CONTEST ENTRIES

This segment of my blog would showcase the various entries that my groups have entered for contests like Unity Game Jam 2012, Game On - Master class, as well as Global Game Jam.

Now, on to the entries!

Global Game Jam 2014: Ploop!

Ploop! is a 2D puzzle game that my team, Team Fight for Five made as an entry for Global Game Jam 2014. This event actually gave us an opportunity to try out how our group dynamics work for our incoming CAPSTN/thesis.

Global Game Jam is a yearly event that lets people create a game based on a given theme within 48 hours. The theme for 2014's GGJ was a quote which had a complex meaning. We didn't win any awards for this but it was a very heartfelt experience. My team realized that we can work well together and each of us knows our strengths and weaknesses. It was really fun creating the various art assets like the different objects.

(Click me!) To download a copy of Ploop! and play :D

Note: You need click the exe file and you're good to go! This game can only be played in Windows PCs.

Here are some screenshots of the game Ploop!

Team Fight for Five consists of the following members:
Lorianne Halago = 2D artist
Cristjan Lazar = Programmer
Sheryl Lim = 2D artist and level designer
Anna Gelicia Navarro = Programmer
Erin Isobelle Yap = Sound designer and level designer

Game On-Master Class 2013: The Land of Dreams

The Land of Dreams is a 2D tower defense game that focuses on various pieces of candies fighting to protect their kingdom. The theme of 'kingdom' made my team, Team HBLA, think for a while on what can be a good concept. We decided to go out of the box and not really go with the medieval feel. It was fun creating the various animations and concept designs of the candies.

(Click me!) To download The Land of Dreams and play!

Note: Just click on the exe file and you're ready to play! This game is applicable to Windows PCs.

Here are some screenshots of The Land Of Dreams:

Team HBLA consists of the following members:
Paul Arvin Andrada = Programmer and sound designer
Mark Antolin = Game designer and producer
Jamaica Balbin = Programmer and artist
Lorianne Halago = Artist
Sheryl Lim = Artist

Unity Game Jam 2012: Silhouettes

Silhouettes is 2D, on rail, side-scrolling game created by my team, Team BL-ED (BLack-rED). Silhouettes throws in more questions than answers as you progress through the game. Being primitive not only means the prehistoric era, it also means lack of complex knowledge. The game makes you rely on your instincts to acquire your necessities and avoid the unknown dangers to survive through the harsh world of silhouettes. It was really a fun experience to create the concept of this game as well as make the various designs for the characters and obstacles as well as create some of the level designs.

The theme for this game was PRIMITIVE LIFE. When we first heard that, we thought of something prehistoric. Eventually, it led to the topic of INSTINCT hence, this was born. We tried making it simple yet, mysterious and addictive. The only thing you can depend on would be your 5 senses.

Truth be told, we didn't really expect to win the contest but, we actually did! It took us nearly a week for the fact to sink in on us and we were really happy that people liked our game!

(Click me!) Here's the web version of Silhouettes! If you wanna play again or if you died, press 'r'!

Note: Please download the web player first before playing the game itself. It's fast and easy!

(Click me!) If you loved the game, show your support by liking our page in Facebook!

Here are some screenshots of Silhouettes:

Team BL-ED consists of the following members:

Lorianne Halago = Artist and level designer

Dylius Jov Ouano = Programmer

Cherish Princess Socro = Artist and designer

Game On-Master Class 2012: Noypi Nota

Noypi Nota is a rhythm game that was inspired by a 3DS game called 'Rhythm Thief' as well as other rhythm games like 'DJ Max Technika' and 'Osu!'. The sophomores of our school (our batch) were required to participate in this competition in groups. It's another day for Team BL-ED to make another game. There was a catch when we entered Master Class: it should be based on a theme and it shouldn't exceed more than 5MB. 

The theme for this category was Philippine Heroes. Truth be told, we had a hard time conceptualizing the game, at first. We had a lot of brilliant ideas in mind until someone mentioned "rhythm game". Since then, everyone started pouring in more ideas about it hence, creating this game. 

Now, how was the game related to the theme?

"When you say hero, you don't have to die for your country, nor do a sacrificial deed. 

Anyone can be a hero in their own way. 

All you need is the push to start a change."

What we were trying to say is that when someone says hero, it doesn't have to be someone famous or you have to do something really big just for you to be called as such. Truth is, anyone can be a hero in the little good deeds that they do. We just need the initiative to do so.

We didn't really mind if ever we wouldn't win the contest but, we were again shocked that we got in the top 3 teams! When we got to the awarding ceremony, it was very overwhelming. We were with other students who competed as well as professionals. It was a wonderful experience, really.

It was such an honor to win the contest, too. All that hard work and constant headaches and breakdowns were really worth it. I'm very glad that I get to work with such wonderful people in my team and may we continue to do our best in achieving our dreams! It was a blast working with these people again and it was fun creating the various character designs and props and even voiced some of the characters!

(Click me!) Try playing Noypi Nota! It's very addicting and challenging!

Note: Please install the web player first for you to enjoy the game. It's fast and easy!

Here are some screenshots of Noypi Nota:

Team BL-ED consists of the following members:
Lorianne Halago = Artist
Dylius Jov Ouano = Programmer
Cherish Princess Socro = Artist
Erin Isobelle Yap = Sound designer

I believe that these games are milestones in my life when it comes to creating games. It's truly an honor to receive such awards and to represent our school in doing so. To those who participated in those contests, congratulations to us all because we did our best and we did a wonderful job! It's also an honor to have gained these experiences and camaraderie along the way.

Let's do our best next time, alright? Now, on to more adventure!

MISCELLANEOUS (Doodles, Sketches and Whatnot)

This segment would technically show all the other things that I've done that's not really related to anything academic. These include my random doodles. 

 RANDOM DOODLES:

This was drawn because I felt that people were depressed lately during this time. I know, it's not really that pleasing to look at compared to my other works but hey, it is a doodle. It doesn't have to be super pretty. I just wanted to convey the message that someone out there loves you when you feel like you're all alone in this world. This was a practice to digital arts.

Another practice on digital art. It's supposed to be a random image of me if ever I was in anime form. It looks very different from me, actually. It's also a practice on drawing in a semi-realistic style. I'm almost there!

This is a very old doodle. This is supposed to be a shirt design for my organization in school. It's a game design team and this is located at the back of the shirt. The front of the shirt was never really finished because I didn't have a good concept for it (it should show the game this team was going to create as well as various characters). This was traditionally made, by the way.

This is again, another random traditional doodle. I wanted to practice on drawing something that's not chibi (simplified/adorable form). I wanted to practice how to ink properly, as well.

This one is probably a practice on poses and male anatomy. I had a hard time drawing this one since poses aren't really my specialty.

This one's a request from a friend of mine. He wanted me to draw his character (which he drew on the left). The one I made is the one on the right. I'm proud on this one because I got to do the anatomy and posing well. It may be in its chibi form but, hey! It's some improvement, right? I also get to learn how to shade properly. This was traditionally made.

This would be the colored version. I'm really proud of this one because I realized that I still have my traditional art skills in tact! I'm also happy that a lot of people like this work and that they thought this was printed! I'm shocked that they said that, honestly. My friend loved this very much and I'm glad he did! I'm glad people appreciated this work. I used markers for the base colors and colored pencils for the shading.

This would be a cutscene or a random fanart of the proposed game we made, "BATTLECRY". I was amazed when this was finished because I was surprised that I can actually do backgrounds. Drawing backgrounds is considered as a challenge to me because I haven't really tried to make those yet. Again, I'm glad a lot of people appreciate this!

This one is really, really old. I made this chibi using markers and colored pencils. I'm pretty much happy with how this turned out. Whenever I look at this, it makes me smile.

This was the phase in my life where I was completely or somewhat new to digital art. I didn't know how to use Adobe Photoshop that much. This was an art trade for a friend of mine. Digital art and dragons are two topics that're hard to master but in the end, I conquered it! I'm happy with the result.

This was one of the doodles that I'm quite proud of. This was made a long time ago, to be honest. The reason why I'm proud of this was is because I only used the small set of colored pencils to color this one. I used the limited colors to create something like this. It made me realize that you don't need the fanciest of materials to get great art; it's how you use them!

This one was part of those phases in my life wherein I was new to digital art. This was supposed to be a logo for a friend of mine for one of the organizations we're about to have in school. The logo in the middle was not made by me. I'm happy how this came out, honestly. Simple yet, effective.

This one's a fanart of BBC Sherlock (a TV series that started back in 2010). I loved the series so much that I've decided to make art for it! Originally, the lineart was traditionally made (you can tell by the white spots seen around the characters). I didn't know how to make linearts/scanned pictures look digitally made hence, it kind of looked like this. Still, I'm proud of this work.

I know that these may not be much but, I really do hope that I can see some progress in my art (as well as my programming skills) as I journey further in the world of GDD.

SDA WORKS (CONCART)

Hey, everyone! It's been a while since I've written in this blog. A lot of awesome things happened during this term. One of them would be this awesome subject that we're taking up called CONCART or CONCEPT ART. It teaches us a lot of things about creating our ideas into pictures and sketches so that we can have a guide in drawing the actual thing later on. 

This subject is very interesting and I had a lot of fun learning from it. My professor here is so passionate and hardworking in molding each and every one of us to maximize our art skills to its full potential.

Some of the works we did are gifs so, I'll be posting screenshots of them here and a link to show you the gif itself.

This picture over here is the lineart for an exercise we had on character design. Sir said that everything we see and draw can be broken down into basic shapes. This exercise made us use circles, triangles and squares for characters. I honestly am not good at digital art yet so, this was traditionally made, first. It was really fun creating these characters.

Here's how it finally looks like:

This picture is another exercise about faces and facial expressions. Sir wanted us to create faces that are appealing and at the same time, distinct. It's actually very challenging to think of a unique facial expression because there are a lot of faces similar to the ones you see up here. Still, I had fun playing around with the shapes and styles of each.

This is an initial sketch of one of the characters we're supposed to create a game with. Yes, it's Gregorio del Pilar. The assignment was to create a character sheet of the characters we're gonna use in our game. The game my groupmates and I planned was about Philippine History. It was really hard to create an accurate portrait of Gregorio del Pilar because his hairstyle's very confusing, for me. I really had fun creating this character.

 This would be the colored version of the previous picture. I wasn't really much of a pro in digital art so, what I did here was I scanned it and used the lineart as my base. I just cleaned out the pencil sketches and colored it in. It looks pretty good for someone who doesn't really know how to do digital art, really. I'm proud of this work.

 The next thing I've learned in this class (and perhaps, one of my favorites) is pixel art! Boy, this was one of the lessons I've dreamed of learning! I was amused by the way games with an art style like this were made. When our professor taught us about this, I instantly tried making sprites. It was fun creating them.

(Click me!) This was one of the outcomes of playing around with the animation in Photoshop.
This is Gregorio del Pilar walking. I was really, REALLY, amused when I made this.

(Click me!) This was one of the outcomes of playing around with the animation in Photoshop. AGAIN.
This is another version of walking. I just made the speed faster.

 (Click me!) This was one of the outcomes of playing around with the animation in Photoshop. AGAIN. Really, I was greatly amused.
Yes, it may be the same sprite sheet but, hey, I was really having fun creating the animation because it was my first time animating something digitally. It was really one of the things I've been dying to learn, to be honest. I remember my jovial mood when I was creating these.

(Click me!) This is one of my most favorite animations that I've done so far!
The sneaking Gregorio! When I first showed this to my friends and my professor, they found it adorable! I was really proud with this one! I got to do a simple yet awesome animation of a character moving! It's a great achievement unlocked.

(Click me!) This was my finals in CONCART.
This was a bit tedious to do because I had a hard time creating a decent background per stage. I also had a challenging time making this because of the time constraints. A lot of things were happening during this time and stress was getting the best of me. I will do better next time! I know this is good but, I want to make it better!

This one was an exercise our professor gave us. He said to compile all the art styles that captivate you and create a poster of it. It's basically a recap of all the things we've learned last term from COMGRAP (COMPUTER GRAPHICS). I think this poster I made isn't really enough but, it's good. I should practice more so that I can make better posters for the upcoming games I'm going to make.



COMGRAP is really a very interesting and challenging adventure for me! I really learned a lot from this class. I hope I get to learn more and practice more, too!

SDA WORKS (ANIPRIN)

This part of my blog would feature all of the things I did in my ANIPRIN or ANIMATION PRINCIPLES class. I really learned a lot from this class because it taught me the basics of animation. It may be quite tiring because it's once per day with 3 hours but, it's actually fun because of my classmates and my professor. Another reason why I loved this class is because we spent most of the time watching movies and videos with regards to animation and movement. I was amazed while watching them, honestly. The way it was drawn, the contrast of colors and design, the simplicity and complexity of details, even the movement, I was in awe with them all. With all those in mind, with all the basics given to us, I'll do my best to create smooth animation when it comes to creating games (especially when it comes to cutscenes).

Forgive me if ever there's not much to post here but, my professor hasn't returned the plates that we've passed to him. 

This is a screenshot of our finals presentation. We were supposed to create a game trailer on the game we proposed during midterms. The title of our game's called BATTLECRY. It's technically a game that features the Philippine-Spanish war. You get to play as Gregorio del Pilar, Jose Rizal or Andres Bonifacio. You get to follow their life story during the war and see what exactly happened during that time. The reason why we chose this kind of game is because we wanted it to be fun and at the same time, educational. We wanted history to be a bit more fun to learn with and not just something that we should memorize. I had fun creating this because it was easy to color when it's grayscale. I also had fun because I get to experience making gifs. 

(Click me!) This is a sample of a gif that I've experimented with. I was highly amused, really.

(Click me!) This is another sample. See what I mean by highly amused?

This is scene 1 of our video presentation. This was made by my groupmate, Niels.

This is scene 2 of our video presentation. This was made by Niels, as well.

This is scene 3 of our video presentation. This was made by me.

This is scene 4 and 5 of our video presentation. This was made by Sheryl.

This is the final output of the trailer. Dale was the one who compiled and fixed the finishing touches. This was very enjoyable to make despite the fact a lot of things were piled up on us. I hope that we'd be able to make the game and I hope that we'd be able to improve on this.



ANIPRIN was an awesome class to be at! I hope that I'd be able to apply those lessons I've learned, in the future.

SDA Works (FREHAND)

This part of my blog shows most of my works for FREHAND or Freehand Drawing class. It was a very fun subject for me not just because of the professor but, also the fact that I get to draw traditionally again! I realized that the style I have right now isn't really good enough for the game industry yet so, I need to do better and improve! It has thought me various ways of expressing myself through various traditional media.

 This drawing's part of our finals that time. We needed to create concept art for a game that we were supposed to make. Any game would do. Our game had something to do with sleep and accessing a world that you'd never imagine. I was asked to do some character designs and so, I made Xylo. He's one of the main characters of the game. I had fun drawing him because I was really in the mood to draw him that time and I think that I'll keep this character and game concept for future use.

 This is another drawing of Xylo, my character for our game, DIMENTIA. That's how he looks like when he's logged in the game by sleeping. He can access the world anytime as long as he naps and that he has the right equipment for it (in that case, is the pillow on the former drawing). I also made some expressions of him because I always wanted to draw expressions for my character! Yup, this is definitely a keeper for me.

 This is my submission of our midterms. We had to copy a statue that was displayed in our classroom so, I copied this one. I realized while I was drawing this that I still have a long way to go before mastering my style and mastering realistic art. I believe that I'm stuck with a cartoonish or anime-ish style (which isn't a bad thing at all) and I feel like I lack anatomy and shading lessons. I don't really know how to copy things accurately but, I think I can still improve.

 This is a practice on how to draw male anatomy. I had fun drawing this one because I got to improve a little bit on proportions and anatomy. 

 This is a short drill on how to draw 3D basic shapes. Our professor told us when drawing something or someone, try imagining it as simple 3D shapes. It actually helps me whenever I draw guidelines when drawing. I thank my professor for the tip.

 This is a short drill on drawing robots. I had fun drawing this because it's my first time drawing something inorganic. I believe I can do better than this but for now, I should practice!

 This is another practice on drawing still life or inorganic objects. Vases are quite hard to draw for me because you still have to think of a good design for it. I still had fun, though.

 This is another exercise for drawing basic 3D shapes. It's very tiring to draw the same thing over and over again but, I believe it will be worth it once you mastered it.

This is a practice on still life again. Our professor asked us to draw a chair that's in the classroom. I had a hard time drawing this because I didn't have the right kind of pencil for shading it. I'm not really good with drawing objects but, I believe that this is actually good for starters and I can tell I can still improve on my art style.

SDA Works (COMGRAP)

This segment of my blog features all the works I did during my COMGRAP or Computer Graphics class. This was also one of the classes that I had a lot of fun with. The reason why is because I always wanted to learn and improve on my skills in digital art. I never really knew how to operate Adobe Photoshop fully until this class came along! Now that I know how to do in that program, I'll do my best to explore more about it and improve my art not only traditionally but, digitally!

 This is an example of a screenshot on how my zombie character should look like. This is a part of a screenshot of a game store screen; which was our one of our assignments. I had a lot of fun making this one because it's the first time I drew something that didn't involve any lines/outlines. It was quite hard to color that but, I had fun nonetheless.

 This is a practice and assignment using various tools of Photoshop. I had a fun time using this because it gets to unleash my creativity when it comes to making something so complex with simple shapes.

 This is a practice on how to make various brushes using the brush settings. I had a hard time copying our professor's brushes on the left side because I really didn't know how to use Photoshop that well. Nonetheless, it was a fun experience.

 This is another exercise on making robots. I still had fun making each and every one of them because I used my own shapes for this one! It was quite tiring but, rewarding.

 This screenshot is my submission for our midterms. We needed to make an on-game screenshot with the theme "Zombies Vs. Robots" wherein your player is the zombie while the robots are your enemies. I had a lot of fun with this one because I get to draw something digitally again (the zombie with the Arnis sticks) and I get to explore more features of the program!

 This is another exercise that enables me to play around with Photoshop. I honestly had fun with this because I get to tinker around with various commands again.

 This is an exercise that lets us use the Pen Tool in order to follow and fill in the shapes our professor gave us. I had a hard time with this one because I didn't use a graphics tablet but, a mouse. Another thing, it's very hard to manipulate something that has to be quite accurate and precise. I still had fun, nonetheless.

 This is an example of the game store screenshot I was talking about earlier. We were supposed to create different images of the game screen using layer composition or layer comps. I actually got confused on how to use the layer comps because it was quite hard for me to comprehend since I wasn't really experienced in Photoshop. Afterwards, I got the hang of it and it ended up like this. I'm quite pleased with the result despite my experience with Photoshop.

This is another screenshot of the layer comps homework. It shows the options menu, as you can see here. I really had fun using the various filters of the program as well as the rendition of colors. It was really fun making this assignment.

 This is another homework wherein we had to make a start up screen for the 'game' we're making. I had fun making this one because I get to explore more about Photoshop and apply what our professor taught us. It was a really awesome experience creating this piece.

This is an assignment regarding making a cover for our game. I had a lot of fun drawing this because it was fun coloring and creating the robots and zombies. It may not really look like those game covers out there but, I just wanted to make it look different and somehow, out of this world.

This is one homework that I'm really proud of! Our professor told us for this homework, we need to zombify someone. I chose to zombify myself because I think it's fun messing up your face with things like blood and cracks and scars. I had fun using the 'liquify' tool in Photoshop! It ended up with this result! I really liked it and I think my friends did, too. I'm really proud of this work because I believe that the photo manipulation I did here looked really good despite my experience with Photoshop.