Fallout: New Vegas Interview

Fallout: New Vegas’ PR showed a cavalcade of interesting imagery, from the return of classic super mutants to the brightly lit Strip. Curious to learn more about the aesthetic, we interviewed art director Joe Sanabria and lead concept artist Brian Menze about the artistic ideas and processes behind some of the novelties we’d seen.

Please keep in mind that this interview was sent in prior to the game’s release, so some of the questions may have lost some relevance. There’s still plenty to take in, though:

GB: Tell us a bit about your day-to-day responsibilities on Fallout: New Vegas and how they’ve evolved throughout the game’s development.  What other team members do you work with on a daily basis, and what processes are required to bring something from the concept stage to actually having it implemented in-game?

Brian: I’m the lead concept artist and only full-time concept artist on FNV. My responsibilities include providing a clear image for 3D artists to build game assets from, providing 2D in-game assets such as billboards, signs, logos, and posters as well as doing some icons and Vault Boys. My role hasn’t evolved much, but I do tend to be more involved in critiquing the character models more now than I did in the beginning. I work with nearly everyone in the art department and many of the designers. Depending on the item I’m conceptualizing, I deal mostly with the designer who’s made the request and the modeler who will eventually build it and of course my art lead, Joe. I talk a lot with the animators as well to be certain something I’m thinking about or something that was requested can be done and work with them to find solutions if the initial idea is too crazy.

Getting something into the game starts with an idea or a request from a designer, which is then given over to me, to create a visual representation of that idea for everyone to understand what it will look like and possibly how it may function. I draw up as much as I can, sometimes iterating with the designer or my art lead, until the image is approved by Joe. Once the concept is approved, it’s passed on to the modeler who is scheduled to build the thing. Implementation is handled differently depending on if the item is a character, creature or poster and there ends my involvement.

Joe: My day to day responsibilities are to direct the art staff and coordinate with other project leads to make sure the game looks good.  In the early stages I’m working on gathering reference images and sketching up ideas and concepts.

As the project evolves, I work with production and the leads to track the work and make sure we are meeting our project goals. During this time I’ll be busy working on concept pieces for the team. As the work comes to an end I’ll do more and more play-testing of the game and send out notes to the team.

GB: New Vegas seems to come across a bit brighter than Fallout 3, thanks to such elements as the lights on The Strip and the lighter color of the sky.  From an art design standpoint, why did you feel it was necessary to introduce some additional color to the post-nuclear world?

Brian: Some of us, myself included, have worked on previous Fallout titles and have always wanted to introduce a bit more color to the world of Fallout. As an artist, brown sometimes gets very challenging to use over and over again without getting really repetitive, so the artists were thankful that we had an opportunity to add some color to FNV. Though, we tried to keep those splashes of color where it looked natural, as we didn’t want to make Fallout into something else. Fallout has a very distinct look and we, of course, wanted to maintain that.

Joe: I work with the project director, associate producers, level designers, programmers and on occasion the sound designers on a daily bases.

To bring an idea from a concept to in-game, can range from simple to pretty complicated. A complex concept like say the Strip, will require a team to coordinate on a bunch of tasks, over a few months.

To keep it manageable we break up the work into a series of small goals. In the case with the Strip, at first we just focus on the scale of the structures and the layout, afterwards we then focus on getting the textures and materials dialed in, and then work on setting up the lights and adding AI and scripted events etc. During which we are making optimizations to the art and design to make sure it’s running without any issues.

Brian: The answer is found partially in the question. The concept of “not hit as hard” gave us a lot of freedom to lighten up on destruction without completely doing away with it. In other words, even Fallout’s most pristine areas still have a gritty aesthetic.

Joe: It was important to use color because it gives the game character and mood. It allows us to make areas more memorable. When used correctly color can enhance an experience and ultimately that’s why it was so important that we stay away from muddy colors.

GB: When I think 50’s world-of-the-future architecture, art deco and googie come to mind. We’ve seen both throughout the Fallout franchise, but titles like Fallout 1 and Fallout 3 had more art deco than they did googie. Am I right in thinking The Strip will feature primarily googie architecture? Is that Vegas heritage showing?

Brian: FNV does indeed have a Googie-style influence. We wanted to give the audience a real sense of Vegas and the time period, so we felt it was important to go that route and partially it’s what anyone would expect Vegas to be. We pulled (just a little) from the 60’s here and there as well, but Googie is what influenced us most.

Joe: The Art Deco movement started in the early 20’s, during a period when many of the eastern cities were prosperous and growing. As a result it really influenced the skylines and the design movement moved to other areas, vehicles, furniture and appliances. So in many ways it captures the optimistic 50’s period for which the Fallout franchise is known for, it nicely contrasts against the dystopian wasteland.

The west coast development really expanded during the automobile revolution and so not only was it a different time period, the nuclear age, but cities where now designed for folks traveling by car rather than by foot.

Since the real strip didn’t really get fully developed until the early 50’s, most of the hotels where designed in the Googie architecture style, a futuristic “Meet the Jetsons” type of architecture.  In older cities, buildings are the visual focal point and building signs are small in comparison and more aesthetic then functional in their purpose. On the strip, the sign is the focal point and in many cases is as big if not bigger than the building itself. With folks now moving at fast speeds it was important for casino operators to catch people’s attention well in advance to lure them in.

This is what we based all of our visual designs on for the hotels, so yes the heritage of Vegas is indeed reflected in the Strip of New Vegas.

GB: As far as item design goes, what overall philosophy have you employed to keep weapons from feeling out of place?  How about clothing and other mundane items strewn about the desert?

Brian: I don’t believe we ever had a problem with weapons feeling out of place. Inherently, we approached most weapons with the characteristics of the Fallout universe in mind. I remember we would occasionally find an arbitrary prop here and there that would seem too “modern”, but those would quickly get dealt with. Once you have a room filled with items influenced by a 1950’s era aesthetic, it’s easy to spot a chair, rug or trash can that doesn’t belong.

Clothes, for the most part, were handled by me and I would spend extra effort finding proper reference material to be absolutely certain the appropriate items of clothing were used. If a type of clothing were fictional, I’d reference materials and design elements used during forties and fifties. Still, with the sci-fi elements, we tried hard not to make them seem too modern and I often looked at home appliances, industrial machines and old pulp magazines of the fifties to pull ideas from. Any reference material I found was included with the concept for the modeler’s to use as well.

Joe: There are two approaches, for items based on real life objects for example, the ballistic weapons. We base those off reference from that period to make sure it’s accurate, then we think about its history, has it been locked up in a safe or did it get dropped down a cliff. Just about everything in the wasteland has a history and so we try to reflect that in the design.

Other times we try to tack on items to give it a more improvised look and reflect the dystopian reality of the wasteland. I’ll give you an example for an old shotgun; the gun stock is cracked from being dragged around the wasteland, it has been fixed with a clothes hanger wire and to replace the cushion on the butt, a sandal has been fastened to it and holding the grip onto the barrel is a screw clamp. This mix and max of odd parts, as well as the history, add the right ingredients to make it fit in a world where nothing is pristine.

For new weapon designs, in particular the power weapons, we incorporate some of the same elements that we see in other Vault-Tec items.  Even though minor, what we try to do is make it seem like the same folks that designed the Pip-Boy also designed the Reflectron and other items. The functional purpose of the item may be different but the aesthetics should be the same, knobs as opposed to sliders, monochromatic CRT displays etc.

GB: Fallout: New Vegas will feature a new selection of perks and bring back character traits. To accomodate these additions, have you created a lot of new Vault Boy poses?  If so, are there any examples you can tell us about?  Will any of the poses used for Fallout 1/2 traits be reused?

Joe: I think Brian can address this better than I.

Brian: I’ve done so many Vault Boys for FNV. I feel so lucky to be tied to such an iconic part of the Fallout universe. To answer your question though, there are many Vault Boys that re-use a pose, but for quite a few I did draw unique poses for or even added additional props and characters.

Brian: No, I’m afraid that little guy seems to have been retired.

GB: New Vegas has several different factions, and we’ve seen a very distinct style for at least one – Caesar’s Legion. Will other factions like the Khans, Chairmen, or Kings have similar recognizable styles? Is there any concern that enemies decked out to look like Romans or similarly unusual garbs might come across as a bit silly?

Brian: I hope they have recognizable styles, since I tried very hard to make sure they did when I conceptualized them :). I think in Fallout there’s a lot of tongue-in-cheek humor that allows for things to get silly, and I’m okay with that personally, though I don’t think they do.

Joe: We worked hard at making each faction distinct, not only with their garments but also with their residences, weapons and graffiti. Nothing is ever arbitrary. It’s all for a visual purpose and even little elements are made to reflect the group’s character.

I had no concerns with items coming off as silly. That would only happen if it were completely out of context, meaning there’s no real reason how or why the outfits where made and also don’t reflect the local surroundings.

In the case of Caesar’s Legion, rather than making straight up reproductions of centurion armor, we build it with a foundation of found objects, in this case American football equipment.  It makes sense they found a stockpile of football gear and decided to build their armor out of it and makes it fit in the world.

GB: From a visual perspective, Fallout 3’s super mutants were distinctly different from super mutants we encountered in Fallout 1 and 2.  New Vegas’ version is again closer to the ones from the BIS titles. Take us through the process of designing and recreating the Fallout: New Vegas super mutants.

Brian: Specifically, we re-tooled the texture a bit, re-worked the head and brought the mouth straps back. Our animation team has also did some work to make them behave more like the mutants in Fallout 1 and 2.

Joe: We wanted from a story standpoint to have some of the mutants from the previous Fallout titles, partly for nostalgia but more so to illustrate the migration of creatures and folks from the west. We focused on the important parts, which we thought was the head and shoulders, since that is the focal point during conversation and is when players are most focused on them.

With this in mind, Brian worked on the concept and the character artist then took over and worked on integrating it into the game.

GB: The nightkin were a relatively minor class with no real distinct look in Fallout 1/2. Could you take us through their design, and what criteria they had to meet in order to properly fit into New Vegas?

Joe: Brian focused on a new texture treatment for the skin as well as adorning them with found and improvised items to reflect their unstable mental state.  This mix and match of items found in the wasteland helps the Nightkin fit in the wasteland.

Brian: We started with the mutant but changed his skin tone to a grayish blue color. They’re meant to be stealthy guys so I gave them hoods, fewer hard surfaces and sharp objects either as ornamentation or as weapons. I used reds in their attire thinking that as they appear form stealth mode, a sudden splash of color would help with the initial scare.

Also, by using objects the Nightkin may find in their wandering about to dress them, they have a “found object” sense of style. Ultimately, they had to be scary, which I think they are.

Thanks guys!