A while back, I realised it would be impractical to attempt to make highly detailed and realistic looking assets for this project; simply put, I don’t have the time or energy to do that. To that end, I wanted to explore different visual styles, to find something that is time-efficient to make but at the same time visually appealling. I settled on two in my research.
Panzer Front was a Japanese PS1 game by Enterbrain, who are probably best known now for making the RPG Maker series of game engines. It was huge inspiration for the project, and I have a soft spot for the aesthetic. There’s something about that early 3D look that I still love.. maybe it’s because it reminds me of the excitement we all felt at the possibility of 3D?
I wanted to see how the game might look in this aesthetic, so I started making a small diorama to test it out. This is a quick test of the Sabre in that style; with some compromises. In Panzer Front the track and wheels are one solid block, however I didn’t want to lose the spinning wheels and track deformation I already had, so elected to break convention a little and keep them separate.
I had tried this aesthetic before, but I tried to use modern techniques for the textures and the result was horrible. This time, I tried to think about how these textures would’ve been made at the time, and emulate that process. I figured the most likely process was to use photographs to piece together the texture, then touch up in Photoshop. It took a little longer than I expected purely because I didn’t have ample reference, but the actual construction was pretty rapid.
I need to build the rest of the diorama to be able to assess this style, but I’m optimistic so far.
The second style I looked at was based on the game Ashen, which oozes the kind of atmosphere I want in this biome for Parabellum. I think it appeals to me so much because I really appreciate paintings done with minimal brush strokes; I’m so impressed when an artist can make your brain see a complete scene with only a handful of lines.
This is what I’ll be attempting after the lo-fi 3D, to compare and contrast the results and finally settle on a style for the game!
-Rob
Parabellum 