One of the coolest conferences I saw at Game Camp was about the art process behind the “reverse city builder” game Terra Nil, given by the tech artist Jonathan H. from the South African studio FreeLives.
In this game, you first bring life and nature to a desolate planet, and then remove all the mechanical installations you installed before leaving your paradise.
Jonathan starts by talking about the origins of the project- a solo game jam submission. Sam Alfred made the game all by himself in 48 hours (a heroic act which I’m very envious of). Following the positive reactions from players, the studio decided to transform it into a fully featured game.
Once they figured out the art style, they put a lot of design work into the buildings. They tried to create industrial buildings that visually resemble their functions, while having a distinct silhouette that can be instantly recognized when zoomed out. Quite a design challenge!
The game uses 3D graphics, to allow for dynamic lighting and shadow effects, but because the camera angle is fixed, they can project a hand-painted texture directly onto the models. You’d never guess it, until you see the building from the side! Then it looks all stretched out and funny.
Since Terra Nil uses a tile grid as a map, they encountered the issue of how to handle the edges between tiles. They used a “dual-grid” system to create round edges between tiles, and to smooth the transitions between different types of tiles, such as between forest and desert.
Finally, Jonathan ends with an interesting philosophical take on the game’s message. Although Terra Nil doesn’t explicitly talk about climate change, by playing it, you feel like you are acting out a positive and hopeful future. It’s a nice way to ease eco-anxiety.
I would love to see more games like this, perhaps even more focused on climate change on our own earth, that keep the hopeful and positive attitude while learning (or even acting out) the changes we need to make.