Catalyst
I did the art direction for the game Catalyst. I also programmed it ! You can download the game for free at https://hevn0.itch.io/catalyst
Catalyst is a digital Toy made as a student project over 3 weeks, it doesn't have a purpose nor an end. It only has a system which is basically a main game mecanic. You roam as a spaceship along a world made of very simple geometric shapes, and, you can gain speed by flying close to these objects. You also can also drift, to reorient yourself while keeping your momentum and that's about it !
My art goal for Catalyst was to make the player feel like he's harmonized with the environnement.
As i was doing both the programmation and the art of the game, I had to make fast and efficient choices so that the game would look and feel good.
The first thing i worked on was the ship. I thought that if i had one thing to polish to get a clean result, it would be the avatar.
Here is an early concept of it.
There is three movement states in Catalyst : Neutral, Drifting, Acceleration. I made three postures that correspond to each states.
Additionally, the acceleration state has an animation, based on how much you are actually gaining.
The system of Catalyst implied to have an environnement made of Rectangular shapes, to get the most out of the mecanic.
To make those Cuboid forests a little less boring, i made a shader that would outline and make them unlit to cover their real shape.
I applied the same shader to the ship, following my idea of mixing the player and environnement.
I then randomized the color at each speed step. You can see that the color get less saturated as i get close to pass a speed step.
For the drift I made a second shader that add colors to the environnement It also generate a growing sphere that emphasize close objects. The colors are responsive to the colors currently displayed, so that the color harmony is always respected.