Placeholder graphics

TheAlchemyst

Hey yall,

My interest in Game Design is from the crunchy-data infrastructure side. My artistic skills are... nonexistent. I was going to use some scratch visuals for everything in order to develop a proof-of-concept. So i.e. my characters would have some basic animation stances with temporary images, with the intent of adding some proper graphics and fuller animation sequences later.

Does any one have any suggestions about how best to do this without shooting myself in the foot later? In other words I don't want to get stuck re-writing everything when I get a hold of graphics, so I want it to efficiently transition from the simplified state into the Alpha state.

BBEnk

When I start prototyping I use just a box and circle graphic were needed to build game because thats all it really is, I don't worry about any actual graphics until I have something that needs them.

ogreofwart

Yeah graphics are just a decoration for the characters and can be redesigned at will.
Just like changing costumes

TheAlchemyst

What about adding complication to the animation? It seems as though it should be easy enough to do later rather than at the start of the project, but I'm always afraid of inefficiency

ogreofwart

I think but don't quote me that the actual animation depends on the amount of frames you use and when in an instance it can be also changed to as simple (less frames) or more complicated (more frames) as you want within the actual actor.
But I could be wrong as I'm still only a beginner myself and concentrate on more static drawing than animation.