Kitsune

For project number two of my second year at university, I opted to take the reigns. Our team of 8 formulated an idea for a 2D platformer game centred on a fox with access to a range of magical abilities.

Roles: Project Lead, Programming, Animation

In my role as project lead I worked closely with the lead artist and lead game designer to coordinate production. Once we had determined the core assets and mechanics needed for the demo version of the game, I set about creating a timetable so everyone would have their own tasks and associated deadlines.

Animations I created for the player-character (the fox) using the Spriter software. The sprite art was made by the talented Viktoria Horváth.

For the idle animation, I desired to evoke a sense of relaxed breathing, which would be visible to the player despite the fox being rendered extremely small onscreen. I researched walk/run cycles and closely studied reference videos of foxes in motion, in order to produce the running and walking animations. I took some creative liberties with the grooming behaviour, as it was something I wished to add to endear the fox to the player. With the licking animation occuring at random intervals whilst the fox is idling, it gives the character some semblance of agency.

Creating the animations for the enemy character proved to be a very different challenge compared to the fox. Part of this was due to the asymmetry of the character, with the sword hanging at the left hip demanding that it be shifted between multiple animation layers to retain continuity when the enemy turns to face the opposite direction (simply flipping a single animation would make the sword appear to switch hips). Adding to the confusion is the sword being drawn across the body, meaning it moves from the background to the foreground or vice versa. Utilising multiple sprites for the tail of the cloak proved an effective way to add dynamism to the running animation, though it is a little too noticeable in the idle animation.