is overkill and gobbling up precious time from more important assets. Here's some basic wiring, lining and rendering.
Speaking of which, you might have noticed the institute does not resemble the old x:Evo comics all that much.
Here's a map.
X:GEN takes place in an alternate reality of that universe, with some minor divergences. Don't worry too much about it, everything will be explained in time - suffice to say, Mutants have been outed way before you arrived in the institute, and Xavier has not been idly waiting to recruit his students, teachers and building up his mansion into a proper campus.
1.1 - Roadmap and unreliable plans
I'm gonna take a break here to talk about UHF's plans going forward. We got this pimping roadmap explaining what steps the project is going to take in the following months.
This has been part 1 of our dev logs, you'll be able to find them at our discord, alongside our scrapbook and official, promotional artwork for X:GEN.
See ya there!
DISCORD:
PATREON:
What is X-Gen?
X-Gen is a trainer-centric adventure point and click based in an alternate universe of the classic X-Men: Evolution cartoon, built from the ground up as a fun and immersive experience for fans of the franchise and newcomers alike. It is being developed (exclusively) by the UHF team.
Embody the newest student to arrive at the Xavier Institute, and use your nullification powers to help unveil a conspiracy involving time-travel and multiple realities, all the while interacting with your peers and exploring a fully realized Bayville (at three different points in time), with a myriad of venues and secrets to be found -- ready to react to your decisions.
Characters, Setting, Style and Brand
As a below-average artist it's all too easy to simply copy through Steven E. Gordon's original artwork -- thankfully, 1:1 copy of the original X:EVO design would neither fit nor work with what's expected of an adult game. Finding the sweet spot between the necessary adjustments while keeping up with that style in a recognizable way has been both fun and hellish. Any short amount of breaks from constant artwork means I need to go back and grind the skill back into some semblance of sharpness.
...But this is by no means a blog post, let us talk about work (It gets technical). Designing a character from the show for the game begins with a short study of forms, playing out a few poses and proportions. While this is fairly straightforward for the sprites each character has obvious morphological differences that go beyond skin color and shading, and that I try to keep on the back of my head constantly.
Rogue, for example has a bigger set of breasts than most other girls, bigger biceps, slightly defined tummy, round ass and an "outie" -- these elements translate directly into other poses and keeping both internal consistency between two (let alone a dozen) versions of the same character (in different perspectives) and the same poses for different characters (we don't do recolor) is paramount.
While the sprites are under the spotlight 99% of the player's time, backgrounds still received some love, although the idea of simplicity AND substance over quality and detail is the ruling metric in my head when working on these. Sharp edges, easily identifiable zones and times of day with detail sprinkled in, anything else is overkill and gobbling up precious time from more important assets. Here's some basic wiring, lining and rendering.
Speaking of which, you might have noticed the institute does not resemble the old x:Evo comics all that much.
Here's a map.
X:GEN takes place in an alternate reality of that universe, with some minor divergences. Don't worry too much about it, everything will be explained in time - suffice to say, Mutants have been outed way before you arrived in the institute, and Xavier has not been idly waiting to recruit his students, teachers and building up his mansion into a proper campus.
1.1 - Roadmap and unreliable plans
I'm gonna take a break here to talk about UHF's plans going forward. We got this pimping roadmap explaining what steps the project is going to take in the following months.
This has been part 1 of our dev logs, you'll be able to find them at our discord, alongside our scrapbook and official, promotional artwork for X:GEN.See ya there!
DISCORD:
You must be registered to see the links
PATREON:
You must be registered to see the links
