OUAN504 - Character & Narrative - Acting Up: Understanding Character & Narrative (How A Character Is Chosen)

OUAN504 - Understanding Character & Narrative:

With all great ideas, there will be many initial forms of one idea to begin with. A great idea cannot simply be picked out a of a hat and stuck with throughout its developmental stages all the way to final production. The same goes for character design. Character artists may have a fantastic rough idea for a potential new project, however how many times do you think they sit there, sketching out designs only for them to be scrapped later? I went on a mission to find out what made a character's final design successful and why that design was chosen above the rest...


I talked last year in another part of my blog about how Bayonetta as a character had so many initial designs before her final form was chosen. I imagine Platinum Games (creators) had so many alternate ideas for personalities and behavioural features too. I never really explored why they went with the super-sexualised, lanky-legged, demonic-looking sass-queen, though. There were so many other potential success in designs that I thought might have been brilliant to play as in-game.

Wesley Burt, a concept artist for many games and animations such as Bayonetta, stated that she tried "westernizing Bayonetta" in roughly 2008 with the designs below taken from her blog. (http://wburtconcept.blogspot.co.uk/)

It comes to my mind that the reason these potential Bayonettas were dismissed could be due to lack of sexualisation (even though they're incredibly appealing anyway!) and overall "witchiness". Although the designs look fantastic, implying that she's a strong female character with a fairly realistic figure in comparison to the final Bayonetta, the specification did ask for a witch. When choosing from a selection of character designs, you have to bear in mind that a winning choice will just "feel" and "look" right. This will usually stem from the impression that the aesthetics will correspond to the personality. The designs above are all fantastic, but give me the impression of Bayonetta being a "bit too hardcore", more of melee-based character, and not as elegant as her more successful designs. 

The Bayonetta as we know and love her definitely fits the bill of being "witchy and bitchy" with a bit more sass and attitude than the others. Her body is slender, giving the cat-like mystery we associate with witches.