Hey everyone, it's Jien again back with Devlog #2! 
This time I'll share a bit about the designs of the main characters in "Adventures of Nalem".

Learning to use the Engine

Earlier this month, I stumbled upon RPG in a Box (RIAB) which is a Voxel based game development engine that lets you create 3D or 2D characters, maps, props, effects and assets all in one program. 

To be honest, I have no experience at all with working with development tools like RPG Maker, Unity or Unreal Engine. When I found RPG in a Box, it caught my attention immediately because I can create models and assets on the fly while creating the game! It was quite daunting to start but the developers of RIAB have made some tutorials to get you up to speed like the Stumpy the Squirrel series on their RIAB Official YouTube channel. It was easy to follow and within an hour, I have already made my first voxel character with a walking animation!

Then I started experimenting and looking for more inspiration online, I searched for voxel models that were made by other people and I took the idea of a super deformed Super Mario model and made this character. 

It wasn't much but the enjoyment of creating something out of nothing was euphoric and it made me want to create more! I decided that I wanted the main characters to have a slightly more humanoid shape while having more freedom for expression and poses, so I took the human template from the RIAB asset library and started modifying it. I shortened the character because I want it to look cute and a smaller model was easier to animate... 

And so.. 

The first rendition of the main character of "Adventures of Nalem" was born!

Nalem and Knafeh (Nalem's rival and friend) colours were heavily inspired by Optimus Prime and Megatron, I felt that it would be like a cheeky Easter Egg for the players to find out, "Hey that looks like Prime!". 

I went on and released the demo of the game, but it left a big hole in my heart, because I wanted more from the game! I want the game to look amazing and to have relatable characters that have something special about them that you remember. Until to the point that I was considering redoing all the assets and using a bigger voxel cube like 32x32, V0 Nalem was made using 16x16 voxels.

Filling the Void

I tried watching many YouTube videos about character design and pixel art, having a hard time to decide what was the best way to approach it. I was also contemplating on whether I should change the format of the game, from an isometric game to a top down 2D game? I started to experiment with pixel art and created some mockup designs for the new Nalem. 

Each design has its own struggles and advantages. For the 3D models, I feel that animating them to so an action seems easier, of course with 32x32 models animating it will be VERY hard as well, while for 2D it is harder for me to grasp the anatomy and how to make them look good, making more frames left me with a pile of goop. 

At this point, I have made so many models of Nalem that I could start a Nalemverse already :P 

As usual, I will keep it marinading in my head for a while. Maybe I am doing it wrong? Maybe I should decide on the "mode" of the game before designing the characters? I need a bottle of Coca Cola right now. 

Jien.