#design thoughts

[felicity0124]

Canari and Gwynn with fancy outfits!

i was mildly annoyed by No One dressing up for Jacinthe’s super-fancy event, so time to alleviate my grievances with fanart.

additional design notes and rambling under the cut.

backside of the paper, aka where i put all of the miscellaneous references.

yes, this entire 2-sided drawing was made out of spite because none of the NPCs dress up, and the player is given the option to wear... a rather ugly Wallpaper Textured Suit. the characters even talk about how the rival not dressing up is a problem... even though some of them are just (or more) as off-theme as the rival anyway.

I get that giving almost all major characters a second outfit for a few scenes is probably not a priority for GameFreak, but alas the suspension of disbelief is just not disbelieving. this is not meant to hate, this is just a fashion nerd voicing a minor nitpick.

will yap a ton about imagined construction and stuff for these outfits because fashion fixation, even though I have no intention of making either.

starting with Canari's outfit. things I noted from her regular outfit are that she seems rather comfortable showing skin and that her design is very asymmetry heavy.

additionally, a nitpick I found with Canari's regular outfit while designing this is that due to her keystone being mounted on the zipper of her tube top, she has to wear that tube top for any Pokémon battle where she intends to use Mega Evolution. as keystones are implied to be rare, I'm assuming that she doesn't have another one, and I just don't want to think about the logistics of if she can take the keystone out. I get that this is a fictional character with one outfit design, but she's got to be experiencing consequences in-universe for attaching her keystone to a piece of clothing that needs to be washed instead of an accessory she can wear all the time.

so, i present to you: dress designed to go around that tube top and her keystone.

because she has the tube top underneath for coverage anyway, I chose to make her dress bodice entirely sheer to maintain the shape of the tube top and keep the shapes somewhat similar to her regular outfit. I'm envisioning it as golden and glittery. The only opaque part is that approximately triangle-shaped patch of lace detailing in the middle of the neckline, which I put there to cover the zipper. the random little zipper in the middle of her fancy dress just felt so weird. anyway, the neckline of the dress bodice is intended to align with the neckline of her tube top so her zipper charm with the keystone can be pulled out to rest on top of the dress bodice. the dress bodice closes on the back somehow. I didn't bother to put thought into that. there's many ways it could work and it doesn't matter which one it is because it's not really visible anyway.

compared to her fitted top, Canari's jacket and pants are very baggy in her regular outfit. as a result, I decided to go for Floof in her sleeves and skirt. they're just layers and layers of yellow ruffles, probably made of tulle or something similar. enough layers to be basically opaque. I used the yellow ruffles for her glove cuffs as well, though I didn't find a way to draw them consistently on a smaller scale. I'm not sure what colour I want the glove body to be, but it's between white or greyblue.

speaking of greyblue. I've decided to limit the greyblue from Canari's regular outfit to her choker and heels, so that the brighter, attention-grabbing electric yellow can be the main colour.

sometime in the design process, I decided that the floof of her dress could also be considered a reference to the electric type pompom oricorio. and considering real world concepts for celebrity red carpet looks, exotic floof bird (as oricorio isn't available in ZA iirc) is probably on the mild side.

as Canari's regular pants are asymmetric, with a lightning bolt on on one leg, I decided to use the ribbon with dots (probably a gold ribbon with white pearl dots) trim motif to make a lightning bolt shape out of wrapped ribbons on one of her legs. I don't envision coloured leggings for this outfit. I do think Sabrina Carpenter style shiny jazz tights would go well with it though. ignore that the lightning bolt is on the opposite side as the one in her regular pants, I wasn't that attentive to references.

and while yes, I know this is for a tournament with Pokémon battling involved, I feel like Canari would treat it as more of a networking opportunity. show up and look memorable. as she's the F Rank promotion match, i think she'd know that she's good but not Jacinthe level good, and therefore doesn't have great chances of winning the tournament as a whole. so yes I decided it would be ok to give her heels. (plus Jacinthe's normal outfit has heels anyway.) Canari also gives me the vibes to be the kind of person who only owns sneakers and other comfy shoes, no formal shoes, so she kinda has to dig around for something to go with her fancy dress. she ends up finding this one pair of heels that probably used to belong to her mom and happens to fits her. (Canari's parents are like, highly implied to be dead, right?)

I switched her pigtails into buns because I thought it looked a bit more cleaned-up and formal.

I kept Canari's body type kinda generic slim and feminine. as a female gaming streamer, she'll have motivation from critics to be conventionally attractive but not to exercise for strength, especially with her shut-in lifestyle. I put similarly little thought into her facial features, just keep it someone close to canon. for some reason the drawing looks like LISA of BLACKPINK to me though, which is just random. it's probably the blunt bangs.

anyway, onto Gwynn.

when it comes to purely physical features, Canari is very feminine, but I chose to make Gwynn a bit more masculine. her face is a bit more square, she's less "hourglass shaped" and she's a bit more muscular. after all, she's Ivor's sister, so she probably has a bit more genetic disposition to building muscle, and while she may be an introverted, withdrawn, and reclusive ghost-type specialist, she needs some strength to keep up with living in the dojo and dealing with Ivor.

however, style-wise, Gwynn is definitely very feminine.

and with her heavy chandelure theming, including the chandelure hat she cannot ditch due to it containing her keystone, I decided to go with a more old-timey European inspired dress. I figure a ghost-type user would prefer more "antique" clothing associated with history and historical figures who're now dead.

somehow, that turned into "ghost of Marie Antoinette". i guess, what better choice of feminine style icon who's now long dead for a character in Poké-France.

a lot of typical takes I see on this concept are for a headless ghost, but I went for the opposite of physical head, ghostly body. so everything neck down is covered by a dark purple bodysuit. I envisioned it as like stocking textured, so a little bit sheer, but because the colour's relatively dark, it'll appear relatively covered.

I also gave her a neck ribbon to cover up the bodysuit's collar. initially I wanted to go for a bow like her regular outfit's necktie, but it looked a bit silly, so I settled on a flat choker necktie.

due to my historical fashion fixation, i have lots to nerd out about with the dress. the silhouette is basically just that of period dresses, except cut a tiny bit shorter to not drag on the ground, both for movement and because Pokémon battles are likely at least a little bit messy. either way, the Queen Marie Antoinette style "robe a la francaise" with the big wide skirt is very feminizing without requiring natural curves. i also drew on knowledge of period clothing for the sleeve shape.

this is where my knowledge of terminology falls short, but the "robe a la francaise" dresses have this big clump of pleats on the back. i can't remember why it's like that but it is, so I kept that in. hence the need for a "back of Gwynn's dress" reference.

I decided to make the overdress primarily white to match the colour blocking to Gwynn's regular outfit. for details, the clasps on the bodice are the same as the small buckle on the hanging side part of her belt. I don't know if I want the thread between the clasps to be purple or black, but it will be one of those.

I actually had some trouble "decorating" the dress because while period dresses tended to have tons of detail, while I felt like the typical ruffles, bows, and flowers might "overload" on detail for both my relatively simple artstyle and Pokémon character designs in general. I ended up choosing a fire motif to reference chandelure's dual typing. this helpfully coloured large swaths of the dress purple and reduced the amount of the blank white areas. I envision the parts in the purple fire sections to be sequined while the white parts are relatively matte, so that they reflect light more and look glowy. (especially in that weirdly dim Hotel Richissime ballroom.)

since the overdress is white, I decided to avoid period white petticoats. it felt like Gwynn needed a bit more edginess or goth vibes, so I went for a cage skirt or exposed petticoat in the middle part of the dress. plus a black cage skirt would work very well with the chandelure theme.

her inner bodice is just a generic corset shape I put together, referencing her hat for the upper portion and being a dark purple panel in the lower portion to balance out the colour blocking. now, in the reference for the underlayer, I put six dots on the bodice where the clasps are on the overdress. period dresses from Marie Antoinette's time were held together by pins, with the overdress pinned to the bodice underneath. but modern people aren't used to wearing clothing with pins in it, so I intend for the clasps to be magnets which could hold the overdress on. (hopefully, I'm not going to debate the logistics, as the overdress can get quite heavy.)

I liked Gwynn's chunky Mary Janes from her regular outfit too much to change them. plus, they fit with the fancy outfit, unlike Canari who's wearing white sneakers in her regular outfit.

also, drawing a cage skirt is annoying, so i didn't really have the motivation to change her shoes.

Gwynn's hair is unchanged because it's too short to style and the chandelure hat would probably get in the way.

I did notice when I finished that Canari and Gwynn have the same necklace type, and tried changing Canari's. but it looked weird, so choker with a lightning bolt it is.

might do a digital redraw/colouring someday. one last headcanon bit before I end this, though:

in this AU where Canari and the other NPCs get fancy outfits, I think it'd be really funny if Canari was a fan of Naveen as a fashion designer. after all, the boutique owner's heard of him, so surely some others have as well. I'd imagine a week or two before the Jacinthe tournament, the other competitors get sent their invites (with the player being the hardest to track down due to how recently they've arrived in Lumiose). Canari remembers this indie upstart fashion designer she noticed a whilez ago and business emails them asking for an emergency commission to make formal dresses for her and G-Volt. Naveen is going through the Stress of searching for commissions to help the rival pay off their debt to the Rust Syndicate and then sees his favourite streamer reaching out to him, with no idea that he's a massive fan of hers, and his mind just overloads. he's going to have so many conflicting thoughts about whether he can charge her more or ask her to pay upfront (she's asking for a very tight deadline, and she has to be somewhat well off with her grandfather's company and her streamer fame) to handle the rival's mafia debt problems, or prioritizing being nice and fair to her. (random, but: as a fashion nerd who's experienced the kpop and mcyt communities/fandoms, I love Naveen so much)

if you've actually read this far, all the way to the end, i love you so much for putting up with my semi-coherent rambling and nitpicking.

[goblindoorgames]

What is this game even about?

How have y'all who are developing games tried to articulate both the themes of your game, the core experience of play, and how they relate to each other?

-- I've done about 20 playtests of Motley and been though maybe forty revisions. And this whole time, I've been trying to articulate more clearly what the game is really about. By which I mean not only the themes I'm trying to explore through the game, but what kind of experience I'm hoping to create space for: how the themes can be expressed through the mechanics, the setting, and everything else. So, what is Motley about? Well, the current "official tagline" still sums it up reasonable well: "a game about messy roommates and the ravenous void." Or, more flippantly, "weird fantasy queer roommate drama." That tells you who and where you are, more and less. But it doesn't really communicate the felt experience of the game. So what is that experience? Well, Motley is largely inspired by my experience living with other humans in various contexts. The ways it's difficult, the ways it's necessary, the ways we can support each other and annoy the absolute piss out of each other. It's also inspired by my experience of being invisibly disabled due to neurodivergence and mental health issues, which often make me seem lazy or uncaring. Which is, of course, the last thing I want to be seen as. And so I try very hard not to come off that way. But sometimes I just... can't. So Motley is also a game about not having the spoons. Both mechanically and thematically, it's about the balance between time, energy, and exhaustion. Exhaustion is a core mechanic. Not general Stress: Exhaustion. Because that's part of the experience I want to communicate: the experience of being Exhausted by life and continuing on anyway. And the experience of play is about balancing those things (Exhaustion and limited time) together with your relationships, the other things that are important to you, and the things that demand your attention. About having to make difficult choices between working on the things that matter to you, caring for those around you, dealing with the problems that continually crop up, and taking time to recover. And it's about how the pressure of that relentless march of time and problems, day after day, puts pressure on the relationships we share with the people around us. It's about how we can crack under that pressure (which is a mechanical thing in the current version of the game) and damage those connections. In Motley, this is metaphorically represented by the fact that you're all living in a ramshackle island-ship-house made of junk and floating in a void that is continually eroding everything you built, and all the problems that causes. But it's really about the strain it puts on the characters and their relationships. An alternate tagline for Motley might be that it's "a game about our broken edges." Because ultimately it's about a group of weird, broken people struggling to live together, to make do, to do what they can for one another even when they're barely scraping by. To fit those broken edges together. And sometimes it doesn't work. Sometimes we cut each other with those edges. But we keep trying. Because we're all we've got, in the end.

[descendantofthesparrow]

im having thoughts

[thebrokenmechanicalpencil]

OK so yep turtle child. I seem to have fallen back into all my old artistic phases once again, Tmnt included in that roster.

I get a brain worm sometimes, it sits and annoys me and wont go away because of course I cant be inspired to draw normal things. Oh well, this is Mucha (pronounced Moo-kah) named after a painter from the art nouveau period. He is the son of our favorite leader in blue, Leo. YES ok wait before anyone gets me, no oc shipping made him. He and his cousin's were made through the art of ✨science✨

Lets say in the bay movies (because those have a soft spot in my heart I'm so sorry I know theyr kinda ugly-) some baddie gets the blood samples from the brothers and instead of trying to make a pandemic (havnt watched the movies in forever forgive me) they try recreating the experiment to try and create super soldiers (overused plot line dontworryaboutit) they mix the mutation agent with four turtles they have on standby, along with the DNA of each brother. Welp mutation happens but before they can get too far the boys swoop in thinking it was some sort of beep bop and rock steady situation. They discover the four recently mutated infant turtles and the rest goes from there.

sorta like the last Ronin but no sads, and before you know it the baby turtles have favorites and now they are sorta parent big brothers. As they get older and the babies grow they lean into the fatherly aspect. Or something.

Now this is the baby who gravitated toward Leo and he to him, and has Leo as a top roll model in his life. Sure all the boys help raise the new set, but again the kids all have favorites. Naturally. (I will mess with this later, but for now this is the wobbly idea) Well Mucha has Leo the stern when leading, silly when the weight is off his shoulders, overly bossy and slightly controlling Leo. Leo who would die for his family but can be cruel and very blunt. Who is also really young in his own right. Being the top role model for a child. Well they have a relationship were Mucha adores him, wants to be like him. But can never seem to live up to his expectations, tries so hard to impress him. He has a loving father figure who teaches him but also tries to helicopter him so much. Control so much, who is blunt when frustrated or angry. This kid is terrified of disappointing him, but wants deep within himself to impress his father his OWN way. Being Mucha not little Leo. He falls where Leo did when chosen as leader, under pressure without his parent even realizing it.

Leo does love him, but as we have seen he is a control freak. So his child naturally rebels, snapping and arguing with him when he's having a bad day. Not wanting to listen to him, because Leo wont listen to MUCHA. As Mucha gets older their relationship becomes strained.

K well I'm stuck in this now. This was mostly a thought post, read a thing about Leo wanting so badly to be a parent. Started wondering how it would go, will continue to work on this. Probably. The reason Mucha's art is so angsty is because that's where the pen went. Hes actually not that bad, usually.

OH well the second, white turtle. He gets his own post later :D

[c-rose2081]

What made you decide to not give Raven her natural black hair?

Mainly because Apple has black hair in her design and I didn’t want them to look too similar ^^

I really like the purple on Raven (it’s very her lol) and I think fully black hair would’ve been too overpowering with the pale purples of her design.

[celestiall0tus]

So now that we've seen all the designs of the Seven Princes in Hazbin Hotel and Helluva Boss, what do you think of each of their designs and the designs of their sigils (which can be seen here https://www.deviantart.com/moheart7/art/Hellaverse-The-7-Sins-of-Hell-1128188249)?

I'm being asked to give my design opinions on something? Holy shit

Rolls up sleeves Let's get into this!

I'm going to cover the sigils all in one because I have no real other opinion besides I like them. I think they did an amazing job incorporating the design of the sins and condensing it down into a sigil.

Now, the real shit

Satan:

I was honestly amazed with his design. I wasn't sure what we were going to get other than him loosely being based on the imps since most of the sins seem to reflect the demons they likely created, but for the man to be a dragon is the most metal thing ever. And the western aesthetic added in was just amazing. I love the reds and orange of his skin contrasted with the dark clothing. And the fact he is so big and intimidating works so well for the sin of wrath.

Beelzebub:

My favorite out of all of them because it's just beautiful. I love the lava lamp torso and hair, doubling that torso burning away the shit she consumes so she's never truly full is just fucking genius. Add to that her hair and tail kinda look a little like honey, the fennec fox motif is cute as shit, and despite what people say, there are definite bee motifs in her design. Her larger hips and thighs to be a bee butt, her legs shaped like bee legs instead of typical hellhound legs, her little bee wings, the antenna on her ears ad eyelashes, the extra arms, it's all there. And to make gluttony a party girl? I fucking love it. Better than the boring typical depictions of a fat ass that just pigs out all the time.

Mammon:

I hate this fucker so much, but he fits greed so well. Being this big, fat cat type of character just screams typical evil business CEO man from old school media that you knew immediately was the villain. Though him being a spider wasn't quite on my bingo card still, even with all the webs around and seeing him transform.

Asmodeus:

I loved Asmodeus from when we first saw him in Ozzie's. I loved seeing him being this big ass rooster (a cock) with his fancy feathers, extra little faces in his hair/feathers, the wide ass chest, everything about him has the swagger of a peacocking rooster. Which, I will say, it might have been interesting to see him as a peacock given the flamboyance of those birds and all the fancy to attract a mate, but we got a closeted Andrealphus, so I can't complain. I will say I'm not the biggest fan of Ozzie in disguise where he's this twink ass twig. It just looks unsettling, but I mean, it works, yeah? Oh! And can't forget the fiery form he takes that is just fucking amazing. I love that his role with the fire dancer or whatever it's called for the circus Luci once ran. Lust and love burn hot like a fire and I love it.

Leviathan:

This will be quick since we only saw a little of them, but I love them. I love the two faces, the two heads, them being the freak show, their colors are just so appealing. I love how the three big envy demons we've seen so far take after each of the heads, which makes sense because envy, they'd want to be like someone else and who better than their prince? Also, side note, I love that one of the heads was into Mammon and the other was like "Uh, yeah, no." It was honestly really cute and showed they are two separate people. I really hope we see more of them.

Belphagor:

Bel is so fucking cute! I really want to see more of her because she's too stinking cute! The bits of sheep inspiration because sleep, counting sheep, though I've seen people point out there's some llama or alpaca or something else with her longer neck (can't remember which one). I would definitely need to see more of her to give a greater opinion, but for now, I think she's fucking adorable.

And, saved the best for last, Lucifer:

The man of pride, the first fallen angel, the light bringer, the morning star, Lucifer. I love the design inspiration making him based off porcelain dolls. It gives this almost innocent but unsettling look (like the dolls themselves). The apple theme of him from his apple core tuxedo, staff, and on his hat are nice touches, love the snake wrapped around his hat, and his ducktail hair. It all just wraps up what he is and is rumored to be with the symbols that became associated with him, that may or may not be associated with him. The only thing that confuses me is his place in the hierarchy of heaven. He has six wings like the Seraphim, but I don't think he was a Seraph. I thought he might be one of the Cherubim, which are traditionally just below the Seraphim, but we've seen Cherubs, but I also don't know if they're exactly the same since Cherubim have four wings, not just two. There was also the consideration of an Archangel like Michael and the others, but the Archangels are amongst the lowest on the hierarchy with common angels just under them at the bottom. Granted things are likely different in Vivzie's version of heaven, but it still leaves me to wonder where Lucifer was in the hierarchy to have six wings. Also, side note, I thought Cherubim before because of him shapeshifting into different animals to fight Adam and the Cherubim are more animal in appearance (much like some of the Cherubs in the show) and Lucifer has a snake face shape. I thought this might contribute to why Charlie almost looks more dog-like? That's a topic for another time, but yeah, I love his design minus that one element that makes me question everything.

[loz-furbies]

Earlier I wrote down my thoughts on the other Zelda designs so let's do one for the new Zelda too.

First the princess dress. When the trailer first played out, with Zelda stuck in her crystal, I thought this was going to be some kind of OoT remake in the toy style since the Zelda design is so similar. But upon closer inspection it's more like a mix between the ALbW design and OoT design, with some TP thrown in as well with the top shape. Which is a big minus for me; I like when the characters have their own visual identity so this is quite boring for me. But I guess it's good that it's a unique design at all at least, unlike ALbW Zelda or many of the Links.

Then again the princess look is presumably not what she'll look like for the most of the game so it doesn't matter that much. As for her more casual look… it's okay. I'm just not a fan of the toy art style with the simplified details and beady eyes but that aside this design communicates just fine that this is a Zelda on an adventure. The cut of the dress is new, the boots look nice and sturdy and the cape originally belonging to Link (?) is a super cute detail.