I've been drawing a series of images for a slideshow/comic to make the loading screen of my current project more interesting,

See borderlands 1 for an excellent example on how to make a game with the minimum amount of artist work time.

Wait.. What..
Borderlands style graphics might be easier because all artists can draw and sketch, which is why it comes natural with the cartoony, sketchy, rough style. But it's not like they just jotted some stuff down and said done. It's still a style which relies heavily on artistic talent and ability to express yourself. Even more so than realistic art, since you need to know where to put emphasis, what to exaggerate, etc. And not to mention using colors in a way that you wouldn't see in real life.

You can't just take a picture of a rusty pipe texture and place in the game, like you can with games using the realistic approach.
I'd even go as far as saying that realistic graphics are much easier, since you're just copying things that exist. Which means a lot of the textures can be actual photographs that have been photoshoped.

Borderlands 1 is far from minimal artist time, Minecraft is a much better example.

I wasn't just talking about the textures, but I still believe they would be much quicker to produce than photo-realistic ones (it's not as simple as just taking a photo)
There are heaps more techniques used in borderlands 1 to skip work;
-all the characters wears masks to avoid having to make faces or facial animation for all the extensive dialog
-much of the dialog isn't voice acted and is only presented in text
-enemies models are re-used again and again just being scaled up and/or color tinted
-enemy AI is re-used
-the world is a dessert, mostly
I'm not attacking the borderlands team or anything, I think if a developer is looking to make a game that feels big with minimal man power or budget, it's a great example on how to achieve that.

Hmm, I have an iPad new with iOS6 and no jail break. I would like to beta test, but is it possible with my setup?

Yeah, to clarify, using test flight means you don't need a jailbroken phone, it is a legit distribution technique.
But with testflight you don't instantly get access to a build, once you register your iphone/ipad there I have to then manually add that device to the list of devices that the NEXT build will work on, and then upload that new build. So it can take a bit of time, but testflight does send our emails automatically to tell you when a build has been made available to you to play.

unfortunately tho, testflight hasn't been working for iOS6, because the engine this game is running on hasn't been updated since iOS was released, hopefully that will be fixed soon, either way, you should get a test flight email

My approach to coming up with game designs used to be like so;
mix and mash enough game mechanics together until you have something that could be enjoyable to do, then try it out.

But more recently my process goes along these lines;
-think of an experience (eg. the feeling of gaining freedom)
-then beak that experience down into common pieces, so, things that usually accompany the experience, (eg. to feel like the player has gained freedom they need to overcome restricting bonds, they also need to initially feel trapped and uncomfortable and then be given a rewarding and powerful feeling)
-then I think of game-stuff that can achieve those elements (eg. to feel trapped the player could start the game without the ability to run or jump or attack)
-then the very LAST thing i think about is the platform / genre / mechanics based on what I think would give people the experience best.
(do you wan't full realistic immersion? probably should be an FPS, do you want a fun arcade vibe? then maybe something more retro styled etc.)

EDIT: at this point you should be thinking "what will require the most (art) work? how can I use a style or technique to cut down on the total work required?"
See borderlands 1 for an excellent example on how to make a game with the minimum amount of artist work time.


Anyway, that's a very rough and quick explanation of how I try to think,
Hope that helps
 

the command for attacking is extremely difficult to do, i think if you wan't people to enjoy this game you really need to work on making the rules and controls a lot clearer, but keep it up because I like these 2 player turn based type games

Was the video on indiedb meant to have sound? I couldn't hear any when I tried watching it.

Maybe people could offer feedback as to why they aren't interested in trying this game?

I've been ytrying to play this on my ipod4 but the game always crashes as it goes to load the level, the game opens fine, the menus work but after i choos a ship and go to actualy play itcrashrs every time

Hey, I'd be happy to test on android when you move to that, I have a samsung galaxy S2, I'll private message you my testflight email too.

Ok, I've just confirmed that Testflight is now working (as long as you don't have iOS6)

Click the link to add yourself as a beta tester and I'll be able to send out builds to you from then.

http://tflig.ht/VbAeUk

Looks really neat,

Only thing I could suggest improving would be the textures/colors, they don't go too well together.

You have very saturated colors from almost all over the spectrum, deep blue dog, bright green grass, orange sand and interface, try to unify them a bit, tweak the values too.

Hey tigs,
I'm wanting some people to try out my latest iOS game and let me know what they think of the controls, user interface, difficulty etc.



If you have a jailbroken iPhone I can send you the IPA file and that should install no worries.

I'll try get the game set up on test flight soon, but that's currently having issues



So if you want to test out the game send me a PM or reply here so i can send you the installer,
Thanks!
-Jackson

chooz, left or right,


this is for my upcoming game 'Stampede!'
link; http://www.indiedb.com/games/stampede

Another option would be to hire a great artist so he makes not fanart, but the cover of the game (a promotional image). Everybody will know that it has been paid and he will be able to put it on his/her deviantART page as a commission with the link to the game.

This is more what I was intending, I don't want to secretly pay artists to make fan art, That seems a bit underhanded and I can kinda understand why that might be illegal in some countries.

Personally, I would estimate taking about 5 - 6 hours to produce a decent piece of promotional art and would like to be paid around 30 bucks an hour, So I would ask for something like $150, But I have no idea if that lines up with what other people have been paid before

AlexHW you sounded like you've done commissions before, what is your rate?

A while ago I had an idea for promoting my game,
Commission some artist of deviantArt etc. (who have a good number followers) to do 'fan-art' for my game, which would hence be marketing the game to the followers of that artist as well as giving me more material to use in putting together promotional images/posters/whatever

But I don't know how much money would be reasonable to pay an artist to produce a single quality piece of fan-art

If anyone here has paid for artwork (or has been paid to make artwork) I would love to hear your stories!

music for getting angry and fighting to,
http://soundcloud.com/onethousandorcas/fight-me

I am making cathedrals and not re-sizing embedded images

I spent months just polishing and doing 'final' touches to Little Dragon 3D before I thought it was ready for release,

after releasing it, the game got a few sales, but not even close to enough to what would be needed to justify spending months of my time and effort on it

Now I'm stuck in the dilemma; should I sink more time into polishing it? will it then pick up more sales and be worth it? or will I just be adding to the already massive amount if time I've spent that hasn't paid off?

I'm not sure it's ever possible to know the answer, so I'm going to continue polishing away regardless

This is some serious plagiarism right here

I dig the visuals, nice shading and lighting all round, the whole game is very neat and professional looking.
Only thing I didn't really like was the way the steering slowly ramps up in intensity the longer you hold the button, since when you first press the button it's having almost zero impact on your direction, it makes the handling feel delayed/unresponsive

Also I'm not a fan of moombahton so I didn't really dig the music, but that's just a personal tastes thing