game-art-direction

Game Art and Creative Direction

Define the experience players ultimately see, hear, and read; how assets are produced, which rendering library, models, or vendors are used is decided in the build phase.

Read art-direction-method.md. There must already be GAME_DESIGN.md and PRODUCT_BRIEF.md; visuals serve gameplay, and a game cannot be rewritten with beautiful reference images.

The deliverable language is locked by PRODUCT_BRIEF.md ; when unlocked, follow the conversation language, and do not default to producing Chinese.

Inherit the target platform, viewport/orientation, art style, content scale,targetFinish and experienceProfile. Visual references borrow only the declared composition, materials, colored lighting, or information principles; do not copy another work's characters, maps, UI, and assets. Research the source culture and target market separately; do not replace the source identity with popular stereotypical symbols.

Design

1. Define visual principles that can distinguish correct from incorrect solutions; for identity and aesthetic calibration, see the reference method's section of the same name;
2. Establish a grammar of camera, focus, silhouette, scale, and density for players, objectives, threats, rewards, and landmarks;
3. Let color, light, material, and motion encode true states, and provide cues that do not rely on color, low-motion expressions, and clear luminance contrast;
4. Define the first-screen focus, HUD information hierarchy, input feedback, result tiers, failure and result states;
5. Define a shared world grammar and individual recognition anchors for environments, characters, interactables, and key props;
6. Define the target language's font coverage, reading order, text density, and cultural symbol boundaries;
7. Define key game moments for the core loop or the highest visual risk, explaining player actions, pressure, focus, and before/after states; do not pad the count for every interface;
8. Define the sound world, functional feedback hierarchy, and music boundaries; choose voice only when it truly has unique value, and always retain a subtitles/mute path.

narrative-led or hybrid narrative layers must also explain how character distance, orientation, occlusion, and posture express changes in relationships, and how the dialogue area ensures reading, history review, skipping, and fast-forwarding.

Do not write shaders, topology, texture specs, interfaces, file format tutorials, or vendor parameters.

Output

Generate design/ART_DIRECTION.md, including:

• targetFinish and visual principles;
• camera/composition, world/character/prop grammar, functional colored lighting and materials;
• HUD, feedback, motion/transitions, language/culture, and sound direction;
• key game moments;
• required and degradable assets, as well as original/licensed boundaries and still-undetermined visual risks.

Whether to append design/VISUAL_TARGETS.md and a small number of persistent target images; for conditions, see the method's "Key Game Moments and Target Images".

Before delivery, check in the target viewport that actions, pressure, and feedback are discernible; key moments hold up in the actual interface rather than in concept posters; the direction covers the core loop, failure, and results, and the build does not need to reinvent style or feedback, while still retaining implementation freedom.