RIOT Update #2

And so, another week arrives. And with it, a new blog post. But before we dig into today’s topic, allow me to deal with a particular issue.

 

Part 1: Peace Flags

Sometime ago we received the following email:

“Hello, Leonard, i see you do great game. But 1 thing is not great – the homosexual rainbow banners. While playing, I would like to feel like rebel, but not like homo rebel 🙂
I Don’t make shit-talk against homos, but i will be really embarrassed to play homo 😀
Hope you can add some other banners for choose.

 

thanks.”

We believe the question is rather disconcerting, given the amount of homophobia (even though no shit-talk is done apparently) and the ideal behind it. However, since the question gets asked repeatedly, we would like to state that those flags are peace banners and not gay banners.

Not that treating of gay riots would be out of the question, but not the case at the moment.

Anyway, we should better focus on today’s topic: the art pipeline and the No TAV campaign.

 

Part 2: No WHAT?

No TAV. In Italian, TAV stands for high speed train. It is a movement born 25 years ago to protest against the construction of a high speed train between Turin and Lyon.

The general opinion of the protesters states that the construction would not be motivated by any real need, and it would have plenty of reasons to actually be stopped. The protesters say, the reason of its existence would lie behind mere economic exploitation.

We should make clear that RIOT is NOT here to send that message. Or the opposite.
RIOT is instead here to tell some of the events of the No TAV protest, trying to be as a camera watching the scene, as objective as we can be, as realistic as the game can reach.

 

 

Part 3: Concept Art

Not only Leonard has been hard at work in writing the screenplay of the No TAV campaign, but also he has drawn two of the four scenarios that are going to compose it.

Both levels are set in Chiomonte, the location in which the construction yard of the TAV is located. However whilst the first one takes place in 2011…

 

… the second one is from 2013.

As you look closely, you will notice that certain elements (such as the rioters’ hut, for instance) are in both levels, indicating that a different part of the same environment is being shown.

That, as the game will tell, has been due to a gradual conquer by the police of the area.

 

Part 4: Where are the pixels?

Please take into account that this art is just temporary, rough, concept art. Most of the backgrounds start on paper, to then become pixel art.

And successively be lit by 3D Lights in Unity, featuring bump mapping and dynamic shadows.

Finally, a reward for the readers who got to the end of the page: a frame of the introduction cutscene for the No TAV level set in Chianocco, the second location of the campaign.

See you in two weeks!