WERE THERE ANY UNEXPECTED DIFFICULTIES WHEN IT CAME TO
IMPLEMENTING ANIMATION? From the start, we committed to a with the animation.
Maintaining that quality throughout the entire game certainly posed a challenge, but we managed to keep that consistency. There were times when we opted to avoid lengthy animations with cutaways or small tweaks to how events unfolded, just to make our lives a little easier.
HOW DID YOUR ARTISTIC PROCESS FOR THE GAME CHANGE AND EVOLVE AS TIME WENT ON? We had the art from the game jam as a starting point, but we wanted to expand on what was there. My initial scales for both the character and the environment, looking at references and getting a feel for what works. The turning point in the process came when I was able
to introduce more artists to the project. I felt comfortable giving them creative freedom over their individual tasks, touches. The process evolved from a singular artistic vision to build on each other’s ideas.
HOW DIFFERENT DOES THE GAME LOOK FROM HOW IT WAS FIRST ENVISIONED?
Loco Motive started as a 2 week game jam, so a lot of the initial look of the game was borne out of necessity and not really having much time. Our initial idea when pitching the full version of the game was to mostly retain the look from the game jam and add minor polish, but it was pointed out know and understand they are two separate projects. I thought that was a great point, so I went back and
reworked the dining carriage. The new version was larger, more detailed, and allowed for greater expression in the everything is thick and bold, there’s a lot of broad shapes. the gaps, often adding detail that’s suggested and not explicitly
20 | MCV/DEVELOP February/March 2025
THE WHOLE GAME IS SET ON A TRAIN. HOW DID YOU MAKE SURE THAT IT REMAINED INTERESTING WHEN EACH NEW AREA WAS ANOTHER WAGON?
This was something we discussed during development. I think there was some anxiety that players might experience train fatigue. Loco Motive is told in a non-linear fashion, with three separate protagonists each sharing their side of the story, so we used that structure to our advantage. To break things up, we begin each character’s story with a sequence set outside the train. We also use this moment to unlock new areas on the train, change the time of day, adjust the weather and lighting, and shift the placement of characters.
like a hot towel to a tired face.
AS THE GAME CAME TOGETHER, DID THE ART DIRECTION INFLUENCE THE GAME DESIGN AT ALL?
Early on, we didn’t use many close-ups in the game, but eventually discovered just how invaluable they were. Given to convey important details or items clearly. Cutting to a close-up helped us highlight key moments, making it easier for players to grasp the context of a scene or to better understand a puzzle. We could also use close-ups to avoid creating lengthy character animations in certain moments, keeping things throughout the game and added many more character close-ups in order to better communicate narrative beats and puzzles.
WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNED FROM MAKING LOCO MOTIVE THAT YOU’LL TAKE FORWARD INTO FUTURE PROJECTS? I think there is a sense of vindication, in some respects. We put an overwhelming pressure on ourselves to deliver, because we felt very much like the underdogs. It’s a new team, we’d never made a game like this
before, it’s in a niche genre, and we’re writing it ourselves. You look at that and it does sound like a recipe for disaster, but with adversity you quickly learn resilience. We got knocked down a few times, but knew the only the other side! I’m very proud of what we were able to achieve.
future project, and our hope is the fans we earned from Loco Motive will continue to show up and support us in whatever that endeavor ends up being.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52
