The Last Faun, Concept & Character Design

The Last Faun, Concept & Character Design

The design behined The Last Faun was centered around an NPC companion. We wanted to make a game where players would cooperate with an AI character towards a mutal goal and use that as a device for story telling.

My first prototype was an NPC that would follow the player and could respond to basic commands. The player being able to order a companion to perform actions and tasks, became the central mechanic for the game and what we built our puzzle and level design around.

The game, "Two Brothers" from Starbreeze, was a hugh inspiration and lead directly to the games main mechanic.

Character & Narrative Design

We only needed two characters in the game, the player and companion, so wanted to encourage the narrative in a way that supported this techanical restraint.

The rough story we settled on was a fairtale like set up, which read something like:

"A lost child in the woods accidentally wanders into an enchanted forrest. Finding a trapped creature whom the child rescues, the two set off on an epic adventure to escape."

The design for the player was a simple enough human child; but we needed a more complex concept for the supporting companion character.

I decided a humanoid character would still be preferable, making it much easier to animate technically. This was the prinicple reason we settled on a Faun character, which seemed unique as a video game character but still manageble for us to achieve. 

What follows is a series of concept drawings, developing the characters of the Kid and the Faun aswell as the narrative and back story.

Bonus Round

This game was made years ago by a 3 man team consisting of a very talented Programmer, Artist and Designer. This was the only project the team collaborated on, but was a great achievement for the young developers. 

In the chronology of my personal betterment as a game designer, artist and coder, this game was the catalyst that started me down the path.

I am eternally greatful to everyone involved, working with them was a privallage. 

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Thanks for checking out the concept art and if you made it this far, let me know your thoughts!