Capstone Project - Client Card : Grug the Stylish

 Moodboard -

In Hotel Bunga the client card's purpose is to show the preferred attributes the player should be working towards. Each client has two priorities and I feel their designs should reflect upon these.

In my tutorial video, I showed a card by the name "Grug the Stinky" as one of the clients, his priorities were Trendiness and warmth. I did later change his name to Grug the Stylish because I felt a little bad calling him stinky :( [also it didn't fit with his theming]. 

Some ideas that came to mind for this character is having him be quite visually stylish, either using a kind of hipster vibe with lots of different patterns and textures to his clothing. I also wanted to give him a pair of glasses made of wood or bone to tie into this theme. His clothing will lean more into modern themes with a prehistoric accent added to give him more of a fashionable and eccentric look. 

In my mood board i included images of outfits I liked the look of, and some ideas of hairstyles/glasses that I might like to use in my design. I also like the third image on the bottom row for its colour pallet. Much like Gremmie's design, I think giving Grug a complementary colour pallet will make him stand out more, however to separate him from the more prehistoric look of Gremmie, I will give him a more saturated colour pallet to make him feel more modern.

Thumbnails -

My first set of thumbnails was to establish a starting point to the overall look of Grug the stylish. I explored several different hairstyles, most of them having a more neat and "styled" look to them [with the exception of design number 3]. Despite his previous name, I want Grug to be very well groomed and stylish, and I think giving him accessories will help a lot to sell that vibe. In the end I really liked the look of design number 7, while designs 8 and 9 were certainly more eccentric looking, they didn't feel as "modern" and stylish as number 7 did. However I will say I did like the idea of the skull hat.

Using this as a starting point, I created some silhouettes of outfits that fit his overall vibe. Personally I really like design 6 and 7 i think while these aren't overly hipster like, I think they have very unique shapes and immediately separate him from the more hunter-like appearance of gremmie. His outfits seem very elaborate and look like they wouldn't be practical to do any sort of work in, which fits well with his purpose in the game. I think the fur elements also tie into his preference for warm interiors. I am not so fond of design number 5, i think the cut of the cloak and the middle section of fabric reads more as a priest, i think the split collar on the fur shawl section also adds to this, so I don't think this would work well for his character.

Gathering Feedback -

Reaching out to some of my peers, I gathered information on which designs they thought most closely aligned with the stylish nature of Grug. I got fairly mixed opinions on this which was very interesting to see. Of my designs, 2, 3, 6 and 7 seemed to get the most votes, with 3's asymmetrical look being very popular. I agree with this, I think the asymmetry gives a more laid back and relaxed look to the outfit whilst simultaneously circling back to the visual language of cavemen outfits. 

Implementing Feedback -

I then used this feedback to inform a second batch of more developed sketches, combining elements of the most popular designs together. Most of these designs have some element of asymmetry to build on the relaxed feel. This is also shown with most of the garments relying on drapery which not only feels more realistic for cavemen fashion, but also gives a very elegant and expensive look to the outfit. 

Right from the beginning I thought that the stripy fur fit well with him, i think it is bold which reflects well on his outgoing personality and sets him apart from the more simple fur pattern of Gremmie's outfit. It definitely seems more luxurious. The fur is supposed to be that of a  Thylacine, however i think it reads more as a tiger print. I will make sure to amend this in my final design [the stripes are more uniform on thylacine fur]. The blue material is colour picked from my dinosaur designs, and is supposed to be a type of thin leather. It does flow a little more like cloth so perhaps making the folds a bit more spaced out would give it a stiffer look. 

Of these designs I am drawn to design 6 and 7, I like how 6 combines the headband of 2 and the fur shawl of 3 but leans more into asymmetry and has better flow through the fur elements. I think 7 reads the best as a hipster, however looks quite boring and doesnt immediately read as style oriented as design 6. I think the poncho designs of 4 and 8 are interesting, but feel more like a hunter-gatherer's outfit than a client, I think I might reuse this idea however for the employee "Klove the brambler" or the client "Obie the fearful".

Gathering Feedback continued -

Here is some more feedback on which designs resonated with people which was again very mixed. I decided to choose number 7 which another person had commented that they liked. I think it fits best with translating Grug's priorities into an outfit design and visually looks the most interesting.

Implementing Feedback -

Following this I did do some slight iterations on this outfit exploring different hairstyles and slight changes to the clothing patterns. Of these I think design 2 has a better distribution of accessories, with the middle section being the most populated area and the rest of his outfit being minimally busy. This avoids the design being to overcrowded whilst still retaining the same vibe.

Colour iterations -

Finally I created some colour iterations, I explored what he might have looked like with his original colour pallet in the first thumbnails i created, and the end one explores what he would look like with orange glasses instead of blue. [As a side note i thought that the orange glasses looked more like amber which could give an explanation to how he made the glasses]. I think the orange lenses distribute the two main colours in a more 75:25 ratio which feel nicer than the 50:50 split of designs 1 and 2, this also helps with his main asymmetrical theme. Before making my final asset, I would like to amend the patterning on his side sash but other than that I am very pleased with his final design.

Trello -

I have now completed 1 employee and 1 client design which will allow me to create mockups of how these two types of cards will look in the final game. I have also filled in most of my project proposal and have begin looking into pipeline and industry research with focus on Publishing and crowdfunding. My next step is to finalize my section of research and create some card mockups to use both in my pitch presentation and my mockup of my game ready for playtesting. I believe I should be able to get this done in time for the deadline. I am also planning to take a trip next week to Creswell crags to visit their museum and cave tour which should help inspire me on the cave and furniture designs within my game. The only consideration for setbacks at this stage will be the weather for next week, as the tour may not run if weather conditions are poor. But, so far looking at the forecast, it seems like everything should be ok!