concept and design

Hi, for those who do not know me from the tgb forums or my resources, I will perform a little introduction about my self. I am 26 yo , from indianapolis. I started programming when i was 11-12 years old in basic. moving along the line today I program in 8 languages. I do alot of concept art and design. I draw in pencil, paint with a wacom tablet and acrylics in non digital. I am also a photographer with a pretty good setup and have won some awards for photos and editing.

I have used photoshop for about 10 years and am pretty advanced at it.
My usual work is done designing dynamic web solutions and web programming from streaming video to database design. I use a combo of tools for 3d modeling maya being most of my workflow some of my painting is done in zbrush and mudbox 2009. i am far from a great modeler at this point but currently am doing the digital tutors total package on maya.

my main project in tgb is gangstars block by block. which i may port to tge i am a little in limbo on this at the moment until i find a few 3d modelers. I am currently in contact with game pro magazine in private bouncing game ideas and concepts and getting feed back on what sells and what won't so over all this will dictate my project. They currently are saying gangstars as is in 2d has great potential so i might go forward with this. If others do not know game pro has opened a publishing section to their arsenal.

It is totally benificial to establish a connection with a publisher whether it be casual or more of a boxed type game you will find them very helpful. Even though most of my concepts fall out of the casual game category I have also established a good reputation with oberon. and their advice even though not looking to publish my game are very helpful as well.

Before you approach companies of this stature make sure you have a well designed plan of your game from concept to completion and have any drawings or game assets ready no matter how small it is. for example the people at game pro have only played my testing ground for gangstars but it helps them visualize a direction the game is heading.

gangstars is pretty unique in the fact that everything is built and colored in runtime limiting the art resourses significantly . if you know how to convert RGB to blend values in game all you have to do is make white grey scales of everything. i have written a file of about 30 colors that are loaded in to the game and converted. and using blend modes you can accomplish any color you want. plus it is easy for me to say hey i want a new color find it in photoshop and add it to the file.

also in the game i have reworked A TON of the adventure kits ai.

as for npc players everything is randomized and made at runtime beginning with a naked poser model to the final step in gun selection and ammo equiption and color choices. everything i have coded i have coded where it can be implemented in any of my tgb ventures from here out kinda like a tool box. a compliment i recieved that really made me feel great was the road and side walk textures i had made. in as far as how realistic they were compared to other 2d game art.

so you can see how colaberation with game publishers or magazines is very helpful in the early going of making your game. although you might be really excited about it the market might not be or some of the options you plan to implement might prove to be unfruitful and you can save a drastic amount of time.

if any of you have questions or want to know more about gangstars or would like to colaberate on this with me just let me know. as for this is not a recruitment blog im not really going to elaberate on much else about my concepts at this time.


ps:!!!!!!! Flow charts are your friends. really they are.
michael