Robert Bailey, the producer, is holding the interview, as usual. Another interview will be posted roughly once a week, cycling through the different team members.
Audio:
Transcript:
[Robert Bailey] Hi, my name is Robert Bailey and this is one of the dev interviews for the VRoom Project from Falling Tricycle
[Alia Gestl] Yeah, hi, I'm Alia Gestl, I'm an illustration major at RIT. And I'm really into video games, so here I am.
[RB] Cool! So what got you into games?
[AG] Really just growing up with a brother who liked playing games a lot, like I always liked watching him play through RPGs and stuff. That really got me into watching people play, and then I started playing some of my own games and share his games with him, so yaeh.
[RB] Any particular games stand out as favorites?
[AG] Animal Crossing series and Pokemon series are my two favorites from my childhood. More recently, I've bene really into Stardew Valley and Skyrim, those are my other two favorites.
[RB] So what type of proejcts have you done in the past?
[AG] Well, I was originally a game design major at RIT, and I actually switched to illustration. A lot of the projects I worked on, I was the artist, pretty much. Deep down I knew art was what I wanted to do in games. Last semester, I..oh, I made a really fun game, well, I didn't do any of the programming [laughs]. I did all the art for it. It was a cool, futuristic wall jumping game...what did we call it? But yeah. Before that there was a game where there was a cute little bunny with a hat. You palyed as the little elf in the dungeon that when the main RPG character goes through and breaks all the pots, you ran around and tried to put the pots back. So I did the art for that, I drew the map and the little bunny that had a hat that fit a pot. And he'd walk around with the pot, that was fun. Those were two of my most recent projects.
[RB] That's a bit of a departure from what we're doing now.
[AG] Yeah
[Both laughing]
[RB] With the sci-fi car combat.
[AG] Well, the sci-fi's still there from the first one I talked about.
[RB] Yeah, nice. So what do you want to do when you get your degree?
[AG] Being a game concept artist would be my number one goal. But if that doesn't work out, I'm kind of thinking about being a tattoo artist.
[RB] So, why tattoos? Out of curiosity?
[AG] I like getting them [laughs]. I've heard...when I get my tattoo I like talking to the artists, and they usually say it's a pretty fun job. They get paid a lot for it if they're good. And, I dunno, my family and friends have said if I become a tattoo artist, they'll get their body covered in tattoos. So I already have the client base, so I just need the training.
[RB] Nice, I was just asking becasue digital and skin are very different
[AG] Well actually, the one artist I went to, he does the designs ddifferently and then he prints them to use as a base on someone's skin. So he uses photoshop or something like that, which is what I do. So it would be like drawing the way I do now, but tattooing it later.
[RB] So, what do you do on VRoom?
[AG] I do the concept art and kind of keep everyone, the whole art team, in track for what they're doing and making sure everyone gets their stuff done on time. And when it does get done, reviewing it and making sure it fits the aesthetic standard for the game.
[RB] What got you interested in working on this project?
[AG] I really wanted to work on a VR game, a real one. Over the alst summer I was trying to start a google VR thing, with the Google Cardboard, but the proggramming sucked. I hate programming [laughs]. Now that I found a team where everyone else is programming, I get to do the fun art stuff, so I'm excited just to play the game and do art things.
[RB] It's always fun to work on games you want to play.
[AG] Yeah.
[RB] So what are you looking forward to on the project?
[AG] I'm looking forward to how it's going to look, becuase obviously that's what I'm really excited about. But I'm also looking forward to how it's going to turn out in terms of gameplay. I'm a little worried it's going to be a game that makes me sick when I'm going to play. But I think having someone who gets car sick easily would help in the quality assessing department. So, there's that. I'm excited to help in that sense. And I'm also excited to see how my visions turn out when the art actually gets put in there.
[RB] Yeah, that motion sickness is a definite concern. Even John, our code lead, from last week's interview, he gets motion sick if he doesn't have anything to eat.So we had a playtest real fast after a morning class. He was like "nope, I'm done, I'm going to puke."
[AG] Yeah, I...I allegedly puked once when I got carsick. That's what my mom tells me. I was so young. I get carsick usually when I'm sitting in the car and not looking at the road. Which is weird, because when I'm playing the game, obviously I'm looking at the road, but just the disconnect makes me sick anyway.
[RB] That is something we'll keep an eye on as we keep going with programming and what not. So anything standing out for you on the project as a concern or good thing?
[AG] Well, we already talked about car sickness [laughs]. Another concern I kind of have is the disconnect with your hands and grabbing the wheel and other things in your car. But that's kind of a natural concern when using a car and not your actual hands.
I'm also really looking forward to the environment too, because the direction our theme is going right now, it'll be really fun but also kind of difficult to keep the aesthetic we had earlier, but make it still seem post-apocalyptic. I dunno, it'll be interesting. I'm excited about that.
[RB] Cool. Besides the car sickness, anything else you think will be a problem? Either with work or the art team?
[AG] Probably...I dunno, I think just getting the look and feel right. I don't really know how to explain it, I think the art direction is going in a couple different directions, and keeping that all cohesive might be kind of an issue in the future. We haven't gotten to the point where we have finished, textured, in game-models for me to look at. But I'm worried there will be a lot of times where I go "that's not right." And someone asks me why, and I just go "I dunno, just fix it." So I hope my communication is up to standard through this project cause I'm going to need a lot of it.
[RB] Yeah, and art team's first model is just coming through that pipeline [the steering wheel]. Have you gotten the chance to see Aiden's texture?
[AG] I saw the texture, but not applied to the model yet.
[RB] Okay, so you're waiting for all those pieces to come together.
[AG] Yeah, I'm excited to see how it all comes together, but I don't want to have to tell someone to do it again. But I'm proably going to have to at some point. We'll see.
[RB] In the art team meeting today, we can probably look at the model textured. Toss it in engine.
[AG] Yeah, I'd like to see that.
[RB] That brings us to the end of the interview, any parting thoughts?
[AG] Art is hard [laughs].
[RB] So yeah, that's the end of the interview with Alia Gestl, our lead artist and concept artist. Next week we'll have someone else and these will just be going through as I interview the entirety of the dev team. So yeah, thanks for listening.
[AG]
As stated above, these will pop up about once a week, as the developers are available.
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