A Brief Look into Indie Artists and Concept Design for Indie Games.
Within the gaming industry, there is two significant halves; AAA and indie. Between the two, thereās an incredible amount of differences, things such as budget, size and recognition. Aspects like this will clearly effect the productiveness and the quality of work, but this isnāt to say that a company with a much smaller budget is to make a game of bad quality but to suggest that there is limitations on what they are able to produce. Indie groups are a great deal smaller than AAA and have scarce budget, often funded by themselves and their audience, whilst AAA are funded by promoters and sponsors.Ā
Taking a look into the art of indie games, I will be comparing it to that of AAA titles and discussing my views on their differences and similarities.
Banner Saga (Stoic Studio) - Arnie Jorgensen
concept art -Ā
in game -Ā
Transistor (Supergiant Games) - Jen Zee
concept -Ā
in game -Ā
Braid -Ā Number None Inc., Ā Hothead Games - Daniel Hellman
concept -Ā
in game -Ā
Journey (thatgamecompany) - Matt Nava
concept -Ā
in game -Ā
Limbo (Playdead) - Arnt Jensen
concept -
in game -Ā
Using my previous post on western AAA game artists, I will share my thoughts and comparison.
One of the biggest things I would like to point out is the difference between concept and in game design. Whilst AAA companies will have a large variety of in game artists, along with outside concept artists coming in to work on production art, indie companies will likely use the same artist (s) for their in game and production design. Because of this, indie concept art tends to share the same style without much variation between concepts and the final product. Another con of the AAA side of the industry is comfort zones for style as to not unsettle an expecting audience, so these titles tend to stick with either realism or an established style. Indie games on the other hand seem to have more leeway when it comes to changing visuals up. This could be due to smaller audiences or the mere fact that people seeing something asĀ āindieā makes them less fixated on standards and lets them have less burdening expectations.
