For some time now, we’ve been collaborating with Fateless Games on their upcoming hero collection RPG Godforge, providing numerous services for the ambitious project. Notably, we’ve been working with the team to devise and create various characters to represent different in-game factions.
One of these characters is Lady Xoc, a representative of the Ceiba faction, inspired by the Mayan queen consort of the same name. Our team provided both the concept art and the final 3D game art for Lady Xoc, and we have some valuable into this process from the artists who worked on the character.
Early Stages of Lady Xoc’s Concept Art
One of the first steps in creating Lady Xoc and the accompanying concept art is drafting a mood board, a collection of images and materials that helps our team develop a mood and direction to strive for in designing characters. Our artists then added their various sources of inspiration for Lady Xoc including her weaponry, decoration, clothing, and overall style.
The research phase was extremely important, as it is for any piece of concept art, to understand the character and its inspirations as well as possible. Lady Xoc is specifically inspired by Mayan and Aztec cultures, so our artists wanted to represent this as accurately as possible.
Following the research phase, our artists created initial concept art sketches derived from the mood board’s reference material to create a rough visualization of the character. Our client was involved at every stage of this process where their feedback was welcomed and we would make adjustments to our concept art to more accurately align with their overall vision for Godforge’s characters. The concept art goes through periods of refinement plus additional sketches, such as ones presented from side views, to help the rest of the team develop the concept art into fully 3D game art.
From Concept Art to 3D Game Art
To morph Lady Xoc from concept art into a fully fleshed-out 3D character, our team leveraged multiple tools to bring the design to life. PureRef was used to examine the reference material by our 3D game art specialists to understand the inspiration and unique visual qualities of the Lady Xoc concept art. ZBrush was the primary tool used for the 3D modeling process, in addition to Maya for the low poly model and UVs. Marmoset was used for baking and Substance Painter for texturing.
It’s paramount for 3D game art that there is a clear understanding of the concept art and a sense of collaboration between the team members to deliver the final piece to the highest degree of quality possible. For our 3D game art specialists, it’s all about understanding the references used for the concept art, their sketches, and every possible angle of the character, so communication was abundant for the duration of working on this character which benefitted the final version’s overall quality.
Challenges and Opportunities with Lady Xoc
A unique challenge in bringing Lady Xoc to life was that she was the first female member of her faction, with every previously created character being male. This necessitated that our team create brand-new clothing and visual elements for her, including Lady Xoc’s feathered crown which is filled with tons of detail and required extensive work both in terms of concept art and the 3D modeling process.
For this character, we had a degree of creative freedom in designing and delivering the character. We presented suggestions for the character during its initial concept stages, and because Lady Xoc was the first female character for this faction, we were trusted to adapt the basic character body that’s usually used to fit this character more appropriately.
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