“We drew a lot of inspiration from other artists and art history. What we are doing is something similar to an artist’s interpretation of something else. To change the meaning and make it our own.”
Poster for Modern Vampires of the City by Vampire Weekend, designed by Rostam Batmanglij.
“This is a record that I have at home. I wasn’t looking at this while making it, but it was in the back of my mind. These are things we all carry with us.”
Poster for Saint-Raphael La cote d’azur by Tom Morel De Tanguy.
“Sometimes we carry these things from a holiday, like when I visited in Pompeii a couple of years ago.”
Kim Chi “This level was inspired by Kim Chi from RuPaul’s Drag Race.”
London’s National Theatre, designed by Denys Lasdun.
“We drew a lot of inspiration from other artists and art history, like Bauhaus posters and Brutalist architecture.”
Video for Nicki Minaj’s “Super Bass”, directed by Sanaa Hamri.
“One of the other artists in the team (Lauren Cason) really likes Nicki Minaj music videos.”
Concept art for Walt Disney’s Peter Pan, by Mary Blair.
“This illustration by Mary Blair for Disney’s Peter Pan is one of Lauren’s favourite pieces of art and a huge inspiration throughout her career.”
Liquorice allsorts.
“This level was inspired by the colour palettes of candy.”
“We wanted everyone in the team to be immersed in the art style of the game. So we printed out loads of reference pictures and we used these foam boards with inspiration for the levels that we could carry around with us when we hot desk. We also printed out every single level. We started doing this with Monument Valley 1. This gave us a really good understanding of the overall shape of the game.”
Non-Boring Environments that need Fantasy Representation
Tropical Rainforests
Scrubland/Dry Forests. For extra effect make them the sort that burn very often; some native plants never germinate until after a fire, and some animals not only rely on fire to smoke out prey, but may even start them themselves.
Savannas/Tropical Grasslands
Temperate Rainforests. I almost didn’t include this bc New Zealand is covered in them, and that’s where they filmed Lord of the Rings. But tbh, no one really knows about them, so it belongs here
Taiga Forests
Barren Tundra, perfect for some extreme seasonal dichotomy
Polar Ice Sheets
Desert-Grasslands (arguably the same as Scrubland but Australia’s good at adding its own twists)
Barren Desert
If you like Cacti, look at American Deserts like the Sonoran
Salt Flats
Soda Lakes and Alkaline Lakes
Madagascar’s Karst Limestone Formations
Madagascar’s Spiny Forests
Madagascar’s Baobab Forests
Madagascar’s Subhumid Forests (Madagascar is cool as hell ok)
Danxia Landforms
Badlands/Mountainous Deserts
Steppes and Highland Prairies
Flood Basalts
Newly-Formed Islands, still rife with Volcanic activity
Now for Underwater Environments, sure Coral Reefs are cool.
But there are SO MANY other kinds of environments for aquatic settings, it’s unbelievable:
Seaside Cliffs
Archipelagos. Not just Tropical Island chains like Polynesia (Moana anyone?) but also Coldwater Archipelagos like the Aleutians.
Tidal Flats
Bayous/Cypress Swamps
Tropical River Basins, AKA Seasonally Flooded Rainforests
Mangrove Swamps/Deltas/Beaches
Kelp Forests
The Open Ocean
Coastal Seabeds
Rocky Beaches with Tidepools
And there are a LOT more I could name but this post is already obscenely long as is, if you’d like to toss in your own go right ahead, but my point is if you limit yourself to European Deciduous Forests you’re a wimp.
Inspiration Haven 