Released back in spring Ubisoft Montreal's Child of Light possessed a uniquely gorgeous visual style that few, if any, have matched. In a talk at the Game Developers Conference (GDC) earlier this year, Creative Director Patrick Plourde discussed the journey from concept art to bringing the 2D RPG to life.
Plourde cites the artwork of illustrators Kay Nielsen, John Bauer, and Yoshitaka Amano (the last well-known for his Final Fantasy artwork) as overall inspirations for the soft, wispy look of Child of Light and its protagonist, Aurora. When asked if there had been any pressure to create a character and style that were more "bad-ass," Plourde, who also served as creative director for Far Cry 3, said there had been a little, but he believed the correct route to go matched with the original inspirations and the story that had been written:
At that point I wanted to have the character that was on paper represented onscreen, so it made no sense to turn her into a bad-ass. So that's the principle reason why it didn't work for me. Of course somebody can make a female bad-ass character; that's OK. But for this project, where we were, what was interesting for me, it just was connecting, so we kept going with something more delicate.
The full presentation has been made available for free viewing and can be found here on the GDC website. It's a fantastic session for those interested in artistic direction.
Much more recently, Plourde also spoke at the GameON: Finance conference in Toronto. According to Ploude, Child of Light's financial picture ended up just as rosy as some of its characters cheeks, the small team's game having made a profit for Ubisoft:
It's not as profitable as Assassin's Creed is profitable, but it's profitable enough that we would have been able to fund a sequel. Or if it had been my company, I would be driving a Ferrari and doing donuts.
According to GamesIndustry, Ubisoft has retained Child of Light's developers as a core team at its Montreal studio.
[source gamesindustry.biz, via gamesindustry.biz, gdcvault.com]
Comments 16
Great game, good to hear it did nicely.
Yeah, I'm glad it was profitable. It seemed a nice value and the team was pretty small. It had a character to it that larger games often fail to hold on to.
I found the game a bit too beholden to its own melancholy flavor by the time it was done, though.
Played it projected up huge on our wall and we'd just stop playing and just look at the image all the time. Beautiful work.
I love Child of Light and I just hope they do a sequel.
Great game . I want more like it.
A sequel sounds good. The game was great, but felt a little unfinished. I'll bet they get it just right with another go.
But are they saying Aurora's not a badass? She's totally a badass. She beats the snot out of giants and dragons.
I'm more interested on how it did on the Wii U plus compared to the other versions.
See, Ubisoft, I really don't care if you don't release stuff like Assassin's Creed and Far Cry on Wii U. But this sort of game, please bring them our way. I'm still disappointed we didn't get Valiant Hearts.
Loved this game, more like this please!
How interesting — I was just thinking about this game in class today. I'm very pleased to hear it was profitable! It is overall one of my favorite games, and it even introduced me to a pretty awesome composer (Cœur de pirate). I would certainly love a sequel of sorts.
P.S: I still would have loved to have Valiant Hearts on the Wii U.
Intresting stuff, I've still not picked this up but I've got plans to spend some money over x-mas to milk the last of the reward scheme so I'll get it then. It's probably the longest a Ubisoft game has gone without a discount!?!
Strange to think the director of farcry did this too, couldn't ask for a more different type of game! Just love that art style.
An interesting read, particularly as it focuses on it's gorgeous artstyle. I'm glad to hear that the core team who made Child of Light has been kept around, I'd love to see a sequel or spiritual successor of the game made in future.
In fact, this article does remind me that I still need to go back and complete this game. Apparently I was right near the end when I stopped playing to focus on other things at the time. I suppose once I've finished using my Wii U to record gameplay footage for my channel, I can get back to completing Child of Light... and Hyrule Warriors.
I love this game. I wish more developers would work on smaller projects like this instead of the annual AAA titles. But they are companies and those titles probably bring in millions more then something small like Child of Light.
Loved Child of Light. A sequel would be superb please Ubi!
Oh and another 2D Rayman also please while you're at it!
decent game, but too short with almost no replay value. Kind of an into to rpgs more then anything. but I did enjoy it for 2 playthroughs. sadly it is probably not going to see a sequel...
I almost bought this, despite it being Ubisoft, until I realized the Wii U was missing the DLC. A shame, because it looks like a fun game.
This game was great. The soundtrack was one of the best I've heard in years.
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