Lemma Soft Forums

Do you know any visual novels that use photos of physical sculptures (clay, plasticine, recycled materials etc...) or stuff like dollhouse furniture as character/background art? It's something I'd like to try because I'm much better at sculpting than drawing or 3d modeling with a computer. Images from games are appreciated ☺

Photos are used in place of drawn backgrounds in some visual novels with some photo shop filtering, but I can't recall or think of a VN that uses physical 3D models since it's not a cost effective way to produce art assets for a strictly digital medium.

Check out The Dream Machine on steam. It has what appears to be clay animation, though I'm not sure if it's just digitally rendered as to look like that. But regardless, it's a viable platform I think! Just probably way more work.




http://store.steampowered.com/app/94300 ... pter_1__2/

There are a few narrative indie games that use claymation. I can think of Beeswing and Sluggish Morss off the top of my head. It's not a filter -- those are actually sculpted from clay and then photographed. (Some special effects are added in after.) A VN with static images would probably even be easier than making fully animated models like those games do. Here's a screenshot:

Baru and the Spirit Prince uses that art style for its characters:

House of Dolls here on lemma uses pictures of physical things and places for the game too :].

OP, this might not be exactly what you're looking for, but there was a shift a little while ago from using super sleek, high polish graphics to creating art assets for video games that were a little rougher - and mimicked textures from real life, such as paper and other textures that are fun to touch and look at.

A few examples that come to mind are Kirby's Epic Yarn, Lumino City, and The Paper Fox.



Of course, Kirby's epic yarn and the paper fox have art and graphics that are made using mainly computers and digital software, but I believe parts of Lumino City were hand built by the creators.

Unfortunately I cannot think of any visual novels that use the technique you are describing, but that doesn't mean that it shouldn't be done! I personally would love to play a visual novel like that. I think that it would be challenging to create, but the result would be different and unique from other visual novels and interactive story games currently out there.

Those screenshots are so beautiful, Sasquatchii!

The Dream Machine is an adventure game that uses sculptures.

Thanks for the examples and information. I honestly didn't even think about the cost. I guess it's fine, because I have lots of unused craft materials lying around.