"Beholder" was a small game me and a small team of friends/studnets made in our third/minor year on AKV St.Joost.
The minor was called "Arts&Interaction" and the overal theme that the projects had to be about was the news and how it influences us.
We quickly decided on a game as medium since it was something we all were interested in making.
After some quick brainstorming we decided on a "Your choice influences the world around you" game. In the end this was way too ambitious, but we got a fair bit of work done. You are the head editor of a newspaper called "The Beholder" and you decide what will be on the front page of the paper that day. Every choice you make influences the world around you.
I was tasked with co-writing the script, overseeing the storyline and flow of the story, music, basic animation and doing some of the character designs.
This last one was very important for me, because at that time i had little to no experience in drawing digitally and didn't really have an high self-esteem.
Firstly we brainstormed the style, a lot passed by, but we decided on a black&white silhouette style to fit everyone's style and skill-level.
Secondly we devided who did what in terms of character designs. I had to design the normal villagers, a snake like reporter, a bull reporter, a bear-like reporter and an octopus reporter.
Down below you will see various sketches and drawing phases.
This were sketches/blueprints for someone else to make the villagers. How they looked in their final form you can see in the animations down below.
Sketch
Rough Drat
Final version
Sketches
Different variations
Rough sketch 1
Rough sketch 2
Digital version
Variations
Pen sketch
Digital sketch
Final
Down below you will see some of the animatics/animated cutscenes we have made for this game.
Sadly the game was never fully finished so i can't give a link to play it.
One of the endings: Your paper takes over the world
Bad ending: your workers quit and work for someone else.
Intro animation
