HAUNTED ANTLERS
In a forest beyond dreams exist a people who's horns crown their heads and fill them with knowledge from the stars. They had lived a peaceful life for generations in total symbioses with nature.
Meanwhile in the forest, an old and forgotten force awakens form his thousand year slumber amongst the ruins of old.
Filled with nothing but contempt and hatred for those who had forgotten him, he plots his revenge. Seeking vengeance against those who had wronged him.
Ignorant of the coming danger, the village continued it's peaceful life. But soon enough a disturbance was felt in the forest. People started disappearing. Alwin, the village's newest druid, grew weary of the fear and tensions growing in the village and decided to change things.
But events are about to unravel too quickly in front of him and plunge him in the darkness of the forest...
The Forest and all that it holds secret awaits, are you ready to confront it?
Haunted Antlers official poster
Digital painting long - pixel art
2020
Haunted antlers is a Zelda like game in pixel art that is driven through a hidden narrative. We wanted to create a game that could imitate the wonders inside the tales we were told when we were young.
The story itself is a mix between Nordic mythology and and traditional Japanese tales that inspired the Ghibli studios.
As those inspiration previously did, we wanted to make our forest and enchanted. A character in of itself. Overall the goal of the game was to make it feel poetic and filled with secrets while still letting the room have some room for imagination.
INSPIRATION
Mock up concept
Digital painting long - pixel art
2020
ARTISTIC DIRECTION
We wanted to make the world of our game magical and a bit real like those in the stories of Tolkien. In his books we found an ambience that we very much wanted to use in the game.
On a more visual note we took the illustrations of pixel artist NostalgiaTree who gave us a much needed visual footing in pixel art and level of details we wanted.
Other Games like Eastward, Undungeon, and Earthbound, served as inspiration for different aspects of the game as well as visually.
The project itself was very challenging because it was the first time I worked with a team of 8 people comprised of game programmers, game designers, and artist. It helped acquire very much needed skills in artistic direction communication and working as a team. The size and level of details was also a challenge. The overall project was a very instructive experience, also taking into account more than 3/4 of it was produced at distance because of the corona virus outbreak.
EXAMPLE
OF ASSETS
"murals on ruins"
The story told through the ruins of old,
an asset seen through out the game to highlight the story and certain locations. Giving more importance to the environment
The story told through the environment was one of the most important criteria in the marking system for this project. The player needed to be able to comprehend the story without it being too straight forward
If he is willing the player can discover the story through hidden clues and messages throughout the map.
Through the game there is an evolution inside the environment, that implied a change in colour pallets and some unique decoration for each part of the world.
On the right is an example of asset in different forms and location inside the world.
BLUE being for the corrupted part of the world and STONE for the normal part of the world.
IN GAME FOOTAGE
TO DOWNLOAD AND PLAY THE GAME FOR FREE GO TO :
This game was made with Unity.
With the participation of
SAGLIO Helena, TOGNETTI Nicolas, VUITTENEZ Valentine
in Game Art
GHIGNONI Manon, MARY Aurélien, PICARDAT Simon, SCHMITT William
in Game Design