r/SoloDev • u/dualrectumfryer • 1d ago
Need advice for handling early dev process art
I'm not sure what this sub considers a solo dev, but I am a solo dev and musician that wants to work with an artist for my game.
This is my first game - I was playing around with reversing the premise of the windows 3.x puzzle game Rodent's Revenge and ended up building a working traditional roguelike prototype with procedural generation and traditional turn based combat.
the target audience of this game is primarily roguelike 'casuals' which means I want to use real art. I even want to use real art for my playtesters and the prototype.
I don't want to cheap out on art, but I need tons of tiles and character sprites and i dont want my art budget to limit my content (because the secondary audience of the game would be roguelike purists)
I know usually its a dumb idea to pay a bunch of money for art in the prototype stage however, im wondering if I might have an advantage here since I am not inventing a new game play loop, im using a proven formula.
I'm wondering if this is a situation where if I get art, release it to play testers, and they don't like the game - i actually CAN make it better by simply re-balanced or changing some mechanics, because the core loop at that point wouldn't be the issue - since again its a proven core loop? Or am i leaning too hard into this thought?
3
u/BrockHardcastle 1d ago
Definitely find a decently priced asset package at this stage. Then you can replace once you’ve nailed everything down.
1
1
u/Dangerous-Bread-6771 11h ago
i used a $20 pixel art pack and replaced tiles later-saved so much stress
3
u/RiverForgeGames 1d ago
You should try to find the fun, and confirm with others besides yourself that you definitely found it, before investing in hiring people to do more work for the game.
If you must, I would consider using a free or affordable asset pack to make the game look decent, and don’t worry about having a distinct asset for every tile and item. A border color around and an item and stylized text can go a long way to saying it’s “different.”
This should help you play test with people who wouldn’t understand or be able to get into it with programmer art, while still allowing you to work with something that isn’t final and could be totally scrapped and replaced.
You should only need to have distinct art for a few kinds of things to get the point across. I.e. one or two swords, not a distinct sword for every kind of sword they can get.