Boss Arena + Monster - High Concept + Sketching

 Boss Arena + Monster - High Concept + Sketching

To begin this next set of projects, I wanted to outline a starting point for my concept. Since they are meant to be complimentary to each other, I think it is important to create a strong baseline to inform some basic sketching and reference gathering.

My initial thoughts were "what games do I want to use as reference?" - to which Dark Souls and Hollow Knight were in the forefront of my mind. I also remembered that I had created a phot bashed character with these inspirations at the beginning of the year, and I considered expanding on that universe since I already had a foot in the door. The more I thought about it however I realized that the Gothic medieval theme was very done (it was the main inspiration for the rest of my class let alone a cautionary search on artstation), so I went back to the drawing board. 

I thought about an interesting gameplay mechanic of a character that summons attacks from markings and drawings on walls, and then thought of a cave painting idea. However when I started looking at interesting caves, I found this type of cave called Cenotes which are these water filled sink holes in Mexico. Even looking at some pictures of them on google some had the subtitle "boss arena" so I thought it was fate and used that as my primary inspiration source. 

I still wanted to keep the idea of a character that is an artist of sorts as it feels like an interesting idea, and reminded me of the character Grimstroke from DOTA 2 which also just happens to be my main (who basically was a "chosen one" who corrupted a ritual, stole the souls of his village on accident, and now has a powerful ink and paintbrush as his method of attack to paraphrase. He also launches the soul of his dead wife to silence enemies so he is a lovely character all round - His backstory if you are curious can be found on the DOTA 2 Wiki: https://dota2.fandom.com/wiki/Grimstroke/Lore).

Grimstroke - DOTA 2

Now it is fairly obvious that Grimstroke's design is heavily inspired by Japan, and so I was planning on giving the character's base concept a Mesoamerican twist. If I still wanted to use the Ink idea, I would have to figure out how prominent in the scene it would be and how it got there. I also at this point gave my project the working title of "Inkan" but this is very likely to change.

I started looking at the gods and goddesses that are documented from Aztec, Mayan and Incan culture, with a particular emphasis on the Aztec gods; The geographical location of the Cenotes is in Mexico rather that northern south America. I then quickly realized there were a LOT of named gods and goddesses, so I refined my search to specifically caves, waters and artist gods and goddesses. I found a pair of Goddesses with descriptors on their appearance that I thought would help inform my design for my boss, Chalchiuhtlicue the waters, rivers and lakes goddess described to have skirts that turn into streams and is described to be the source of the Aztec deluge (think Noah's ark, world floods) myth, and Xochiquetzal the fertility and arts goddess who is described to be associated with the moon and to dress in elaborate clothing. This pair of goddesses gave me a decent foundation and idea along with Grimstroke to start designing a character, and the Cenote temple they would reside in.

I wanted the Cenote to look like a forgotten temple because I thought that the game could be an exploration game, similar to Uncharted or Tomb Raider, and you happen across these slumbering Gods and Goddesses who are angered that they haven't been worshipped in centuries and thus have forsaken their duties - in this case these Goddesses have weaponized art and corrupted water, and so I created the below sketch page:

Initial Sketch Sheet

I am going to move to blockout the arena design soon, and I will be iterating the design for my boss too. I know that I want her lower half to look like flowing ink, so the majority of the iterations will likely be the outfit and that silhouette using reference of ceremonial garbs.

In this sketch page I also started thinking about how you beat this boss other than "just hit her", and I thought about creating these seed pods growing from the corrupted vines that could be used to negate areas of the arena from ink, like erasing. Another idea came from a chat with Craig, where he asked what the worst thing you can do to an artist is - blinding. I think I may create a sheet exploring a stage system for the boss, the beginning being hostile but calm and considered, and the later stages when you shatter her mask becoming more aggressive and reckless. I will need to make sure that there is enough visual direction to the player that her mask is a point of weakness to attack that causes critical damage.