The role art has in games is huge. Whether talking about concept art, cover art, animations, compositions, user interfaces, and even shaders, art has at least some role to play in each of these. In this article, I will touch a bit more on the topics of shape language, composition, and animation to explain how these concepts are used in games.
Shape Language
Generally speaking, when an artist is coming up with a character, environment, or whatever the subject matter happens to be, there are three main shapes they will think of. These shapes are the circle (this includes curved lines as well), the square, and the triangle.
Artists use these simple shapes to help come up with their designs due to the implicit feelings each imposes on us as people. Generally speaking, the square shape gives us a sense of stability, maturity, defense, security, and so on. The circle shape generally tends to convey innocence, friendliness, curiosity, and other emotions along those lines. The triangle shape is often associated with danger, edginess, unpredictability, and other similar emotions. When incorporated well, an artist can generate feelings into their viewer without the viewer even knowing why a piece makes them feel as they do. For example, look at this artists interpretation of Kirby with different shape languages:
The square and triangle designs give an entirely different feeling from the beloved Kirby that many of us have come to know and love. The concept of shape language also extends to environment design as well!
Composition
Composition is a very broad concept in art, and I suggest checking out this blog post for a better idea of what composition means in photography and this blog post for better ideas of what composition means in terms of painting if you are interested. Generally speaking though, composition deals with the way a scene is constructed through the arrangement of elements in the scene. Some of the composition techniques/principles are:
Contrast
Emphasis
These are just two examples of how video games utilize the same composition principles that artists and photographers use in their work. These composition techniques really help a player to know what is important, help players find their next task, and more. [Gomez, Gabe]
With the evolution of video games over the years, video games are being more widely recognized as an art form. Video games are kind of a culmination of a lot of art forms like music, writing, and of course the visuals of the characters and landscapes. The author of this article points out the importance of art in games. It sets the tone and feeling of an environment. The stylistic choices a game makes can heavily affect how a player interacts with the game. How can we take what the author says about artistic choices in games and apply it to thinking about how we engage a player? Is there a way to use art strategy to help players feel comfortable and confident in financial literacy?
