Yeah, so it’s a bush…is probably what you’re thinking. Below is one of the first and more definitive pieces of art I created that helped drive the environmental style of Moonrise Fall. The ease and organic workflow of Hexels lead me to create concept art for the game as well. Even though the information hadn’t really changed in the journal, it’s presence in the game had. Up to that point, the journal felt rather dry like a textbook or user manual. Including these doodles really made the journal come to life in a way it wasn’t before. In this instance, I just wanted something that felt natural and casual, like someone lazily doodling in a notebook. You can adjust the pen settings in a variety of ways and produce a lot of different styles. I set up my pixel brush to work similarly to a real-life pen and just started drawing. Using a drawing tablet, I manipulated the pen pressure settings to adjust the size and flow until it felt natural. While they certainly come across as pixel graphics, they have an organic feel rarely found within the medium.

Here’s a collection of hand-drawn doodles to help spruce up the pages of the in-game journal. So in spite of what may be considered a retro medium, the art felt fresh and new. I believe I was quite successful in translating my personal style into a pixel format. Hexels’ tablet drawing support was a nice feature that helped give the art that hand-drawn feel. I wanted to embrace the squares while still delivering something unique.

With Moonrise Fall, I wasn’t really interested in creating a nostalgic pixel experience, but one that felt like my own. In this article, I will discuss my process and share some tips that may help you out as well. Over the last few years of development on Moonrise Fall, I spent a lot of time with Hexels to create all of the required art and integrated it into Game Maker Studio. Armed with a clue-filled journal, a camera, and a lantern, he must unravel the mysteries of the forest by photographing the strange creatures that reside there. Moonrise Fall is an atmospheric exploration puzzle game about a boy who finds himself lost in a supernatural forest after losing both parents in a car crash. I recently started my own studio, Made From Strings, in 2018 while developing Moonrise Fall.

I studied art and design at the Art Institute of Tampa and have been involved with game development for 10 years. My name is Christopher Mathes and I am an artist, musician, developer, and the creator of Moonrise Fall.

Marmoset hexels