Marina Ayano Kittaka

@even-kei

Angeline Era out NOW!! Stream Vhoebe - Amothers Lov EP! Blog with Zonelets! Anodyne, Even the Ocean, Sephonie dev w/ @hantani

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Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· 18d

An exciting activity is listening to the Angeline Era OST while reading the extensive notes docs.google.com/document/d/1...

1-3 FERAL MARINE LIFE: VS. VERY ALMOST NEARLY SIXTY-FOUR FISH
2023/07 (Sketch), 2023/02 (Final)
Fish Boss Fight
The fish song used to be the song used in the fights against the Duelists, but as time went on it didn't feel chaotic enough for the fish fight. Instead I turned to a draft that was being used for the Bugdog Mass (which is why there are some dog sounds), and finished that up for the fish as the song was too goofy for the Bugdog Mass which is a creepier kinda boss. There's a really obscure vocal sound sampled here for some of the weirder SFX, like a surprised anime-esque "eh??" Overall I wanted this song to be kind of weird/intense/goofy as a good first impression for the game, lol.
Refs: I didn't use much reference for this song, but the kicks in the 2nd half definitely remind me of some gabber stuff.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jun 30

namesearching

screenshot of a post: "Welcoming Dr. Angeline Beltsos: A New Era in Fertility Care at Brown Fertility"

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jun 17

I love anime

1996 Windows Pinball game Angel Egg designed and developed by Littlewing. Decorated with colorful angels and swirling clouds.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jun 5

Rigify
Introduction

Rigify helps automate the creation of character rigs. It is based around a building-block approach, where you build complete rigs out of smaller rig parts (e.g. arms, legs, spines, fingers…). The rig parts are currently few in number, but as more rig parts are added to Rigify it should become more and more capable of rigging a large variety of characters and creatures.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jun 3

can't stop thinking about this message I recieved. much to consider

grindr message "U like girls but you here gaying"

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Apr 24

These skeletons or écorchés stupefy because they act like living creatures.

Screenshot of low-poly skeletons wielding swords in a dark cavern, captioned: "These skeletons or écorchés stupefy because they act like living creatures." - Roger Caillois, Au coeur du fantastique (At the Heart of the Fantastic)

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Apr 10

is rock made of everything

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Mar 6

Fence is like a trolley that moves along a track independently of player. Despite not being the coder, I've prototyped for a few of our games. My prototypes tend to be drastically different from final game, but containing kernels of ideas that are useful in conversation and planning! :P

basic 2D game room with a fence sprite moving between points 0 and 1. a small green character stands on the ground. Using free Kenney assets.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Feb 5

Shareware game Mega Peril Snake (1996) by Digital Sheep/Beau Chesluk (a programmer on Perfect Dark (2000)). Features distinctive burp/belch sound effects when eating the animated abstract shapes, and a child's voice saying "have a good day!" when you exit. On "Galaxy of Games: Arcade Action" CD

Pre-rendered 3D title screen of a snake approaching a wireframe cube

A warped photo of a cat's face overlaid with a hypnotic swirl. Oval shaped walls preventing wraparound. Level name: circle of life

A series of cyan pillars filled with wiggly snake sprites. Level name: Temple of Nepal

a level shaped like a cell splitting. The background is a mashup of a photo of berries and a fish illustration.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jan 29

and exactly this is happening now. The majority of @klobuchar.senate.gov's "demands" are vaguely asking DHS to stop violating already existing rights without applying any leverage to make them do so. One of the only concrete suggestions is body cams. So "reform" = give them money and power

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jan 29

Paper details how police pushed for body cams so that they could protect themselves and control narrative while policing and surveilling more aggressively. Dems allied w cops to create narrative that this was somehow a corrective for state violence, now every time they kill they get more $$/power

One of the defining principles of Obama-era “criminal justice reforms” in the eyes of the
people implementing them was that the administration’s new policies should increase the size and
power of the punishment bureaucracy by giving it more resources. A theme uniting the work of
most of these reformers was this: with more resources, the punishment bureaucracy could make
itself better.150
In the hands of astute politicians and police leaders, body cameras became an easy sell to
a public desperate to believe that something was being done. Democratic party political leaders
crafted an appealing narrative: body cameras were what they called a “win-win.”151 The cameras
provided the public with “accountability” and “transparency,” and police= wanted them because
they were “good cops” who had “nothing to hide.”152 The mantra of the Obama administration was
that everyone agreed that body cameras were the solution. When making his public pitch for body
cameras in the news media, Eric Holder explained that “people on both sides want the same
things.”153
Over the last several years, as police killed more people in 2021 than they had killed in
2020, and as police killed even more people in 2022 than they had in 2021, and as police killed
even more people in 2023 than in 2022,154 the Democratic Party doubled down on body cameras
at critical moments of public scrutiny. Following the Obama administration playbook, Democratic
politicians worked closely with police leaders to bolster the narrative that body cameras were a
necessary solution to police violence. The increase in killings simply meant that we hadn’t yet
spent enough money on body camera contracts. Each new act of police violence became further
evidence of the need for “accountability” through video surveillance. Each uncovered police lie
became further evidence of the need for “transparency” through video surveillance. All of it was
used to further the urgency with which to secure prodigious sums of money...

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Jan 23

This is fucked up lmao. Come on.

Minneapols -20 degrees F. Feels like -41

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 30

miner from angeline era mine level saying "they hate mining!"

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 30

reading our reviews 😈

happy and sad guy on a bus meme, but it is labeled "Angeline Era mine level" and both sides of the bus are surrounded by rock.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 19

On the flip side, my cover for Angeline Era OST Volume 1! Melos' soundtrack was too powerful for a single album art...

A big diorama representing various characters and scenes from Angeline Era full of bright colors and patterns. Crann presents a freshly forged sickle to Caitlin, and Kilai gives a glowing green geode to Ronit. In the center, Arkas spreads his hands over a Tets kneeling in prayer.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 17

Love to see Of Floating Isles by Kawika Guillermo featured at my local bookstore! Melos and I had the pleasure of blurbing:

Of Floating Isles on a bookshelf. The cover features a blue sky filled with different colored sky islands.

Of Floating Isles is an invigorating work of gaming memoir and history that reveals how our virtual experiences are inextricably linked with our off-screen lives. Through their own story, Guillermo convincingly demonstrates that the time spent in games is as real as anything else—that games construct monuments within our memory, engraved with hidden facets of ourselves. Of Floating Isles is a testament not just to the power of video games as art, but to the kaleidoscopic meanings that can result from recognizing games as an active element within our lives.
-Marina Kittaka and Melos Han-Tani, game designers of Sephonie and Anodyne 2: Return to Dust

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 13

It's true they really are made of broccoli!! (old dev post)

Caption reads: "In order to create a beautiful sense of scale, video game artists rely on a technique known as broccoli"
Screenshot of Angeline Era overworld map featuring small trees. a photo of broccoli that was used to create the tree texture is overlaid.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 11

My humble birthday girl requests: play Angeline Era, tell a friend, blog about it, or write a review!! In addition to art, did you know I was story lead? Angeline Era embodies so much of what I've chased over the past few years, from wildflowers to parties to Apocrypha to ancestry.

A scene from Angeline Era with angels milling about ruins of buildings. One angel is saying to the player "OH! Wow... oh wow... that's splendid. Thanks for doing that!"

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 10

It seems people want to ponder orbs—I mean learn about Matcaps! They're great for gesturing at complex lighting and reflections within a stylized art style. And as a bonus, no UV unwrapping! ^.^

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 9

Thanks Ana, this was a great convo! Funny looking back on this part hehe... 😈

Whenever we implement a feature that we think goes against the grain a little bit, or is not what is necessarily expected from mainstream games, you have to like dom the player a little bit and say “You’re gonna like this.” And I think that’s a really valuable thing. People like being dommed, because it’s consensual, you know? It’s what you’re engaging with—it’s not like me making a game that controls your life. So I’m trying to lean into that energy

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 9

Good morning Bumpslashers! Thanks for a great Angeline Era launch day feeling very grateful!! ^.^ Hope you all are enjoying the game!!

A fisheye distorted helpful bugdog from Angeline Era yelling, "Tets!! Tets, you must Honor Fae Princess Niamh! The “mh” has a “v”-ish sound. It’s like “NEE-IV” or “NEEV”! Tets!"

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 9

Basically it takes a 2d texture (which generally looks like some kind of shiny orb) and maps it onto a model based on the *normals* rather than a UV unwrap! So its a super simple way to kind of "bake" a more complex looking material down to something functionally simple

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 8

Angeline Era is out NOW!!! ^.^ here's a breakdown of some elements and techniques I used to create the HUGE visual world of Era. Ultra-dense action and secrets meant a bigger focus than ever on visual clarity and communication! ⚔️🔍 See it in action!! store.steampowered.com/app/2393920/...

Cube-based environment art (along with melos’s “auto-cuber” tool) allows for the efficiency and complex secrets-hinting of 2D tilesets combined with the benefits of 3D lighting and atmosphere.

Large “EnviroChunks” with flexible triplanar materials quickly establish setting in the background of scenes.

Gestural vertex colors quickly and beautifully define characters that pop against the environment and look good small or large onscreen.

iNaturalist.org can be an amazing resource for game artists, featuring species id and many public domain community photos of life on Earth!

Matcap materials are good for creating shiny or translucent objects while maintaining a simplified/stylized look.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 8

Hehehe I agree! Struggling to find the credit atm but it's based on a drawing that a friend of his made!

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Dec 8

melos... gonna get you....!!!!! (angeline era achievement icon)

a little low poly melos han tani surrounded by ominous pulsing red glow

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Nov 6

There's a powerful feeling when coming across a melancholy town in Angeline Era. The sunlight and song washes over you... I'm excited to share it with you very soon! Please wishlist: store.steampowered.com/app/2393920/...

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Nov 5

I'm particularly proud of the old sailor who has a lot of personality packed into very minimal geometry!

Blender view of the old man's face, which is not much more complex than a cube with a few loop cuts

A close up of the man's face rendered in-engine giving a crotchety frown.

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Nov 5

I think of Angeline Era's character art as "gestural" vertex colors: big blocks of gradients and hard edges that loosely gesture at finer details. They are often seen very small on the screen, so it helps them not appear over-detailed. But I also think it looks beautiful up close!

3 NPCs, a snazzy dressed woman, a grumpy old sailor, and a dapper bearded man. They are rendered in a chunky low poly style with a mix of flat vertex colors and simple textures

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Nov 4

Long ago I probably would've tried to make these sigils super clean vector files with logical angles, and it would have taken forever and looked bad. Instead I just sketched them out at low-res then used photoshop "refine edge" to upscale. It adds a subtle organic ink-bleed quality, which suits them

Low-res and pixelated 4 circular seals showing rainy mountain, happy face over farm fields, mystery structure, and woods

HD version of 4 simple illustrated circular seals

Marina Ayano Kittaka@even-kei· Nov 3

Decided to make a little seal for each overworld zone in my game Angeline Era! I hope you feel intrigued to explore...