a lot of this can be done using post-processing effects, shaders
displacement maps, offsetting color channels. I don't know about other languages but actionscript makes its so easy to use filters with bitmaps. I'm sure a coding buddy could get these in motion for ya.
Yeah me and programmer friend Henrik Flink are currently working on a game. I am sure he can figure things out if needed. He has a great sense for game design too so we make a pretty good team.
I will never be able to art this amazingly.
Yes you hell will! Everyone can learn anything. I wasn't born with any unique ability. I have just been working and exploring a lot. As long as you keep making stuff you will learn and gain from it. Just be passionate about what you do then things will eventially come to you.
Of course I consider myself very lucky to have been able to be in the right environment for learning things. And I have worked with so many different visual things so it kind of blends into everything, concept art, pixel stuff, mattepaintings, illustrations...
Though I spent almost 4 years at a movie company where pretty much every project we worked on got cancelled. So I have probably worked a lot more than the average artist and can't show almost anything from the past 4 years which for me became a good motivator for improving personal projects and starting a two man game company with a fellow friend.
Sorry for forcing my life on you, but hell man, you have every chance to make great things! Just start and keep on going! I'll give you feedback on stuff if you want!
Do you have an idea for a game around that art style?
Not yet really. Obviously these are set in a sidscrolling environment but I have no specific thoughts on what really could be a strong game design behind them. I wouldn't want to do a simple platformer. I myself am very drawn to unique game design or good interesting features. Just to make a reference, ICO, in a lot of aspects we had seen it before, the playable character and the castle and its elements where in essence kind of similar to Zelda OoT or any other puzzle action 3D game. But what added something to ICO was the female character which was a totally new element in those kind of games. So I would probably look for a design like that or something in the line of what J. Blow did with the mechanics of Braid.
Me and Henrik have some future ideas of sidescrolling games but if they will be anything like these mockups I do not know...
Developer
