He made his first game on a ZX81 when he was just 12 and has 30 years’ experience working in the games industry across pretty much every field of art and design you can think of. Now, having enjoyed success with brutal 2D adventure Slain: Back From Hell, Andrew Gilmour is the creative driving force behind Valfaris, and one-half of developer Steel Mantis (we spoke to fellow Steel Mantis dev Thomas Jenns in a previous post).
We fired Andrew a few questions about Slain, Valfaris, his incredible art skills, and gaming in general:
Question: 1. Slain: Back From Hell was Gothic lands and swords. Valfaris is space-scapes and guns. On the surface, the differences are obvious, but how are the two games similar? In terms of story or lore, is there anything that ties the two games together?
Andrew: Slain and Valfaris are set in the same universe. During Therion’s travels through Valfaris he will encounter some familiar friends. Not to give too much away though! But, yes, the stories are intertwined.
2. Did you always want your follow-up game to Slain: Back From Hell to be set in space?
Yes! I knew exactly what was coming next even before the end of Slain. In fact, during the development of Slain, I did an April Fool’s tweet about changing Slain to more of a sci-fi vibe and posted an image (see above) – which turned out to be Valfaris! Slain: Back From Hell is also set in space, just on a different planet.
3. Slain: Back From Hell and Valfaris are both shaped in a 16-bit styled, old-school gaming 2D mould. What is it about this style of game that appeals to you?
Well, I grew up playing these types of game. Slain was my attempt at making a Ghost ‘n Goblins type game, and Valfaris is more inspired by Gryzor/Contra and Turrican type games.
I like doing side-on 2D as it’s more like you’re playing through a series of pictures, so you’re able to frame what the player is seeing, as opposed to the freedom of a FPS or TPS where you have to take into account everywhere a player can look.
4. Can you offer some insight into your approach to game development? Do you stick to a certain way of working? Do you have a game fully planned out before you start, or do you begin with more of a general idea and see where it ends up?
I like to get the start and the end fleshed out, so we know where we’re going. Then I get the world that we’ll be building visualized, so we know what we’re moving through. Here’s an example of the first concept layout for Valfaris before we started the game:
The great thing about Steel Mantis’ game-dev style is that it’s very organic, so we can drop, cut, add and move stuff around as much as we need, and since we both wear many hats, we can do it quickly. As there are just two of us, we can be very versatile and able to change course as needed.
5. Where did you learn to pixel art so good!?! Again, can you share any insight into your methods – are there any particular tools or techniques you use to create such a unique, distinct style?
HA! Thank-you! I love working in low-poly (sub 1000 tris) models and low-res textures (sub 256x256 pixels), so my art is a combination of low-poly and pixel art or maybe somewhere in limbo between them. I use 3ds Max (which I’ve been using since it was created), Photoshop, and Aseprite for all my pixel pushing needs, and we put it all together in Unity.
6. Valfaris’ hero, Therion, can carry three different types of weapon at any one time, one each from the three weapon classes – pistol, melee, and destroyer. When you’re blasting through Valfaris, what’s your favourite loadout?
Well, there are no weapons in Valfaris that are NOT fun to use! We want to make them all enjoyable. I love the railguns, so Therion’s Call and Skysplitter are fun! My main set-up right now is Therion’s Call, Bloodaxe/The Bastard, and Hellwraith.
7. When you’re not making games, what types of games do you enjoy playing? What’s the last game you played, or completed? And what were your favourite games growing up?
There are a lot of games that inspire me, among them are Quake 1, Diablo 2, and Bloodborne. In the arcades, when I was growing up, I spent a lot of time on Gauntlet, Golden Axe, and Ghosts ‘n Goblins. I played a ton of World of Warcraft, and I’m a big fan of Tribes as well.
Then there are the old Speccy games, Jet Set Willy, Manic Miner, Jetpac, Sabre Wulf, and so on.
I’m currently playing a lot of VR sims, such as Project Cars 2, Elite, and IL-2 Sturmovik, and some VR Skyrim. And when not in VR, I’m playing Warframe, Diablo 3, and Path of Exile.
Massive thanks to Andrew for taking the time to answer these questions.
Matt | Digital Uppercut