Capstone project - Thumbnails, Idea generation and observational sketches
Project management - Trello:
For this project I have chosen to manage my time using Trello. As there are so many tasks that need to be completed for this project I found splitting the tasks up into their respective MLOs will allow me to better see which of the learning outcomes I need to work more on and better use my time. I have assigned labels to each task with a colour explaining how complete said task is, with green being complete, orange being in progress, and red being to do. This is much simpler than using a Gantt chart and it means I can work my tasks in around my tasks for my other projects.
 |
| At the bottom of each devlog post, I will update the status of tasks completed on my Trello. This will assign a date to the tasks completed. |
Thumbnails & Observational sketches [Part 1]
When considering things to draw for this project, I first wanted to explore what a "cave BnB might look like". I took inspiration from the flintstones and how they combined the concept of a cave house with modern architectural shapes and décor. At this stage I hadn't fleshed out the biomes yet [see my post on Game mechanics for info on that :)) ] but i knew I wanted to have each cave look different depending on which area it was from.
For my beach themed cave, immediately the idea of a surf shack came to mind, I tried to reflect this in my sketch with the seashell beaded drapes, tropical plant life, shutters to give the cave a more lazy and comfortable vibe, and the overall shape is more squat and reminiscent of a small shack. I would love to look at some prehistoric plant life that may have lived around the old coastlines to make this a little more accurate, however this sort of vibe is what I am hoping to achieve.
For my jungle themed cave, a two tiered cave with a balcony felt fitting. I couldn't put a cave in a tree [however that might be something interesting to explore in future sketches] so i thought this layered look might be something interesting to build upon to link it to the treehousey feel. I also think using more plant-based décor will give it more of a jungle like feel to it.
At this stage these are just very brief ideas, but this got the ball rolling for my considerations on how the cave bnb's would function in my game mechanic wise.
On the opposite page, my first note was discussing how many people I wanted my game to be for. My 2 main thoughts were either 4 players, or 6 players, I think with how long I have to make this project and how many cards I am looking at making, 4 players is a small enough number that the game is still suited for families, but also not too many that I will be swamped with an excess of cards to illustrate.
My notes follow with:
"Respective players get to choose from a roster of cave locations each with their own pros and cons to work with"
This inclusion of the pros and cons mechanic gives an extra layer of consideration to where you want to build your cave. This links up later with the Clientele [See Game mechanics for info].
Originally, I was going to have the caves be on cards with info on both the front and the back. This mechanic is inspired by a card game I have played by the name of Star Realms (Wise Wizard Games, 2017)in which some cards are double sided with increased stats on the other side. In this case, I would have the starter cave on one side, then once a round has been one, an improved version of that cave would be on the reverse.
I want to keep as many of the cards mostly covered by art rather than text, this will make my game appeal to a younger audience [and I also much prefer drawing pictures than writing].
Better caves would bring in more money, but would require more supplies to decorate,
At this point too, I considered if my game could be made solely into an 18 card game. I like this idea, and I like how this would keep costs low, However I really want to try making a more complex game that requires more cards. I will have to revisit this later on once my mechanics are more solidified.
Linking to my considerations for turning my game into an 18 card game, i wrote down a hypothetical of what cards i would need to reach that goal. I figured that i would need:
4 double sided location cards
6 enemy cards [double sided with more enemies on the back]
4 resource cards [double sided with recipes on the back]
4 customer/ trader cards
While this is a good consideration, I don't particularly like having so many double sided cards, it feels a bit messy and I think it might be easier to understand if I just had more cards. Following this, I made the rules a bit more complex than my original ideas, so i don't think this many/and types of cards would work for my idea anymore.
In my game, Creatures would be used to harvest supplies from to build furniture to build furniture to decorate the cave. I made a note here about dinosaurs being depicted alongside cavemen which isn't very historically accurate, but then i reminded myself, neither were caveman air bnb's. I think it adds to the comedy value of my project which is something I really want to keep at the forefront of my work. This game should be funny, lighthearted, and full of silly nonsensical stuff that's only purpose is to make the player laugh.
I made a sketch about creature cards in my previous post, I wanted to build upon this by considering what information would be needed. Here were my ideas and my thoughts on them:
Name of the creature - somewhat vital, I think this could maybe make my game somewhat educational as long as i keep my designs relatively accurate.
Bio - I might omit this, I want to keep my game as low on words as possible, there isn't really a need for it gameplay wise and it might take up valuable space. I'll think on this.
ATK and HP score - I think with this i was still very much in the TTRPG mindset, rolling for attack and damage is just going to add a lot of extra mechanics and complexity to my game as well as the added cost for dice. I did consider reusing my mechanics for the game Titanarum me and a group of friends made in college, however I really think that this would just be needlessly clunky for this application. I'm going to revisit this later, I first want to really get down how the rounds of my game play, then i can look into making certain areas more complex.
The most important part of the card is the art, as this links to what I hope to do in the future. I want to keep actual game creation as a secondary skill that I can develop, my main goal is becoming a Tabletop games illustrator [specifically TTRPGs but there is a big market for board games in general so I don't want to Pidgeon hole myself too much, i also think its fun trying something ive never done before :)] so the art of this game will be what I want to give most of my time to.
I haven't really drawn many dinosaurs before, so I went and did some research on some games that have some relatively accurate dinosaur designs. I found this game by the name of Saurian (Urvogel Games, 2017) that is regarded to have some of the more scientifically accurate designs on the market. Artist Jacob Baardse builds his models with his in depth knowledge of paleontological reconstructions to create realistic recreations of dinosaurs (Baardse n.d.). His work is presented in 3D, created using a mix of Blender and Zbrush, which when it came to creating observational sketches was incredibly useful in being able to rotate the models and draw from a variety of angles (Baardse n.d.).
I used his pieces Triceratops Prorsus - Saurian (Baardse 2017), Tyrannosaurus Rex- Saurian (Baardse 2017), Denversaurus Schlessmani -Saurian (Baardse 2017), and Ankylosaurus Magniventris - Saurian (Baardse 2017) as reference to draw my observational sketches from. I felt these sketches helped me understand the shapes of some dinosaur heads better, however I do feel I need to draw some more dinosaurs in the future, to get a better understanding of their body shapes. I would also like to do some studies on dinosaur skulls, Neanderthal skulls, and prehistoric plants. Most of these will be based off of either museum pieces or scientific sketches.
Bibliography :
Baardse, J., 2017. Ankylosaurus Magniventris - Saurian [Online]. Artstation. Available at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/VlGWn (Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Baardse, J., 2017. Denversaurus Schlessmani -Saurian [Online]. Artstation. Available at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/vP31a (Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Baardse, J., n.d. Summary [Online]. Artstation. Available at: https://www.artstation.com/littlebaardo/profile (Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Baardse, J., 2017. Triceratops Prorsus - Saurian[Online]. Artstation. Available at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/3zvkY (Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Baardse, J., 2017. Tyrannosaurus Rex- Saurian[Online]. Artstation. Available at: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/lV1KPz (Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Urvogel Games, 2017. Saurian [Online]. PC. Steam. Available at: https://store.steampowered.com/app/587450/Saurian/(Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Wise Wizard Games, 2017. Star Realms. Tabletop. Star realms. Available at: https://www.starrealms.com/learn-to-play/ (Accessed at: 15 December 2025)
Comments
Post a Comment