Evaluation

Evaluation

The objective of this project was to create concept art for a video game.

The project started off with three separate ideas. The first of the ideas was based on a web series created by myself and friends called “Stuff you shouldn't do in a horror movie”. Its plot was what we would have liked “Stuff you shouldn't do in a horror movie” to become. It was about a group of friends who travelled around America investigating hauntings and other supernatural entities. They were; Isaiah, the newest member of the group. He was kidnapped off the street by The Narrator after he was asked for directions. He's the only regular person of the group and the character that the player controls at the start. He's more timid than the rest of the group but is unsure if he actually wants to get back to his usual life. Connor, the cameraman of the group and the one who actually wants to make the series. He's calm, collected and the only one able to really get through to The Narrator. He acts as the mediator of the group. He's the only person that the Narrator really cares about. Last is The Narrator. His real name is unknown and the other characters don't know much about him. He's a difficult character to describe. His sanity is constantly in question and his actions are completely random. He does the web series as he's a thrill seeker. The game would be filled with amusing conversations between the group, usually fuelled by The Narrator.

The second idea was based off a script that I started writing but stopped when I realised it wouldn't make a very good movie due to the lack of dialogue and the fact it'd mostly be the main character wandering around by himself. I only had the outline of the plot mapped out. It was about a character that woke up on an island with no idea how he got there. The island is completely empty but there are various signs of things that could have happened to the inhabitants of the outline. It would have been up to the players on which theory to follow. The character would also have to try find a way off the island and to find out if the rest of the world is the same as this place. The original idea actually came from a bet within my group of friends on who could make a decent storyline out of the shortest horror story in the world. “And then the last man on earth heard a knock on his door”.

Its atmosphere is what would have made the game scary. It was called “Aftermath”.

The third and chosen idea was “Smiler: The World's happiest serial killer”. The character of Smiler came about because of “Stuff you shouldn't do in a horror movie”. In a discussion for possible villains for the second season of “Stuff you shouldn't do in a horror movie”, the idea for a ridiculously polite serial killer was one of the front runners for the villain. This character became Smiler. This game was chosen because I found that the mechanics and gameplay would have been a lot more interesting than the other two games and because I can’t think of many.  The game focuses on Smiler; a serial killer who’s last killing spree went wrong. He went on vacation to get his head back together and has returned to resume his killing sprees. He’s supposed to be a Slasher villain. Slasher movies are pointless horror movies. The only goal in them is to kill off the main characters in the most creative ways possible. They are usually just made for fun. A big inspiration on the idea was the film “Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon”. This film shows a guy planning out a slasher movie type spree. Instead of being shown as villainous and evil, he’s shown to be charming, funny and actually quite a nice guy. It made me think of a world where all these villains get together on weekends and such and just hang around. It’s an amusing idea to imagine these kinds of characters giving each other feedback on their work. A constant point of discussion between me and my friends is if certain characters had plans in their movies. The one we all agree on is Michael Myers in the movie “Halloween.” We think that he’s far more intelligent than the sequels showed and that throughout the first movie he had it all planned out extremely well with it only going wrong due to him underestimating his main target and a fortunate coincidence.

When creating the characters for the game, I decided to give the serial killers horror movie - like backstories, but have them act like normal people. They hang around and talk to others in the business. Smiler holds tea parties with a couple of friends. Most of the story is told by Smiler telling it to his friends. These friends are: Baby face; a child killer who consumes their corpses to try and maintain his youth. He has his eyes and mouth stretched out to avoid having wrinkles. He sounds like he’d be a disturbed and scary individual and he is when he’s on the job. But when he’s off duty, he’s a loyal and caring friend who offers various advices to his friends. The other friend present is called “Spades”. He is a villain who constantly changes his look, name and person in general because he can’t find anything that people find scary. He’s usually referred to as “Chester” by the others. The character of Death shows up every so often to have a rant at Smiler and the others for increasing his work load. Death is usually portrayed as someone who actively seeks out death and organizes them but in this version it’s only his job to collect people to take them to the afterlife. The victims are all various horror stereotypes and don’t really need much coverage. Smiler himself is a nice and polite person when he’s off the job. He donates to charity and does a lot of community work. On the job he maintains the politeness but he’s now aggressive and murderous.

What Next

The main character is killed off in the end; this would usually stop any sequels from being made but due to what the game is paying tribute too, it’s possible it could be done. The Friday the 13^th series’ 4^th part was called “The final chapter”. Despite this there were 7 more entries in the series after. It’s happened to the big 3 franchises of the slashers have all done this so it’s possible Smiler could return from the grave. It would be in a tongue in cheek fashion that he’d return. I’d like to think that the series could make an interesting tv show with the killing spree shown in a horror movie type fashion while parts with Smiler hanging around with his friends would be shown in a more comedic fashion.

I think the things I did good in the project were the characters, especially Smiler and Babyface who came out perfectly, the games sense of humour and the overall plot. The presentation, for me, I think it went really well. There were no real negative things said and the entire project was well received, with people understand the humour well. Things that didn’t turn out well were the drawings themselves. This was down to make lack of drawing skills. I think that can’t really be improved due to it being about my skills in general being bad instead of just for this project.  I also think I could have done better on the research tasks. I think I didn’t do enough.

In conclusion I think the project went well. The idea was very well received despite its content. People seemed to understand quickly that it was more of a parody and a tribute to Slasher movies more than something serious. The target audience would have been horror fans especially as they would have gotten the references immediately and movies that pay tribute to others are very popular in the horror community so I expect it would have been well received.