The Manifesto
The Manifesto is an interactive experience I made for one of my college classes in 2021. The assignment was to write an artist manifesto explaining my inspirations, the career I want to have, and why I make art. I decided to go above and beyond and turn this assignment into a game.
Ideation
I started off brainstorming the contents of my artist manifesto: the genres and mediums that I like, what I’m trying to express through my work, and my career goals as an artist. As I structured the game to fit into this assignment, I knew it couldn’t be a playable game because of time limitations, so I decided to make it an interactive experience, meaning that there are no directions given and there’s no goal to be accomplished. It’s like a virtual interactive museum.
I made sketches to figure out the camera angle, mechanics, and environment. I actually used a potion game I played as a kid (ever heard of Avatar Star Sue?) as inspiration for the gameplay: You explore the environment, picking up objects and dropping them into a cauldron to create a potion. The objects are my inspirations and the final potion represents them all coming together to create me, the artist.
Once I ironed out the idea and mechanics, I started coding a prototype in Unity. I learned how to click and drag 3D objects, change the lighting depending on the player’s location, and have the material color change when a specific object is dropped through it. It also took a bit of time getting the 3rd person camera and player movement working, but I eventually figured it out.
Prototype
While coding the game, I got started on modeling the environment and props in Maya. It was important to keep things small and simple due to the time constraint of the assignment. I designed the two floors of the house to represent my contrasting sensibilities. I love children’s media that’s very bright and colorful, fun and silly, but I also love adult media with violence, sex, and depressing storylines. I see it as being a well-rounded artist; I have an appreciation for most genres and mediums.
Modeling
Playthrough
I definitely put in a lot more effort than I needed to with this project (my instructor was just asking for a short presentation), but it ended up being a great learning experience in coding, scope, and time management, and it makes for a neat portfolio piece.
