Creative freedom in studios and freelance
polycounter lvl 3
Hello everyone
I was recently at a talk about games art and film and one of the things that came up or was asked was how creative can someone be when adapting something from history. An example that they gave was games like creative assembly rome total war and hellblade among others. One of the key things that was brought up was the differences in a studio and freelance environment and with todays culture where everything almost feels like its scrutinised for cultural appropriation and to what level of restriction a studio has to give its artists and what restrictions artists put on themselves. Taking a historical character and seeing how far you can go with the design of that character and their look. Also how far you can go creatively before the character loses its distinguishing features before the character just doesn't feel like they look the way they should look.
One example that was given was taking a person like ceasar and giving him longer hair than what you would see and even be changing the way the Roman eagle crest looks as far as the shape and design of the eagle. another example was designing Ghengis Khan to be a more of an emperor that never went into battle and having swords that where a status symbol and decoration compared to a weapon of war
So I thought I would find out what others think in their own personal opinion on the matter
I look forward to hearing your views
I was recently at a talk about games art and film and one of the things that came up or was asked was how creative can someone be when adapting something from history. An example that they gave was games like creative assembly rome total war and hellblade among others. One of the key things that was brought up was the differences in a studio and freelance environment and with todays culture where everything almost feels like its scrutinised for cultural appropriation and to what level of restriction a studio has to give its artists and what restrictions artists put on themselves. Taking a historical character and seeing how far you can go with the design of that character and their look. Also how far you can go creatively before the character loses its distinguishing features before the character just doesn't feel like they look the way they should look.
One example that was given was taking a person like ceasar and giving him longer hair than what you would see and even be changing the way the Roman eagle crest looks as far as the shape and design of the eagle. another example was designing Ghengis Khan to be a more of an emperor that never went into battle and having swords that where a status symbol and decoration compared to a weapon of war
So I thought I would find out what others think in their own personal opinion on the matter
I look forward to hearing your views
Replies
A lot of it feels like a topic to topic basis. We have black people in our game, but it's a game set in "Braveheart meets Magic the Gathering" so we group all non-white humans as 'Outlanders.' (i.e. Non locals) I have yet to hear anyone push back on it. I myself especially since I haven't seen anything racist or appropriating, but I carry race discussions and assertions nonchalantly unless it's super big and generally outside of work.
You've, and we've, seen clear examples of the public giving outcry, but I have yet to see face to face how that's received internally. But my suspicion is that it's very much a decision that's made by someone's particular worldview who has that specific overriding power. (Creative Director, lead writer, etc.)
Art I'm directly working on, I try to do my best. Like I'm thinking back to a black player character I was making, and I'm looking through google to source African face painting styles: I want to make sure I generally keep respectful, but I perceive I have some leeway because there's no Africa in the game. There's black people, but they're not African. But I'd be silly to think these visual features I am borrowing and remixing aren't going to be references back to certain African tribal tattoos and face painting styles. I don't know if I did a respectable enough job yet. I just know it made the person look badass and "not from the game's location."