Endgame - New Art Style

So as Changeling continues to wind down development wise, we've turned at leats some thoughts to future projects. 

We've pretty well settled on Endgame as our next project (at least for now). I have been contemplating various things about this project - how to set up the game, what game engine to use...and what art style to use.

While we haven't really started development in any real capacity, it's always good to think about these kinds of things in advance.

Changeling was and is a very heavy first project.

It is honestly pretty massive as far as VNs go. There are definitely bigger ones with heavier gameplay elements. But as far as just...size. It's big. Especially for an indie project.

The learning curve was pretty steep, but there have been tons of things I filed away for potential future projects. One of those was art style.

Changeling is what I'd call my "natural" style. It's just how I art when I'm not going fo ra particular style  or trying to accomplish a style. It's just how I naturally paint digitally. There are some massive drawbacks to this style.

First - it's just not popular. Changeling hsan't released yet, but it's no secret that VN lovers prefer anime styles overall. I think it's just the clean, sleek lines and cell shading that people really enjoy. 

Second, it's time consuming. Like...really time consuming. Complex, multi-layered shading just takes forever. 

So I've been strongly reconisdering using my natural style for future projects. I cannot (and will not) draw anime. From a practical standpoint, I'm just not good at it and I never have been. I can't achieve that line quality, get the faces right, or do that kind of shading. And I don't want to help perpetuate the idea that anime is the only 'good' art style.

But I'd really like to find something that's a little less time consuming - and maybe easier from a perspective of pose changes, outfit changes, and the like.

In the past, I have had a sort of "Esh Lite" style - it's just a style that has clean outlines and uses some different (simpler) shading methods. I often use it when I'm doing character art but don't really want to go all out with it. 

I've been thinking of refining this style for Endgame. I think it has some characteristics of my typical style, but is definitely less "painterly"...sort of. I can definitely still go overboard with multi layered shading. 

Anyway, I have an old piece of an Endgame character - Jack Viscer - that I recently sort of spruced up as I tried to play around with how to refine this style into something I'd be willing to use in a large project. 

I thought you guys might like a sneakpeak at it...so here it is! 

(NOTE: This is not a sprite, it's not "official" Endgame artwork, final character design or anything like that. It's just a piece of character art in a style I am thinking of continuing to refine for future VN projects.)

And for the curious, who want to know about this character:

His name is Jack Viscer, he is "the crimson rook." He's Delphine, and is part of an organization called Crimson.

And...I think he's around 24. I don't remember his exact age since I haven't looked at his character profile in a long time. When I really look at him, he kind of Marc V.2, doesn't he? XD

His personality is a bit different, though. So there's that...I guess. Maybe I'll end up changing his design so he's less Marc-like. OxO;