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aurelliocheek · 4 years

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Frostpunk: Art that Amplify the Design

Senior Lead Artist Łukasz Juszczyk writes about the art design of Frostpunk.

In Frostpunk we think about steampunk not only as a pure style, setting or ascetics that we chose because it was cool. We see it as a utilitari an element of our world. The factor that can make you a survivor or a science conqueror. Also, steampunk felt a natural fit because in a frozen world people would invest in steam energy rather than electricity. Steam technology could be less efficient, but besides energy, it gives heat – core and essential resources in our game.

On the other hand, we had a precious stake on the horizon which is survival of the society and we knew that we had to avoid toy or cartoonish steampunk. Perhaps that’s why we can’t see a lot of randomly put cogs and moustached gentlemen in their cylinders in Frostpunk. We believe Frostpunk as ‘believable steampunk’ where all the inventions, technological solutions, as well as all other aspects and themes presented in the game, should be explainable and make sense in the world as such.

Frostpunk is a very detailed looking city-builder.

Hitting the mood It‘s important in 11 bit studios way of making games that art to amplify design message. Those aspects have to click together. To establish that grim, unforgiving and palpable bleakness we reached for several tools like lighting and color, stylized parts of UI, particles or even architectural forms. Hitting that gloomy tones were possible mainly through using dark UI splashes in Book of Laws tab or story events screens regarding our society, and overwhelming harshness showed across certain assets like dirt on buildings, frozen edges of the screen, sharp shards floating in the air or sharp textures on 2D pieces. The colour palette in the game is obviously cold and bleached, dominated by royal and steel shades of blue. But there is a pinch of hope. We think about that every morning in our daily cycle. We wanted it to look uplifting…but only until minus 60 degrees kicks in. And at any point in development, we didn‘t consider other, more stylized art styles like an oil painting or something like that. Mostly it‘s never worth it. You rather want to stay focused on one direction after you establish it. Evolving from one idea, developing it step by step, testing, prototyping and looking for the best way to amplify the message of the game.

So there wasn’t anything we threw out and what didn’t make into the final game. But I could tell I’m not happy with some UI and UX elements. Mostly from the city-builder layer that is informing about structures being in range. Or the ones that tell you to have to place building here and not in other places or show that there are some issues with a particular building. I know for sure that we could make them look more elegant. But in general, I think we delivered the best looking city-builder game ever. With plastic, aesthetic and often artistic touch. Doing something that was never done before could turn against you and is multiplying doubts in mundane work. That’s why I’m really proud of my team that they overpowered a huge amount of surprises they faced and challenges that nobody even tried to predict. From small things like adding snow caps on roofs to big things like making vivid city with believable structures.

The Console Edtion is equal to the PC version and always runs smoothly.

Snow and snow again Meanwhile, The Last Autumn expansion is another kind of achievement for the art division because we flipped the table and messed with core visual elements. During the main game development, we had never imagined that there would be Frostpunk without snow. Because of that, we had to adjust all buildings, the whole environment, and all 2D illustrations. But knowing that frost will happen anyway in the end, we had to address that as well. The in-game weather change is relying on delicate and complex smoke and mirror tricks. Removing and adding snow may seem like not a big deal, but remember that we are talking about the game that‘s almost 2-years old and was crafted through a lot of custom and precise systems. So basically Frostpunk was not as flexible as we wanted because so much content is created thanks to these systems. As a result, the biggest challenge was not removing snow but making it appear again.

Also, introducing a whole new way of resource extraction was quite tricky. In The Last Autumn, players order them, and they are delivered on board of the ships. In theory, it means building one dock and fishing harbour on the map. But we had to prepare and set up 20 buildings to make it work as intended. First of all, we developed a unique and distinctive renderer system in our internal game engine which helped maintain a certain look. But being faithful to the art style of Frostpunk even this time was also a matter of being aware of key visual elements and visual structure of the game. In each one of previously launched updates, we tried to look for something fresh and interesting for the players and ourselves as well. But at the same time, we kept in mind to stay close to the core visual elements. And it doesn’t necessarily mean to restrain creativity. It is the opposite. Knowing your game boundaries can stimulate creativity even more. And that is what happened during The Last Autumn development.

Lukasz Juszczyk Senior Lead Artist

Began his adventure with graphics from street art, from where he still has a fondness for interesting forms and typography. In 11 bit studios since 2016 bound. Initially responsible for the design of the environment and lighting, then as a Senior Lead Artist, he helped to maintain the artistic direction of Frostpunk and now is the Project Lead.

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