The goal was to create a simple black-and-white world, so colour will not be used in this game. Real pictures are overlaid with a black-and-white filter to create the background, so the main character is designed to be as animated or unrealistic as possible, to distinguish them from the real world (background).
When the main character’s image appears on the background, use a white border to differentiate it from the background.
Dark colours are represented by using grey or solid black instead, and lighter parts are left white.
If the eyes are light in colour, they will be left white or colour in light grey.
If the eyes and hair are black, you can make hair parts dark grey to differentiate them.
Moodboard of Basic Tone and Style:
Black and white has always been my very favourite style of painting, only three colours and lines can construct a simple and clear world. At the same time black and white is an oppressive and aggressive colour as their contrast is very obvious, so in this work with a more depressive theme I chose to use black and white as the base colour palette to create a high contrast between the light coloured figure and the dark background to provide a sense of oppression to the audience.
Main Character: Heroine
Moodboard of Main Character Heroine:
The heroine is a Chinese female high school student who doesn’t have many emotional fluctuations or expressions other than a poker face, this is because she is not happy about her school life, so I referenced some similar Japanese anime characters.
For the hairstyle, I chose short hair because Chinese high schools only allow short hair or long hair tied up, and the classic characters in the references all have short hair, so I decided on short hair in the end, but it can also be explained based on the story that the heroine’s hair is cut short for school. And she would have a strand of hair sticking up on each side of her hair, and a prominent strand of hair on her bangs as her distinguishing mark.
The heroine will only be wearing a long-sleeved school uniform in the game, and the short-sleeved uniform will only appear on her student card ID photo.
For the most part, the heroine is expressionless but only smiles when she sees her kitten friend.
Main Character: The Calico Cat
Moodboard of Main Character The Calico Cat:
The two fancy cats at the bottom of this cat’s archetypal mood board are a kitten from my high school campus on the left and a cat I met near WSA on the right. But since they are both more complex in colours, I have simplified the colours a bit to make this cat stand out more, and the tail is a reference to the classic Chinese Li Hua cat pattern.
The reason it only has a nose and not a mouth is that only colour blocks would make it look cuter, while the mouth needs to be represented by lines, so I left that part out.
Background:
Moodboard of Background:
All of the backgrounds were taken when I first got my camera back in high school, some of the photos were originally taken using the camera’s black and white filter, while others I reworked to black and white.
The backgrounds are in the parametric style of old film cameras, and I have deliberately toned down the resolution and sharpness of most of the photographs, increased the noise, and turned up the contrast in order to blur the details of the photographs so that they more closely resemble the concept of liminal space.
Fonts Used in the Game:
Microsoft YaHei Light is the most commonly used font, as it is used in the UI on the main game page as well as in the dialogue.
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