From the conception of Wylde Flowers, our team set out with the goal of creating a bright and friendly world for the player to get cozy in. We also wanted to design cute and expressive characters that would bring the heartfelt narrative we were crafting to life.
These ideas were brought to form by Wylde Flowers’ sole concept artist, Iona Vorster, who had the monumental task of artistically shaping the world, its characters, and more.
I had the pleasure of chatting with Iona about the design process for Wylde Flowers, her own creative process and challenges she faced when designing. Enjoy! ✨
Audrey: Can you tell me a little bit about the process for just starting out with the designs and style direction for Wylde Flowers? What were some of the beginning conversations like?
Iona: When I started designing the characters, we already had the style of the environment being established, and some areas were starting to be fleshed out (like the farm and the town.) So first of all, any characters we created had to fit into this existing world, which definitely helps narrow down the options! Initially, I explored a more realistic style, but in the end we decided that wasn’t the right feel for Wylde Flowers. We also wanted to have the characters be really animated, especially in their facial expressions. Based on this I explored a whole bunch of directions simultaneously, experimenting with proportions, level of stylisation and exaggeration, etc. The style we settled on was chosen because it felt the most unique and fun, fit into the environment design well while still allowing for the characters to be easily read on screen at a distance and up close, and also allowed us to create our huge variety of unique character types!
Audrey: If you had to pick one, what would you say was your favourite concept to design?
Iona: This is so hard to answer! Over the course of almost 3 years of development I’ve designed
characters, environments, plants, animals and even VFX so picking just one out of all that is a challenge. While I’m proud of Tara’s design, I really had a lot of fun designing Ravenwood Hollow so that might have to be my pick. Although, I’m probably legally obligated to say the cat!
Audrey: What did you find the most challenging to design?
Iona: There was honestly a lot that I found challenging, but a really rewarding and exciting challenge! Being the sole concept artist on a project means there’s a lot you have to figure out on your own, but it’s also an absolutely amazing growth opportunity and I grew so much over the development of the project. But I think the most challenging was designing the look of the magic VFX. I had never designed VFX before, there were a lot of spells that needed unique designs and it all had to fit into the game’s style so that was a complex challenge to crack. Magic is a huge part of the game, so in a way, it was like designing the look of the characters all over again!
Big thanks to Iona for answering my questions, providing so much insight into her creative process and giving us a detailed look at the art of Wylde Flowers!
Wylde Flowers is available now!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1896700/Wylde_Flowers/?gclid=CjwKCAjwkaSaBhA4EiwALBgQaD67wcL892HRXkMtVLzmSyUV_ysGfN7eJW0lImqN0ckg_mED39YwIhoCAYEQAvD_BwE
✨Audrey
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