Welcome curious game fan.  Welcome to the Denki Gallery.  Wherein we show you some of the images and artwork created by our visual experts during the development of our latest and Denkiest games.  In this instalment, art guru Stewart Graham explains some of the ideas behind the playscapes within Quarrel and shows a number of levels which didn’t make it in…

In case you’ve not been paying attention, Denki’s not the sort of company that just throws things together and sort of hopes for the best.  Everything the company does – from each individual component of a game, through to err, this blog post – is judged against the Denki Difference.

What is the Denki Difference?  It’s pretty simple – we judge everything against key measurements such as FEEL, DRAMA, CONVENIENCE, TWIST and LIFE.  They all have to be satisfied, if something is going to make it into a Denki game.

We also use  a set of ‘guiding lights’ for each project – a constellation of considerations to help us stay true to our destination.  In the case of Quarrel, one important one was “Worlds Worth Winning”.

So, generic, near identical levels were not going to work.  They had to be ‘real’ and distinctive.  Each level had to have a bit of a twist in there, but had to be accessible and convenient at the same time.  They had to feel desirable, not cheap and plastic.  They also had to encourage fiddling and exploration – making it feel like players had somewhere worth exploring.

Simple!

So Stewart went off to think about these issues and come up with some concepts for playscapes…

Stewart: We considered some very silly things when thinking about the landscapes and islands in Quarrel, including this delicious looking cake.  It was definitely ‘fun’, but ultimately failed to fit into the theme. We wanted locations that were desirable, but also solid and permanent looking.

Stewart: Sadly, one thing that didn’t quite make it into the final game were some large, impressive waterfalls. Every level had to have a feature, preferably a feature with some life, and a waterfall seemed to fit the bill perfectly.  We were very keen to include a level suspended in the clouds, placed on a huge cliff.  However, the cliff just got in the way of the camera.  As development progressed, it became far more important that we could place the camera anywhere within the level.  So big impressive backgrounds were forced out.

Stewart: On the pilot version of Quarrel, we had eyes on some of bigger hills.  They’d follow the game with interest and make the scenery more of a participant.  It was something fun and a bit silly, but again, it didn’t quite make the final cut.

So there you go – the hills did have eyes.  Briefly.  The cake was not a lie – and not all waterfalls are photogenic.   Don’t tell us, ladies and gentlemen, that we’re not putting some top quality thought into our Quarrel playscapes…

- Brian (@flackboy)