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Need inspiration for final tier spaceship

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Wagydan
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Joined: 02/16/2010
Coop project - Sneak peek 2.jpg

Hey guys,

I'm working on a cooperative game which has the workingtitle 'Oh my! Invasion'. It's pretty light and easy but varied and deep enough to keep playing again and again. I know the game works because it's based on an educational game I designed for an academic hospital. I gave it another theme because I want to publish it for the popular market (with permission ofcourse)

Here is what got me stuck for now. I've been working on the artwork for the aliens that will try to invade the planets that players are protecting. Planets are invaded via a tiered system, starting with small Green-Blue-Red generic spaceships, working it's way up to more organic looking Orange and Pink aliens, followed by zeppelin-fish like ships in silver and gold and FINALLY the horrible purple ships that can destroy the planets.

The problem is now that I have a designers block when it comes to the final "mothership's" artwork. So I thought I'd ask the BGDF-guys. Any ideas? Would be very much appreciated. It should be kinda scary but still cartoony enough to not scare away kids or anything like that. I've attached the artwork for the first 3 tiers.

Joost (fablesmith.com)

Cogentesque
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Joined: 08/17/2011
Heya Joost, Well first of

Heya Joost,

Well first of all, from your description I can't actually work out of the aliens you have designed already which fits into which? Where does the pink one with tentacles come into it? Is that a pig scary tier 4 purple one?

So yeah, firstly that, scondly one alternative you could do is add another type of alien graphic as "tier 0" and move everything else up - if you are truley stuck for ideas for even bigger and badder alien ships - try and go the other way: make tiny weeney harmless ones and shift the rest up! :D

Other than that: I would probably say scary faces with monster teeth - spikey zigzag style teeth to go on the shup body. If you can change the background - that would probably do a very good job of showing the ship as a mean one to "not mess with" maybe something simple like the traditional japanese rising sun burst effect:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?um=1&hl=en&biw=862&bih=743&noj=1&tbm=isch...

then you could dsign your ships just as anyold ship but the background would make it big and powerful - much in the same way that the silver ad gold tier 3 ships get their "power" from. Also, on this, are you actually going to get them printed in shiny gold and silver or are they going to be essentially grey and brown? Because if that is the case, they may well not come out quite right : perhaps you could simply recolour them globally (tier 1 = blue, tier 2=red, tier 3= green) etc

If you did this Probably best ot go with the TaiKwonDo belt colour system - makes sense: http://www.itf-information.com/information08.htm

white - innocence
Yellow - the earth
green - the growing plant
blue - the sky
red - "danger"
black - opposite of white

Alternatively and if you are all out of ideas do a google search on "concept spaceship" or something like "comic spaceship" and then borrow some design elements from them. On cursory glance I am getting: Spiky Bits, Big Rocket Boosters, Pointy Shapes etc

Hope I've helped :)

Wagydan
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Joined: 02/16/2010
Thanx

Hey Cogentesque,

Thanks for taking so much time for your lengthy reply. I'm sure you've helped. The moving-up-a-tier option is interesting, but I don't think the art for the current Tier 3 would be scary enough for the end-boss vibe.

I really like the bursting sun idea to give the ship more oomph. And you're right about the Spiky bite, rocket boosters etc. I think I'll google some Orc Warhammer 40K art for inspiration...

I'll send a JPG once it's done.

The Loneliest Banana
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Joined: 09/06/2011
When I think of motherships I

When I think of motherships I think of colossal size. The mothership could be so big that only part of the illustration fits on the tile. Or maybe it looks huge because there are tiny versions of other ships in the art for scale. The size would be enough of a distinguishing feature that you could base it off one of the other ship designs.

Or you could put spikes on it. :)

Cogentesque
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Joined: 08/17/2011
"Too big to fit on the card"

"Too big to fit on the card" would be great.
Also - the bursting effect if there is any space left. That's cool - banana's idea is rockin'.

Banana wins 1 bgdf ultra point: ★

jzylkin
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Joined: 10/13/2011
Not to nitpick, but shouldn't

Not to nitpick, but shouldn't the final ship be the colonizing ship, not a big bad warship?

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