[Squid rambling about Tiberian Sun]

Now with a video!

 

... that for some reason won't embed!

 

Here's a direct link (sorry)

[Squid rambling about Tiberian Sun]

 

To me Tiberian Sun is the C&C game that stands out the most as the most artistically complete and unique. Two years ago I wrote an essay on the way the future is depicted in the game, and it still captures my attention more than any other RTS on an artistic level.

 

Tiberian sun to me is a slower and more meditative game than most, even when it's a frantic firefight; the sheer oppressiveness, of the apocalyptic setting oozes from the sprites and the audio, and flows over the action masking it and slowing it. It is this game, and it's soundtrack, that has caused me uncomfortable day-dreams of a blighted landscape, and that inspired my apocalyptic art-y student film. The theme, setting, and execution blend better than any other post-apocalyptic text I've ever come across, and form what is to me a genuinely haunting and simultaneously beautiful image of a human world. The game's simple sprites and storyline are almost sidelines to the world it presents, which causes its own imagined scenes to take place.

 

Images of soldiers patrolling in a dusty blighted landscape, the distant lights of their base obscured and dimmed by ionic clouds and dust. A large metal door seals shut at night, leaving a lone troop stuck in the wasteland outside, the stars above are motionless as his breathing echoes in his helmet.

 

The cover image of the soldier, his eyes obscured by a cyber-punk mask, itself oppressive and built from necessity, staring out with an expression of stoic duty or patience, but perhaps his eyes are tearful and he stands alone in a field of fatal crystals?

 

Tiberian Sun to me is a hauntingly perfect depiction of a desperate world and humanities place on it.

 

[Corrupt a Wish]

You lose all artistic ability.

 

This is a small price to pay

[Corrupt a Wish]

All right, but unforeseen circumstances always ruin your meticulous plans

I wish I had a fully functioning AT-ST, with sufficient fuel and spare parts to last my lifetime, instruction manuals on usage, repair and maintenance, and government approved licenses to do with it as I please, as well as insurance.
Try ruining that

[Squid's Pixelart]

A salty sea captain

 

[W3D vs UDK]

Personally I don't have any nostalgia for w3d, it holds no special meaning or memory to me, but I pragmatically accept it for what it is when playing. The only reason I'm here is because I want to play an FPS game about Red Alert 2 and Tiberian Sun. Seeing how slow development here is though I'd cautiously recommend moving to a newer engine, not for graphics, but for a more modern and user-friendly toolset and tutorials/support, which would mean faster and therefore more energetic development, and for the appeal to new developers. Again personally, I toyed with the idea of spending time learning the use of the w3d editing suite, but in the end was persuaded against it by the age and nichey-ness of the engine, deciding my time was better spent honing skills I think would be more useful to me later on. This is my own personal perspective, but it means that at least one potential developer was turned off by the engine itself.

[You Laugh == You Lose!]

Came across this image and added a caption;

 

[Squid's Pixelart]

Awesome! Thanks Squid!

No problem

 

Remarkable work. Thank you, Squids!

There's only one of me, but thanks

 

I think that obtaining a pixel-art avatar from Master Squid should be a requirement to join this forum

 

I had noticed that basically all requests are for avatars...

 

 

Here's a small little art-y thingy

 

 

I'm going away next week and won't have any computer access so if you have anything you want quickly you've got about 24 hours!

[Squid's Pixelart]

Here we go, first batch on this thread!

Einstein;

 

I didn't want to do a caricature

 

And here's KillingYou's pyramidhead conscript (two versions)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Squid's Pixelart]

Also, if you don't mind, I'd like to see a recreation of my avatar, but with a smoking battlefield and a pile of bodies.

 

This may take a little time, but I'll get on it after the above

 

Hey Squid, I still love your pixelart work.

If you ever feel like continuing on HeroesX or actually starting a real time strategy game, I'm up for it!

 

Thanks

If you've got anything for me to work on, I'll be happy to!

I don't know about spriting a whole game, I could do textures but drawing hundreds of animated sprites for infantry might be a tad over my limits :stare:

[Squid's Pixelart]

may i have an Professor Einstein avatar plz?

 

I'll give it a go

[Squid's Pixelart]

Hello, it's me, Squid

my favourite pastime is to imagine things, but sometimes that's not enough, and so I draw, or compose, or film. or edit, or model etc.

I'm sort of a jack-of-all trades in terms of art, not really specialising in anything and doing OK at a few things. One thing I've been getting into is pixelart, which is loosely described as a digital drawing where every individual pixel has been placed with purpose and no anti-aliasing (auto-blur/blend) has been used at any point. It's a nice, quick form I think, so it allows me to quickly 'sketch' an idea I've had in relatively good quality.

If you'd like to know where I come from thematically here is a little breakdown;

 

 

I grew up with Star Wars - the originals on TV and the prequel coming out in cinemas. The Star Wars universe I still consider the best ever conceived, and the astonishingly detailed 'used-future' of George Lucas is to me the golden standard of universe creation (Blade runner ties into this, I consider it another pinnacle of used-future and of sci-fi in general). My belief in a used-future was augmented by reading Isacc Asimov, which has forced me to always ask for a used, working future. After Star Wars came the logical next step: Indiana Jones. This is my No.1 favourite series in terms of aesthetic, the browns and whites, the gorgeous costumes and the mind blowing music all fuse to form a masterpiece. If Star Wars is the foundation of my style, Indiana Jones is the infrastructure, the piping and electrical cables.

I still love modern Hollywood movies - such as Oblivion or Exodus; Gods and Kings - but my cultural focus has shifted to that obscure art form; vidya games.

I've played many games but generally stay away from multiplayer titles, I don't like that they always breed competition (which I'm adverse to). My creative juices have been altered by the great 90's single player games; system shock, deus ex, half life, etc, while my ideals for what games should be capable of have been set high from the early days of Minecraft.

Fallout 3 and NV are my second favourite games ever, the fallout universe being a recent, massive influence on my themes. I find that my current theme is altered by whatever I'm playing at the time, Skyrim, the Bioshock games (which still affect me emotionally though their settings and music), Anno 2070, Tropico etc.

My early game experience was with RTS's - Age of Empires, Rise of Nations, Warlords Battlecry, Tiberian Sun - which slotted neatly into my growing fixation with apocalyptic and cyberpunk visions -, Red Alert 2, and my next major artistic idol: Rise of Legends. This game is my No.1 favourite of all time, not for its gameplay (which was only really decent), but for its universe and art. This game got me into steampunk (sort of - I loath the modern scene-punk where people dress up Victorian and wave nerf guns at each other) as an art form, and really kickstarted my fascination with the industrial, as well as bleak natural landscapes.

This fascination with landscape has been aggravated twice in recent memory: visiting the southern island of New Zealand, which is breathtaking beyond words; in a fantasy way (wildflowers grow by the street), and my trip into Outback Australia, which is barren and apocalyptic. The land in general is a major focus for me, as humans work to shape and form the landscapes, they also work to form us - people from a desert are naturally different to those who live atop peaks.

While the foundation of my style may be firmly set in place, what forms the walls and really keep me going is music. It sounds a bit stereotypical but I can't be travelling without my earphones and I can't be at my computer without background music. Music is the art form of sound, the engagement of the imagination and emotions via moving waves of air. I play Trombone (just passably) and compose infrequently, but always listen to music.

I try to seek out music with a purpose behind it, a strong sense or feeling it is trying to get in your head. Generally I'll be listening to soundtracks (both game and movie), - which are designed to compliment visual scenes, but work sometimes better on their own - or orchestral. My years of Trombone have left me partial to big band or jazz music too...

Some favourite soundtracks of mine are, surprise surprise, from my inspirations, Bioshock (all of them), Fallout (all of them), Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Ender's Game etc.

Music is the ultimate force that sparks my imagination, all throughout my film and television studies I always placed the music down first, and edited the video to match the tempo and timbre of the sounds.

You may have noticed a theme in my favourite works - that theme is retro-futurism.

I'm not yet sure why, but my absolute favourite theme to work in is history, or specifically, a different history. Games such as Bioshock 1 or 2, set in a alternative art-deco underwater city, Fallout, set in a 1950's version of the 2100's, or Rise of Legends, set in a steam powered renaissance world; these are my favourite.

Older films or games also managed this inadvertently, Tiberian Sun is a 1990's future.

Thanks for having a read, if you're interested in any of the same things, post here, we can have chat

 

I try to get as many pictures done as I can to work on my ability, so if you have any requests please fire away!

As a quick aside to all the purists out there, while many of these pictures are true pixelarts there are some that are not. I have used gradients or transparency tools on some of these pictures - often for backgrounds. You should be able to tell which are which

 

 

 

 

 

Ongoing!

 

 

[AR :: February Update]

I am so excited for AR I might just explode, Ivan style.
I am extremely grateful that you decided my design was useful, and I'd just like to say thanks for allowing me to have a go, and to be part of your game!

In response to the comments above with suggestions on how to improve the design, where were these suggestions when I was drawing them?
Jokes aside, I agree with the comments regarding the helipad making minimal sense, but I suppose the helicopter doesn't really need to land in order to drop off supplies. I built it the way I did for aesthetics, as having the areas separate, or worse still, having the helipad by itself, makes the whole look a little too disjoined. I toyed with the idea of putting the helipad on top of the building, but then how do tanks get down (without a comical ramp or elevator)?
I'm sure the BHP staff can decide what to do with the helipad, the way I have it is just how I did it!
In regards to the comments on the spikes on the soviet bay, I was hard pressed to find a rooftop element besides those vents that is used on multiple buildings. I stuck to the spikes because as Pushwall pointed out, the battle bunker and wall had them. The joining section where the spikes it was meant to be a sort of infantry bunker incase the building was under attack, so it made sense to copy the 'defensive' spikes over.
Finally in response to Gezking, I found that most of the soviet/allied buildings (besides the barracks and lab) were just redesigns of the same structure, using different styles. The war factories, refineries and construction are good examples of what I mean. So I kept the same structure; garage, communications building, bunker, helipad, the same on both but tried to use the allied (rounded shiny metal) and soviet (jagged pink brick) styles for my designs.
Although I joked above thanks for the feedback, it's useful to know what the players think of my designs

Once again, thanks AR team for letting me have a go!