CrazyHoundGameDesign

  Over the last few months I have been posting the various chapters of my world building exercise on my fictional world of Goroesgi. While I think I was able to use it as an example of how I go about trying to build my own world which I hope can become a setting for games and stories I plan to make in future, there seems to be a few people following along with the world I've been building. The World Building blog series is over for the purpose of talking about how I am creating a world, but the exercise continues for me, and for anyone that is following the world I'm creating. This means I need to write more about it for me to continue to expand the ideas and rules of the world I'm creating.  For the World Building series I posted the chapters that were written before I restarted my blog and trying to focus more on my own creative projects.  This means it has been a few months since I last picked up the project other than making the blog posts and tidying up what I had al...

Following my recent efforts to improve my drawing and artistic skills, I've realised that one area I seem to consistently struggle with is drawing faces that fit. While I think part of this comes down to getting to grips with drawing the body poses and trying to get the perspective right, which I'm still working on, I've recently realised that as I am likely an undiagnosed autistic person, and likely with ADHD, that I never really look at people's faces, and don't really know how to draw expressive faces as a result.  By this I mean that as much I can interact with people through masking, and I might be looking at someone's face, my brain isn't focussing on their face.  I don't look at the details of the face, and don't really notice facial expressions unless I force myself to try and figure it out. Over the last few months where I have been doing the PenUp challenges I have been able to try drawing different people in different poses and scenarios, ...

  This week's post describes the "Academy" of Goroesgi.  The Academy is the most recent faction to be formed on the Great Ark, and it is the primary academic institution for the society that exists there. The idea for the faction came about because although I had already touched upon two other core factions in society, with the idea that people are starting to develop magical abilities, and that this is a pretty recent development, it makes sense to me that an institution would form to study and research these new abilities. Also, with the other factions being focussed on the exploration of the structure, the Guild, and the religious faction, The Way of the Builders, this third main faction kind of rounds out the core societal factions and presents another angle for expanding the interactions throughout the society on the Ark. This week's post is also the last one that has been written in advance.  I plan to continue to build my world and expand it further.  This mea...

  This week's Art Post is for the second PenUp Challenge in October. The theme this time was, rather aptly, "Draw a Monster".  With Halloween coming along soon, I guess this allows them to keep things seasonal. My last few challenge uploads were pictures where I tried to get a character into the image and align to the theme.  This time, I ended up drawing a picture of just a monster.  No characters this time, just a monster, but surprisingly with this one, I was able to create it in less than a day. The monster is based on the idea of a reptilian like monster.  The design is a bit simplistic, but there was one thing I wanted it to have that I managed to get into the picture, teeth, and lots of them. Most of the time on the picture was spent on colouring and shading, but I think it works rather well, and without it the picture would be pretty basic. So, without any more pointless explanation, here it is. With all of the extra time I've had the last week or so, I ...

  This week's World Building Chapter describes the Guild faction.  Like most fantasy anime and game worlds, the Guild is intended to serve as the main source of quests and missions in the game I would like to make.  In the world I have set up so far, it is also one of the primary societal factions aboard the Great Ark.  So to me it makes sense to explore the Guild in more detail, describing how it works and how it is structured so that when I eventually create a game or set a story in my world, I can use the Guild and it's system to maintain consistency. Next week's chapter will discuss the Academy, another of the key factions in the world. Thanks for reading! The Guild The Guild has existed for as long as the Ark has existed, its primary purpose was always to provide work to the people that live aboard the Ark, from simple labouring and farming, through to appointing governors and leaders of the settlements on the various levels of the structure. Originally, the ...

Over the last week or two I've been practicing drawing different poses to better understand the proportions and get used to drawing characters.  Most of these have been simple sketches, and my current level still isn't there yet.  Through this practice however, I've realised I really still need to focus on drawing faces.  Faces looking up, down, left, right and any combination of directions. For drawing faces there are so many different guides and tutorials.  From drawing circles, to boxes, to tracing the drawings of others where the character is looking in the direction you want.  The most beneficial approach I've come across so far is a distorted box approach, but even then drawing a face that looks reasonable can still be a challenge.  I might get a shape that works, but where I seem to be struggling is the placement of the facial features.  I don't seem to be able to draw them in a way that fits the face around them.  Part of me th...

  In this week's World Building chapter I started to think about the people that now lived on the structure of the Great Ark Goroesgi. As with the previous passages, this one is about how the society living aboard the Ark lives rather than describing actual individuals living in my fictional world.  The idea is to create a series of factions and a scope of the society to maintain a cohesive world when I eventually manage to create stories in my world through games or other media. The passage touches on quite a few different principles for use when constructing stories, from the types of societal roles people can have, and their professions, through to the economic system used, and the larger factions that operate within the society. As this is the first passage discussing these aspects, there are a lot of new ideas raised that are vague, needing further refinement in future to better explain how the different aspects function in the fictional world. Next week's chapter will di...