Production Blog 2 - Two more OCs who I probably should've explained a bit more

I grabbed a few characters I haven’t introduced at all and put them in a halloween-themed side story that totally wasn’t rushed last minute to get something in for that day. Let’s take a looksie into those two and give them faces. Because I didn’t describe their appearances that much (if at all) in the short story that introduced them. I think I had one sentence that described Sara’s appearance, and that’s it.

Yeah, let’s go with Sara first.

Sara Crown

I needed a fluffy, can-do attitude character to act as a sort of relief character. Not exactly comedic relief, but more like being able to diffuse tension through the power of the Warm and Comfy. When coming up with a flaw, I wanted something that wouldn’t contrast too differently with their caring personality, but would also hinder the goal of being Warm and Comfy. “Tunnel vision” was something that first came to mind, and didn’t really take into fruition until...I wrote the short story.

Meet Sara Crown, Raina’s co-worker and next door neighbor. A person who wants to do right and be the support she’s always wanted to be, but falls short due to a combination of a lack of due diligence and/or committing a bit too much to the plan she wants to execute (see the failed surprise birthday cake from the last post*).

*She means well, we promise. Sara used rubber fake knives dripped with watery ketchup.

Sara’s character design was something that was whipped up on the spot without a lot of experimentation or exploration of palettes, body size, clothing choice, and other visual information I may or may not be forgetting. When I first drafted her, I was thinking “fluffy confidence” and this is what ended up happening when I put it under a bucket of blue paint. So in lieu of not being able to show any kind of design “evolution” of sorts, I’ll just name a few characters who I drew inspiration from when creating Sara, at least in personality.

Aoba Suzukaze from NEW GAME by Shōtarō Tokunō
Nadeshiko Kamagihara from Laid-Back Camp by Afro
Tita Russell from Trails in the Sky by Nihon Falcom

And if you’ve read the short story and are thinking, “huh, I don’t see these comparisons at all,” then...

Masky’s adaptation of Sara is REALLY GOOD OH GOD SHE’S SO CUTE.

You’re probably very right.

James

James, the well respected and very responsible* landlord of the apartment Raina and Sara live in. An aficionado of all things beauty (safe for work or otherwise), he strives to keep his complex in peak condition, including the tenants who rent if they so desire (he’s also a registered trainer). James does approach Raina and Sara a bit more casually than the rest of the tenants who live here, either calling on them to help him with some tasks or to just hang around.

*He’s only responsible when he has to be.

I wanted James to look two ways: “to look like someone reliable but actually doesn’t actually do anything substantial,” and conversely “to look like someone who’s lazy but also gets the job done very well.” For some reason, I decided that from those two lines of thinking, I made James look like some sort of streetpunk/washed out boy band reject. Like with Sara, James’ design was created without a lot of exploration into what he could look like. So instead, I’m gonna fanboy over Yakuza 0 for a hot second.

James’ conceptualization was made at a time where I was really getting into the Yakuza franchise and wanted to draft stories based in a red light district setting. I found myself deeply engrossed with how these stories, specifically with Yakuza 0, were able to balance a serious crime drama AND the silly wacky side stories with the city’s inhabitants so masterfully. The visual storytelling in its cutscenes that transition right into gameplay is an absolute joy to witness. Some of the side stories I’ve outlined when the project was originally an anthology was to follow the city’s more seedy underbelly. While those have been shelved for now in favor of focusing on Raina’s story, I hope that what came out from the shelf now will be worth your time.

Because he’s also a very good boy.

James and Sara were both conceptualized during pre-production of Zero Plane, so they don’t have as much history when compared to designs like Zylphia and Raina, both of whom were repurposed from different projects altogether. However, I do hope the little insights I was able to provide give a bit of context for how I go about developing a character’s personality and visual identity. Next time, we’ll dive a bit into the world and how that was conceptualized, and maybe I’ll try to explain the genre a bit better.

Because maybe I should’ve done that one first instead of going in head first into character designs.

…Does “far future fantasy” make sense?