Xenogears Title Sequence

More assignments! This time we'll see how my drawings have been. I don't draw that much anymore and I'm getting a little rusty here.. I wish I upped the quality of my illustrations more but you can't really help to make things look not perfect when you have other things to do at the same time! Why do I sound happy saying that.. Oh well.

So we were asked to do a 10 frame storyboard for a title sequence of our favorite game, or any game that has influenced us greatly. I chose Xenogears for mine because I can't think of any other game that has affected me in ways it did. It tackles a lot of psychological concepts about identity and humanity. It's for anyone who wants to play an RPG with a really deep story. If any of you are interested, the game is being sold on the PlayStation Network for I believe around $10? It's a game worth playing in many aspects. Don't let the outdated graphics fool you or you will miss out big time on hidden gems!

Images under the cut!

These are my roughs for the storyboard. I think I give a rougher meaning to the term "rough work".. Pardon my use of language as well. Yay for stick people and nonsense drawings?! Trust me sometimes I don't even understand them myself..

So at this point I was being all hip and going yeah yeah my composition could be a lot better (my compositions are horrible I find) but I could go with this hmm hmm so I developed each concept thoroughly and did my best to illustrate them in the best way I could.

I did some tweaks and changed some plans later on like my final illustration for my first screen is this. I thought I should show the logo of the developers first before delving into anything serious.. I re-used the background from an existing illustration of mine because I didn't have time to remake something similar and I was getting so frustrated so I pulled out my resources. Nope. I'm not ashamed of reusing anything that is of my possession! SquareEnix was still called Squaresoft back then.

Well now we're following my storyboard here. I rarely ever paint water so I hope it looked alright.. I should practice painting other things. I took this frame idea from the opening sequence of the game. Have some purple hairs everyone!

Here's a shot of the main character chilling on a peaceful day. His name is Fei Fong Wong and he's a martial artist. I actually like main characters that use fists to fight. Sword fighting seems to be the norm for main characters in RPGs but I find fist fighter main characters to have a certain charm in them..

Blood!! Should I have censored this-- I doubt kids check blogspot in general though ahaha... This is probably my least favorite frame out of all.. I wish I did better on making the floor look more like.. asphalt? I don't know anything about lands... So then tying this to the game, there's quite a bit of dying here.. It starts off pretty light hearted but there's so much more into it as you play.

Who says you can't have more blood? Here's Fei again, except not so peaceful anymore... Shit happened! Presenting this in class was a little hard because I didn't want to spoil anyone..

This here is Elly. The main heroine for the game. Square has a typical way of making heroines I find.. Although I found Elly to be likeable in general.
Back to my drawing umm... I wanted the focus to be just Elly so I emptied the background to a simple one. When I first saw her I thought she had a really beautiful design and I kind of wanted to show that. But I believe I did not bring much justice to her beauty.. (That anatomy..) Elly has got to be one of my favorite female characters of all time and I can't help but love her design!

Unfortunately I cannot remember what this recurring symbol/shape was about.. But you see it quite a bit in the game and I thought I should incorporate it into the sequence. This is just the pendant form of it. It also comes in a window shape as well I believe.. and perhaps some other things.

More characters! Blonde haired one is Bart and black haired one is Citan.. I just realized that a lot of Xenogears men are... long haired. These two, just like Fei and Elly are major characters of the game. There is more to the party but I find these four got a lot more focus than any others. Might be because they are the first ones in the party and that you get to know them a lot better that way? Hmm..
Derpy computer machine thing!

One winged angels! (Apparently that concept isn't Sephiroth's alone) Although in Xenogears these angels mean no harm unlike a certain villain from a popular game that was made a year earlier. I've always found the meaning of this really beautiful. The whole concept of how people need other people and how we affect the things around us and how others affect ourselves.. And that no one is perfectly independent and all that stuff. It's my favorite concept among Xenogears' other psychological concepts.

And for my final frame, well of course it's the logo.. The only thing I did not illustrate in the sequence but I'll drop it here as a closing remark of some sort. Overall I hope I did.. a lot better actually. I got perfect marks on the illustration part.. I should really get the hang of presentations and knowing what to say. Usually I get too anxious and my mind just goes blank.. I'm actually hoping that blogging helps me talk out my ideas and stuff.

In the end this project made me really happy as I've always wanted to do some fanart stuff for Xenogears because this game is far too good and needs more love! My attachment for this game is just.. too much. I enjoyed all the recalling and reading of the wiki pages while I was working on this. It's not everyday you get assignments like this!

You could say that I have huge emotional attachments for the PlayStation 1 games because it's got to do with nostalgia a lot. I got my PS1 when I was still in the Philippines and it's a big part of my childhood. There are things I can't do anymore ever since my move. And there are people I cannot see anymore. Friends, some relatives.. Some regular places I'd normally go to.. And all sorts of things that will never be the same. But games and consoles never change in such ways.. I can always go back to them whenever I have the time to do so. It's a part of my past that I can always stay with no matter where I am. The only tangible things that could ever remain. It's a comforting feeling although a little sad.. But that's really why I love video games!

That's about it for this post yay!