Development Info Tyranny Dev Diary Video #2: Artistry in the Game

[Infinitron]

Tags: Brian Heins; Brian Menze; Feargus Urquhart; Justin Bell; Matthew Singh; Obsidian Entertainment; Paradox Interactive; Tyranny

Tyranny was supposed to have a dev diary blog update yesterday, but it looks like Obsidian and Paradox have decided to skip that in favor of other things. Earlier today, Paradox published the second episode in the series of Tyranny dev diary videos that they've produced. It's all about the game's artistic aspects: environmental design, character design, character animations and music. There's lots of interesting snippets of gameplay footage here, including a look at a new companion - Sirin, the sixteen year old Archon of Song, who was briefly mentioned in an interview last month. So that's six confirmed companions now.

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Obsidian will also be broadcasting some Tyranny gameplay on Paradox's Twitch channel later today, at 4:00PM PDT/1:00AM CEST, so stay tuned.

 

[Neanderthal]

Some nice looking fantastic locations, ant seen that high up view in a 2d game since Diablo 2 Arreat Summit, pity that they're not takin any inspiration from their Bronze Age setting though. Missed opportunity to use all that Hellenistic art and stylisation that set Apotheon apart, an looks so fucking cool.

Still not a fan o retarded combat moves.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Or, to quote myself:

Also:

:deadinside:

 

[Excommunicator]

Artistry

 

[covr]

Artistry? All I can see is slightly modified PoE graphics with Disney portraits and UI even worse than in PoE, uninspiring music (similar to PoE), some kawaii animations and a catchphrase with badly placed comma ('Sometimes, evil wins' - seriously?)

 

[Obsequious Approbation]

I liked PoE music, but it desperately needed more variety, more themes. I hope they rectify that in Tyranny.

 

[Aenra]

aaah.. amerikwa.. and how amerikwan a video that was.. brand/logo/quote on the T-Shirt or baseball cap? Why heavans forbid, let us cut it!

PC
PC
PC
PC

never mind nigger towns, drug ghettos, 1%ers, illiteracy rates, 3/4 neighbourhoods, etc. etc.
land of the free, land of opportunity and above all, amagad, land of e-q-u-a-l-i-t-y. Yes sir. PC or bust.

/sigh.. Pointless, bitter, resigned /sigh

(yes, that's all i got from this. You want to talk pixels, go nuts. They sure as hell got a luxurious fucking office out of them, lol.. what wonders RTWP may bring forth..)

 

[DeepOcean]

That bleeding statue is EDGY.

 

[Excidium II]

Pretentious shits. I spit on Obsidian's 'artistry' team.

 

[mutonizer]

1) The vignette/banner art style is very, very much like that of Dragon Age Inquisition - Keep. Shit, without knowing, I'd probably would have said it was from DA:I Keep. Not a problem in itself (everything is inspired by something else, blabla) but it's just a bit too obvious, at least to me.
2) Both art AND music directors telling you that "evil won", "it's cataclysmic, disaster, oppressive, yada yada" followed by "but we wanted the player to feel levity, and not be burdened by his actions and choices". WHAT? What the fuck is the point of doing whatever the hell they doing then?
3) That animator chick just cannot animate for shit (or her team or something). The running animations wouldn't even be passable for a newbie animator and the combat ones look like everyone has a couple brooms up their asses.
4) The stylized look'n feel of the avatars in the character panel don't seem to match AT ALL the environment art look'n feel. The portraits match event less with the rest. Nothing match the vignettes look'n feel. What the fuck is the art director doing?
5) The archer jumped 10m into the air and fired 3 "flame arrows" in half a second...


That said, think this video is THE one that finally convinced me it's a no buy. Usually I buy most cRPGs even some I don't really play to just keep the genre going but this shit I don't actually want to even exist or succeed.

 

[BlackGoat]

What if evil won? What does one life matter? What can change the nature of a maaaan

 

[Fever]

*sigh* If it's more of the same, then it's a copy. If it's nice but not edgy, then it's dull. If it's original, then it's pretentious.
Apart from a couple of objectively retarded combat moves - which can easily be overlooked if the game is valid - I see nothing wrong with the art department.
The isometric view is fine, the atmosphere feels great and the music is appropriate for the few bits I've heard.
Sure the portraits could be better, some animations look off, but who fucking cares.
Not buying Tyranny after these 2 minutes? You clearly weren't going to buy it anyway. Yeah, it's better not to support this degenerate kind of isometric Rpgs, god forbid if Fallout 5 gets tainted by its influence.

Some of you retarded, allerged RPG-lovers who strive to be edgy and sharp to the point of just throwing shit on principle are the reason why other once-great franchises have fallen to digrace.
For what I've seen, Tyranny looks less cartoony and blurry than D:OS2, which - guess what? - is going to be a decent RPG anyway.

I bet you are the same people who enjoy the modern and c00l - sic - art direction of F4, Skyrym or fucking HoMM7.
Give me HoMM2 over Ubisoft shit any day. Give me Lords of Xulima over Fallout4, Geneforge over X-COM 2 and PoE/Tyranny over 95% of the console-friendly/edgy/hipster/action-style "Rpgs" you are filling the market with, any fucking day of my life.

 

[J_C]

*sigh* If it's more of the same, then it's a copy. If it's nice but not edgy, then it's dull. If it's original, then it's pretentious.
Apart from a couple of objectively retarded combat moves - which can easily be overlooked if the game is valid - I see nothing wrong with the art department.
The isometric view is fine, the atmosphere feels great and the music is appropriate for the few bits I've heard.
Sure the portraits could be better, some animations look off, but who fucking cares.
Not buying Tyranny after these 2 minutes? You clearly weren't going to buy it anyway. Yeah, it's better not to support this degenerate kind of isometric Rpgs, god forbid if Fallout 5 gets tainted by its influence.

Some of you retarded, allerged RPG-lovers who strive to be edgy and sharp to the point of just throwing shit on principle are the reason why other once-great franchises have fallen to digrace.
For what I've seen, Tyranny looks less cartoony and blurry than D:OS2, which - guess what? - is going to be a decent RPG anyway.

I bet you are the same people who enjoy the modern and c00l - sic - art direction of F4, Skyrym or fucking HoMM7.
Give me HoMM2 over Ubisoft shit any day. Give me Lords of Xulima over Fallout4, Geneforge over X-COM 2 and PoE/Tyranny over 95% of the console-friendly/edgy/hipster/action-style "Rpgs" you are filling the market with, any fucking day of my life.

 

[Bester]

"The reason we didn't do mocap is that it would look too uncanny for the world that we're in".

Right. I think the real reason is that you have nobody who knows how to use it, and you don't even have the equipment.
Your animators seem to be the cheapest human resource in the entire studio, given the "quality" of their output.

"The game had the potential to veer into very heavy territory and we wanted to avoid that".

Well said, Justin. Should use that as a tagline on the box.

 

[Bester]

Yup. Their animator is Cathy Nichols linkedin.

Let's see how skilled she is...

- Did some 2d flash style "animation" for a 2 minute youtube video. (allegedly 2 months)
- Same amount of work on some vaporware mobile game. (allegedly 2 months)
- Same amount of work designing a logo and something, nothing to do with gamedev. (allegedly 3 months)

Total amount of work so far that has to do with 3d gamedev animation: 0. If you count what she cited as animation, and if you cut through the bullshit, then probably a couple of weeks of real work, except how much do flash cartoons really count?

Then suddenly, out of nowhere:
- OOOH, NICE RESUME, CATHY. WE'D CERTAINLY LIKE TO HAVE YOU AT OBSHITIAN. Animation intern where they basically show her Maya for the first time. Then for 2 years she works animating Pillars (horribly).
And now she's like "meh we didn't want to use mocap cause we wanted to have animations not bound by human limitations, we wanted to push the envelop there". Hilarious. Could you lie more? Could you possibly?

This hiring policy at Obshitian is really something. That "narrative designer" chick that thinks Fallout 3 is the best gaem evar. Now this animator. They fish for employees in the garbage, and then surprisingly all their games shit. What a surprise.

 

[Excidium II]

Obsidian has been getting some people with really thin qualifications in the last few years.

 

[Infinitron]

Why are you picking on some random junior animator? Look at the lead guy at least: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shonstewart

Also, how do you feel about Black Isle veteran Brian Menze's role as art director

 

[Sannom]

Also, how do you feel about Black Isle veteran Brian Menze's involvement with the art

First time I see him in a promotional video, that's for sure. Also, as I've already stated, I think he should upgrade his reference dolls.

 

[Bester]

Why are you picking on some random junior animator?

- She's been promoted from junior to a full blown animator over a year ago, so she's not some junior.
- They let her be the face of the animation team in this video, along with her lead.
- You'll be experiencing her "work" soon.

Look at the lead guy at least: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shonstewart

Ask yourself, as a "lead" is he doing a bang up job? Considering that the end result is shit?

how do you feel about Black Isle veteran Brian Menze's role as art director

Sad.

 

[Excidium II]

What's Brian Menze resposnsible for at Black Isle?

 

[Infinitron]

What's Brian Menze resposnsible for at Black Isle?

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Brian_Menze

 

[Excidium II]

What's Brian Menze resposnsible for at Black Isle?

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Brian_Menze

Yeah, I've seen that before, tells me nothing. For all I know he might be responsible for everything that was godawful.

 

[Infinitron]

Fair enough, let's ask Anthony Davis.

 

[Bubbles]

http://kotaku.com/5869592/the-star-wars-fallout--neverwinter-art-of-brian-menze/

He also did the spell icons in PS:T and IWD2.

Edit: http://planescape.outshine.com/official.planescape-torment.org/oldnews/tim_0609.html

 

[Excidium II]

shrug