How Video Games are inspired by art
In this essay im going look at how art movements can inspire games being made.
Art can inspire Games in a ways. To using a form of art as a style for a game (limbo, german expressionism) to understanding a time period (Assassins creed series).
But saying this i dont think games are hugely inspired by art but just implements it into there games in certain aspects.
Art can inspire Games in a ways. To using a form of art as a style for a game (limbo, german expressionism) to understanding a time period (Assassins creed series).
But saying this i dont think games are hugely inspired by art but just implements it into there games in certain aspects.
Im going to look at the Game Assassins Creed as it is a good choice of game when looking at art. The games are based around a variety of time periods and the storys are fixed around huge events in history like The Third Crusade, Renaissance, golden age of piracy, the American revolution and a bit of present as well as the future.
The time periods and the events what happened around them inspired allot of art and Ubisoft loves using it within there games in many ways. I dont think that they inspired the game itself but more the setting of the games and understanding what it was like in that time period.
They do allot of research into the countries and the cities, looking into artwork from the areas to see the point of view of the artist of how everything looked back then and interpret it into there games to create an atmosphere of being in the period of time.
They also look int the original blueprints and maps of the cities itself and the layout of where the buildings are. This was done in assassins creed 2 for Venice and Florence, Brotherhoods Rome, 3 for New York and Boston.
5 minutes in they start talking about the maps from the time period.
They then have to create there own map and figure out where everything goes and how it will work like shops, guarded areas and how a player will use parkour to get around.
Also they go look at the cities now and look at the buildings and the architecture to figure out not only the look but how they can use the building to climb in the game without making much change to the structure.
Another way they use the Art and time a period to inspire them is with there costume designs.
Im going to use assassins creed 2 to show this.
Assassins creed 2 is based around the renaissance time period in Italy. In the game when you are in venice there are allot of crowds wearing venetian masks at the festivals, so they had to design many different mask shape and styles.
On the left you can see the festival crowd and some of the characters wearing masks from full face masks to just covering up the eyes.
all of them in different styles inspired by real masks they saw in venice.
Also below is some concept art for a mask which Ezio would wear in a mission.
The time periods and the events what happened around them inspired allot of art and Ubisoft loves using it within there games in many ways. I dont think that they inspired the game itself but more the setting of the games and understanding what it was like in that time period.
They do allot of research into the countries and the cities, looking into artwork from the areas to see the point of view of the artist of how everything looked back then and interpret it into there games to create an atmosphere of being in the period of time.
They also look int the original blueprints and maps of the cities itself and the layout of where the buildings are. This was done in assassins creed 2 for Venice and Florence, Brotherhoods Rome, 3 for New York and Boston.
5 minutes in they start talking about the maps from the time period.
They then have to create there own map and figure out where everything goes and how it will work like shops, guarded areas and how a player will use parkour to get around.
Also they go look at the cities now and look at the buildings and the architecture to figure out not only the look but how they can use the building to climb in the game without making much change to the structure.
Another way they use the Art and time a period to inspire them is with there costume designs.
Im going to use assassins creed 2 to show this.
Assassins creed 2 is based around the renaissance time period in Italy. In the game when you are in venice there are allot of crowds wearing venetian masks at the festivals, so they had to design many different mask shape and styles.
On the left you can see the festival crowd and some of the characters wearing masks from full face masks to just covering up the eyes.
all of them in different styles inspired by real masks they saw in venice.
Also below is some concept art for a mask which Ezio would wear in a mission.
In Ezios assassin outfit there are also bits what are inspired by the time period like the cloak but with there own spin of it only going over one shoulder and the bonus it gave of hiding the hidden blade.
In Ezios assassin outfit there are also bits what are inspired by the time period like the cloak but with there own spin of it only going over one shoulder and the bonus it gave of hiding the hidden blade.
I would say video games itself is art. In a way its a 3D piece of art what you can interact with, like looking at a a Van Gogh painting and walking into it and looking at it from all angles digitally.
In a way like people read a book and are inspired to draw a character or setting of how they imagined it to be, games can work in the same way look at art, movie, books etc and wonder what would it be like to have that sort of world but be able to explore and be part of it.
Saying that i thing games themselves are art, i can say that assassins creed was inspired by the Prince of Persai series.
It wasn't just inspired though, it was originally going to be a Prince of persia game that became more and twisted into its own franchise.
Philippe Bergeron - "We were working on Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones, And as we worked on it, it just became something bigger than Prince of Persia. We felt it wasn't the same thing, and that's when we started thinking about it as Assassin's Creed. At the same time, Désilets was super into the Third Crusade and that time period - making a Third Crusade game was a lifelong dream of his. Eventually, as we worked through it, we realised that we wanted to make it into a brand."
http://www.totalxbox.com/50961/features/assassins-creed-how-a-prince-of-persia-spin-off-became-ubisofts-flagship-ip/
The Game was called Prince of Persai Assassins and was supposed to come out in 2004 and even had a trailer shown below. and if you played the assassins creed games you can see the elements from the game in this like the hidden blades ant templars.
This image on the left was one of the original concepts of the Prince for the game by Khai Nguyen.
This then inspired the character Altaïr Ibn-La'Ahad in the first assassins creed games.
So this game over time evolved from one game and idea into a completely new franchise which is now huge.
I can see the links between the 2 games as i liked the PoP franchise before assassins creed and there is a lot of similar traits like the freerunning, which was a big part of the PoP games.
