Poster

First Attempt

This was my first attempt at creating this poster - I assumed that, because the sprites and backgrounds are pixel art, it would make the most sense for the poster to also be pixel art.

I experimented with a few different layouts, however due to the number of characters I thought it would be best to make them in this formation, with the main character in the centre so as to not make any of the five suitors more central. I drew up the sketch you see to the top right, and after cleaning it up slightly I (thankfully, as you'll see later) saved it in a backup file at the full image size, and then scaled it down. I like where the characters are in this; Oran is the most confident and friendly with the main character, so is more central; Tokyo and Romeo are friendly but perhaps more allusive, and so are more central, but off to the side; finally, Ross and Noah are the most hostile of the five, and so are positioned up to the top, side-on. Noah is especially important to note here, as he is looking up and away from the hypothetical camera, unlike all the others who are looking either forward, or at the main character - this alludes to Noah's disconnect from the group, which is a very important aspect of his personality.

After scaling it down so that I can draw it in pixel art, I realized that not only had I potentially not given myself enough pixel space to work with, but that pixel art doesn''t really work aesthetically in regards to a poster. I only got this far through the poster before realizing I wanted to change tact.

Second Attempt

I drew up this poster at home, and wanted to attempt a slightly different style; it's supposed to come off as more cartoonish, and the thinner lineart looks really crisp. I even drew up a full new sketch, with slight changes of placement. I finished colouring all of the characters and drawing up the background, and thought it looked pretty good. After coming back to it from a few days spent doing other things, I realised that I hated the stylized look, and that the posing and expressions were sloppy at best.

I also spent a little while during this process brainstorming different potential names for this game; I hadn't thought about it before, as it hadn't been relevant or necessary up until this point. I wanted it to tie into both the dating sim genre, but also the setting and storyline. I also, of course, wanted it to sound catchy and memorable. I eventually landed on "LoveBomb", which (despite some of my peers commenting that the term love bomb is a manipulation tactic, and generally has quite negative connotations) I think fit best with the agressive and, often, quite toxic environment that the main character finds himself in. I also came up with the slogan "Who's your cyber-date?" which, while very corny and on-the-spot, works well enough.

Final Attempt

After realizing that I hated my second attempt at this poster, I tried for a third and final time, this time using the previous sketch, which upon a second look I realised was really good and had some very nice posing and composition.

This poster took my the longest by far out of the three of them - around 3 hours, not including the sketch. I used a brush that I have been obsessed with currently, which creates a sort of round edge that looks more natural, and yet still smooth and defined. I kept shading on the actual characters to a minimum, and mostly used hard edges as opposed to blushing (with the exception of the skin, which I always blush for added depth). I absolutely love how this turned out, and I think that each of the characters really look like their authentic selves in this poster - I also am a huge fan of the lighting and shading, despite the fact that it makes the poster look quite dark. Something else that was not intentional, but actually looks quite cool, is that everyone (excluding Oran, for obvious reasons) has a little light in their eye, apart from Noah. In reality, I just forgot to put one in his eye because his iris is quite small and hidden slightly, however it just further separates Noah from the other characters on a visual level.

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