FOUR Secrets To Gorgeous Game Art!
Summary
TLDRThis video explores the unexpected success of 'Cult of the Lamb,' highlighting its visually stunning, dark, and beautiful art style that contributed to its acclaim as a top indie game. The creators, including Jimp and Blackthorn Prod, share insights on the game's development, emphasizing the importance of a cohesive visual identity, thematic contrast, and the intriguing blend of cute and dark elements. They also discuss their new program, Game Dev Hero, designed to master all aspects of game development. The video provides a deep dive into the art and marketing strategies that made 'Cult of the Lamb' stand out, offering valuable lessons for aspiring game developers.
Takeaways
- 😊 They struggled initially to find the right visual style and hook to resonate with players
- 👌 Finding the core idea of 'starting your own cult' brought their vision together
- 🎨 They consciously combined cute and dark visuals to create contrast
- 🌈 The art direction ties back to supporting the central idea of leading a cult
- 🎾 Creating visual rules and motifs early on helped maintain consistency
- 🎨 The color palette intentionally uses dark and light colors for contrast
- 🔥 Breaking their own art rules sometimes led to creative solutions
- 😎 Adding unexpected colors made some buildings stand out
- 💡 Experimenting to find what 'feels right' guided creative choices
- 💪 Having an artistic vision bible provided helpful reference
Q & A
What was the original game idea that the developers pitched at GDC?
-The original idea was a game centered around a god on a floating whale. However, publishers were not very interested in this idea.
How did the developers come up with the idea of starting your own cult in the game?
-After the floating whale idea was rejected, the developers went back to the drawing board. They realized they needed a clearer, more resonant concept that all aspects of the game could tie into. The idea of starting your own cult encompassed this.
Why did the developers intentionally add dark elements to the cute art style?
-They wanted to expand beyond the perceived kid-friendly nature of their previous cute, cartoonish games. Adding darker elements helped them appeal to a more mature Steam audience.
How did the cult theme lend itself well to the contrasting art direction?
-The positions of cute animal followers contrasted with an evil, satanic cult leader created an inherent juxtaposition that fit the themes of good vs evil and light vs dark.
What techniques did the developers use to maintain a consistent art style?
-They created a visual bible early on that laid out core colors, fonts, symbols and visual motifs to adhere to throughout development and refer back to when bringing on other artists.
Why was sticking to a very limited color palette not viable?
-While visually striking, limiting the palette too much felt creatively stifling and made it hard to differentiate areas and make everything vibrant.
How did the developers allow some flexibility with the color palette?
-They designated certain core UI and marketing colors to maintain cohesive branding, while giving themselves room to experiment with bolder colors in certain in-game assets.
How did breaking their color rules lead to creative solutions?
-When struggling to make a building distinct within their set palette, trying wildly different colors that broke the rules made the building pop uniquely.
What realizations did the Happy Tree Friends cartoons provide early on?
-Seeing the huge contrast and appeal of mixing cute cartoon styles with ultra violence showed the power of blending seemingly disparate themes and aesthetics.
How does the notion of contrast tie everything in the game together?
-From story and gameplay to visuals and audio, the contrast between dark and light themes, cute and gory elements, and more permeates all aspects to create symbolic cohesion.
Outlines
👹 Contrast and identity led to the style of Cult of the Lamb.
The creators of Cult of the Lamb originally had several game ideas that didn't resonate. The theme of starting your own cult gave a strong identity that informed the art style. They consciously combined cuteness and darkness for contrast that worked well. The visual rules and motifs created early on helped maintain consistency.
😈 Contrast attracted a broader Steam audience.
The creators found that their cute cartoon style limited their appeal. Seeing dark games succeed, they intentionally added darkness for contrast. This let them keep their style while also appealing to the Steam audience. The positioning as an evil cult leader commanding cute animals arose naturally.
🎨 Establishing and bending the color rules.
The creators focused on key cult colors early on to establish identity. This visual language informed the UI and marketing. Though limiting at first, vibrant colors were added back for each environment. Other colors have also been blended in successfully through experimenting with what works.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Contrast
💡Identity
💡Color Palette
💡Art Bible
💡Permeating
💡Flamboyant
💡Verdant
💡Breaking rules
💡Elevate
💡Resonate
Highlights
The visuals in Cult of the Lamb are edgy, stunning, dark and beautiful all at the same time.
The creators felt the game was not that good, but they followed through on 4 key principles of gorgeous game art.
Having a core concept and tagline that resonates with people is important for both the game idea and art style.
Transcripts
there's something about Cult of a lamb
that sticks out like a sore thumb in all
the right ways the visuals are edgy
stunning dark beautiful all at the same
time and it's no surprise this game
completely blew up and frankly became
one of the most successful Indie titles
of all time what's even stranger is the
creators including my buddy jimp they
never really felt like the game was that
good but even still they followed
through even though they felt insecure
on four key principles of gorgeous game
art and I think we're insanely lucky to
get them right now straight from the
Lamb's mouth and by the way guys
blackborn prod and I have teamed up to
create the ultimate game development
program it's called Game Dev hero and
that's exactly what you're going to
become with this program it's the
ultimate training for you to master the
technical artistic Financial social
media and business side of game
development it's only open for 30 more
days and there's just 200 seats
available after that it's going to close
for at least 6 months and for those of
you who enroll in the first 24 hours
well you're going to get four private
Mastermind meetings with me and
Blackthorn prod so click below to check
it out all right let's go so what are
some things that you slowly learned
after you know I guess it was a decade
of making games what are some things
that you learned from the art side that
make a game eye-catching that make
people stop and stare at the game what
are some things that you feel game
developers need to to apply and that you
applied to Cult of the Lamb so with the
the kind of the the God on a floating
whale idea and we had like lots of
different ideas and we actually kind of
got far enough with that idea that we
were pitching it to Publishers at GDC
and we kind of they weren't quite as
interested as we had hoped and we kind
of went back to the juring board and we
were like well why is that and we kind
of realized that the idea was quite
convoluted and we there was a lot of
different ideas going on and we really
needed to find that Gem and that kind of
concept and idea and tagline that that
people would resonate with and that kind
of goes through from the the idea of
what the actual game is all the way
through to the art style as well and
they kind of all have to be connected so
I think for us it was from like a an art
point of view it was once we had the
idea like how do we attach a style and
imagery that kind of helps Elevate that
and and everything kind of needs to all
be working together towards the same
goal the idea of of of start your own
cult once we had that idea and that
theme there was so much like visual
identity that we could take from that
all the the religious imagery and and
making sure that that uh goes through
every single thing from the the
character designs to the colors you're
using to the imagery throughout the
world um it all kind of works together
to to support that idea of starting your
own cult I I think that was really a
light bulb moment and we were kind of I
don't know if you've ever been in this
position where you're kind of you got
all these little nuggets of ideas and
you're trying to piece them together you
kind of got these characters in mind but
they don't quite work for you and you
got you know what the game is but it's
like I don't know and then you for us
anyway you kind of we had the the idea
of starting your own cult and then
everything else kind of came real
naturally after that I know the feeling
yeah yeah yeah I get I get it because um
we're in that same exact situation with
our game Twisted Tower stylistically we
were kind of all over the place we knew
we liked Bioshock right but that wasn't
that wasn't enough and so for for 2
years well it was probably about a year
a year and a half it felt like we were
sort of floundering and trying just
trying to keep our head above water and
not get drowned in too many ideas too
many visual flavors and visual Styles
and it wasn't until we realized that
it's a firstperson shooter fairy tale
nice that's when we go got it that's the
style and so you're so you are so
spot-on when you say that the hook
dictated the visual style yes was it
luck the reason I say that is because
your strength your yours and Julian's
strength is cute hyper cute characters
and that was like I I think all the way
back to the Happy Tree Friends do you
remember Happy Tree Friends yeah of
course and I'm sure that was an
inspiration for you guys because happy
the reason why Happy Tree Friends and
for those those of you listening who
don't know it's just basically bunch of
forest creatures super cute kind of like
Warner Brothers Vibes or even even like
a kid like a Nick Jr show but all of
them are getting like slaughtered right
that was from like early 2000s I
remember watching those videos and
feeling really cool when I was in Middle
School but the reason why those did so
well is because there was contrast right
you have super cute and then super dark
and you slam them together and you get
something that's viral when it comes to
Cult of the Lamb was that an intentional
thought process of we're going to create
contrast how do we create contrast okay
let's put Cults next to cute creatures
it was definitely a conscious decision
to I mean I think it came in two parts
the the first part was a lot of our
previous games um and like Adventure
powers for example which is like really
quite cute and kind of silly um and I
think we saw a lot of comments of people
thinking it was like a kid game game and
kind of and I think as soon as you have
that cartoon style particularly the our
specific style which is quite like
Saturday morning cartoon I I think it
instantly puts quite a lot of people off
and then we were sort of seeing games
like Don't Starve and Binding of Isaac
had a real element of Darkness to them
and and had huge success I think it it
was so it was definitely a conscious
decision to that we wanted to keep the
the kind of cute cartoony stuff but we
also really wanted to um to add the
darkness and and make it bit messed up I
I think coming from flash games for me
at least I think the the super cute
cartoon stuff went really well and was
really popular and and that I kind of
fell into a little bit of a trap doing
that but then going to sort of Steam
games I I think the audience is quite
different there so it was it was
definitely like quite early on um
something that we wanted to do before we
had the the cult idea and then I think
when we had that the idea start your own
cult it just it all fell into place
because we're like right well you're
this kind of you know satanic uh cult
leader but then the animals are really
cute and that kind of juer position felt
really natural and it came very
naturally and it was a theme that we
wanted to explore as well was the sort
of the good and evil the light and dark
the the cute and the horrific um and and
as a cult leader like you're given this
power do you do good or do you do bad it
was almost a happy accident um in the
the kind of theme eventually came
together so well with with the art
Direction well you know I see the game
and I when I when I look at everything
the from the game play to the story to
the hook to the themes and and even to
the visuals everything leans on one
primary principle and this is just my
theory it's all about contrast it's like
there's contrast in everything mhm can
we talk about that when it comes to
color and and and even like marketing
material like when when I look at Colt
of the Lamb your color palette is so
bizarre but it it's I can I can almost
taste it it's so flavorful how does it
taste it tastes kind of like a a a
really sugary cupcake with like
Jalapenos in it oh it's like so I know
right it's but you wouldn't think it
works but there's actually desserts that
do that where they it's like you've got
contrast of two two seemingly different
flavors that wouldn't work together but
they work and so I'm curious if you
could speak to just some tips and tricks
and your thought process behind color
theory when it comes to Cult of the Liam
yeah totally I mean I think very early
on the project originally we wanted to
make the whole game in this very limited
color palette and I think we were like
you know let's we got pick five colors
and everything in the game has got to
use just those colors and there's no
other colors allowed and and and I think
um some games do that really well and
keep things really striking for us that
idea kind of fell away a little bit
because I think we wanted all these
different color animals and we wanted
the the biomes to feel quite different
color-wise but that that idea um still
kind of persisted through a lot of the
marketing images and and the characters
picking a a palette to that kind of
defines your game early on can be really
powerful even if you don't like
exclusively use it for the artwork I
think it can really help form the
identity of the game so I think with
colon the lamb you got the the black and
the red which are kind of quite evil and
dark but then is had the uh the kind of
light white white cream color to kind of
represent the lightness and also there's
like a kind of bright neony greeny blue
that we use as well um which is quite a
light sort of holy holy color yeah and I
think that really helped particularly
with like the UI and the the kind of the
marketing stuff to just keep things
consistent and kind of keep like an a
visual identity for the game that kind
of goes through everything we went
through a lot of pre-production and we
we kind of came up with this color
scheme and the the fonts and some
symbols was basically a set of rules and
visual motifs that we wanted to use and
kind of created a bit of a Bible and
that was really useful just as we kind
of went through the the full production
of the game to to have that to refer
back to and make sure everything kind of
uses some of these ideas and I think
especially when you're kind of bring in
on other artists as well like later in
the process it's really useful to have
those those rules you set out for the
the world and the the imagery and the
the identity of the game um to have that
to refer back to um and make sure that
you're kind of yeah just it's that's
permeating through every every aspect of
it did you guys ever stretch your legs
outside of those rules was there ever a
moment where you go you know what we
need to do a little bit of pink here or
we need to do a little bit of yellow
here yeah definitely and I think that's
kind of why yeah originally as I say we
were trying to use this very limited
palette but it kind of felt a little bit
too limiting in the in to Ed for
everything yeah we we wanted the game to
feel really vibrant as well and I think
all our games always have been been and
yeah super colorful in like a Saturday
morning cartoon so I think there's
definitely areas that you can can stray
stray from it but sometimes it does just
look out of place so I think it's for me
it's just been a bit of trial and error
um and making certain things pop that
you want to kind of draw attention to I
think with all the all the kind of core
things and the main visual language in
the game we we do try and stick to it uh
to those kind of core colors that we use
for the identity but yeah I I do find
myself just putting in other stuff here
and there just to kind of make it feel
unique in the world kind of thing like
for like for example we we got all these
buildings in the cult right and and a
lot of it is kind of it's all like of
natural materials and a lot of it is uh
wood and stone and you know wood painted
red and using that kind of uh that
palette that we've used for a lot of
stuff um and and green as well for like
the grass cuz you wanted it to feel
verdant and and you know luscious um but
I have found with like more the more
recent buildings I kind of want to mix
up a little bit so we've added like a
tailor building and I just didn't feel
right in all these different colors and
I tried all the different colors and
then I kind of just tried it like a a
pink and purple and it just just worked
and it it it gave it's quite a
flamboyant kind of color scheme um which
kind of fits with the idea of uh
tailoring clothes and dressing up your
followers and it just made it kind of
gave that building its own identity and
there wasn't really much of a like
mindset or reasoning behind it other
than that I was just trying all these
different colors and that worked it
looked it looked good and it just it
just felt right so um I think a lot of
it is just kind of
what feels right and what um
experimenting I think and don't be too
afraid to break your own rules as well
cuz um you know that's that's sometimes
where the magic comes from if it's not
working and you're following all these
rules that you set and then sometimes
when the uh when you break your own
rules that's when the kind of real magic
happens all right guys thanks for
watching and just remember Blackthorn
pra and I have teamed up to create the
ultimate game development program it's
called Game Dev hero and that's exactly
what you're going to become with this
program it's the ultim training for you
to master the technical artistic
Financial social media and business side
of game development it's huge it's
taught by veteran game developers who
actually make significant full-time
income doing exactly what you've always
dreamed of and we're going to hold your
hand while you work to achieve your
indie game dreams it's only open for 30
more days and there's just 200 seats
available after that it's going to close
for at least 6 months and for those of
you who enroll in the first 24 hours
well you're going to get four private
Mastermind meetings with me and
blackborne PR so click below to check
check it out
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