Art

Excellent art design can attract more players, whereas poor art design might cause players to lose interest in continuing the game. Common tasks in the art department include:

Concept Artists are responsible for defining the art style early in game development and creating concept designs for scenes and characters. These designs help establish the tone of the game, the atmosphere of the environments, and the appearance of characters, providing guidance for later art creation.

Environment Artists are responsible for creating scene models, including textures for the ground, buildings, and decorations. They typically take the level designs created by level designers and replace basic polygonal structures with visible art assets for players.

Character Artists design both controllable and non-controllable characters, including human characters, creatures, and mechanical characters. Their work is divided into several modules, including character modelling, texture creation, rigging, and character animation.

Cinematic Artists are common in 3D games that require a lot of cutscenes. They are like directors and cinematographers in films, responsible for arranging character movements and controlling camera angles in cutscenes to convey the game’s story.

VFX Artists create visual effects (VFX) for the game, such as character attack effects, impact effects when hitting enemies, light effects for special items, and environmental effects. They typically use particle systems, tracking trails, and animations of textures or models to create these effects.

UI Artists design the game interface based on the requirements provided by the interface designers, including fonts, buttons, windows, and interface animations. Excellent UI design ensures that the interface doesn’t overshadow the game itself, while making sure players can easily find the functions they need and that the visual elements are harmonised with the game content.