Tag Archives: Exoprimal

Ready to move on?

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Hello everyone, and welcome back for another monthly wrap up. Last post was end of May, so I shall catch us up to end of June. Lots of art, lots of games, lots of reading comic books.

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As always, lets start with games.

In my last post I had wrapped up playing Assassin’s Creed Valhalla as the big completion. In June I completed Another Crab’s Treasure which is a souls-like action game where you play as a hermit crab who has his shell repossessed through a collecting loan shark, because he couldn’t afford a new rent imposed on his tide pool. It was a recent release on XBox Game Pass, and a good palette cleanser. The cool gameplay mechanic is your shell acts as your shield, and as a hermit crab you can swap out of shells on the fly, testing out a variety to types of garbage found in the ocean. A fun, humourous, colourful game with similar souls-like fighting and gameplay mechanics. 22 hrs – 1000g/1000g.

I also beat Exoprimal‘s story, just in time for the team to announce that they’re basically done with the game. No more seasonal content or anything as the player count had dropped down pretty low. Multiplayer will still be available as well as all the content on a repeating rotation, but they’re just done with it now. So, so am I. 23hrs – 850g/1000g.

I started Atomic Heart and I’m a few hours in, but as we’re getting into the hot summer months, and I’m playing it on the PC – its a little too warm to play in the evenings – so I’ll probably take a rest on this game for a few months. Same with Final Fantasy VII Remake. In FF I think I’m up to chapter 12 now.

Illestrader and I completed Saint’s Row reboot (2022) but we had an issue with the final mission. Half way through the mission, last week, we called it a night – against my better judgement. And the issue came about because the final mission stipulates that its an end-game mission, warning you that you can’t return to the city hub whilst this mission is active. So what happened this week? Illestrader launched the co-op campaign mid-mission, but I can’t join a mission in progress. So I’m locked out of the final mission, and because its his campaign save, I can’t do it on my own, and there’s no mission replay function. So he got to complete it and I didn’t, which sucks. On my own I might blast through the campaign missions again just to get the final mission’s achievements – everything else in the game is unlocked for me, so it shouldn’t be too bad plus there’s a lot left to do and DLC. But right now I’m too mad to think about it. 14hrs – 215g/1424g.

Also playing through Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown. I play this for 20-30 minute spurts usually after dinner, before putting the boys to bed. They enjoy watching me play it and the gameplay is exciting and colourful and kid-friendly enough.

Lastly and most recently, I’ve started playing The First Descendant as a new co-op game with Illestrader. Game launched free to play a week ago, and it’s a lot like Warframe and clearly a lot of Destiny 2 influences. And Outriders similarities. A lot of egregious microtransaction incentives since its F2P – P2W, with the standard and premium season pass, and multiple character options that are not unlocked outright, but you can unlock them naturally with enough game time spent, or you can pay to unlock, and the skin bundles, etc, etc. Lots of mods and currencies. I will play through the story missions and then move on – I’m not sticking around for the grind. And not spending any more than the season pass. Like one of the top tier end-game characters is $135 if you bought it outright. No thanks.

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Onto some drawings:

In May I drew Scarlett from G.I. Joe and said I’d draw more. Well I drew one more at least: Baroness. There’s a few more I’d like to draw as well. One day…

As I mentioned previously, I’ve been writing a comic reading / review column thing over at Substack. I don’t really know how to describe it, other than I’ve tasked myself with reading at least 1 graphic novel / trade paperback book a week, and then writing about it. Discussing the story, the art, and the creators and my thoughts – just to get them out of my head. At this point, like this journal, its really just for me, as an outlet, as I don’t have any subscribers.

But one of the cool parts is its gives me some motivation to draw some characters I wouldn’t typically draw. One of the series I read was Jupiter’s Legacy, and I did a quick fan art of Lady Liberty.

Next up was a fun inking render of Magik, from the X-Men. This piece has also inspired me to draw her demon side, Darkchilde, which I should be able to share in my next post.

Harley Quinn Fan Art to celebrate another graphic novel reading review. Not that I need an excuse to draw Harley Quinn…read Suicide Squad: Get Joker, by Brian Azzarello and Alex Maleev.

Next was Black Cat, a quick ink wash render.

And then finally a multiple day fully rendered piece for the anniversary of Beyond Good and Evil, Jade. A really great game from 20 years ago. And a fun piece to draw. I’ll probably turn it into a poster as I need some new art on the wall.

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Comics, still reading a lot and buying a lot. Roughly 15-20 months issues a week – which is crazy to think about. And also very hard to keep up with. Presently I’m 5 weeks behind on my reading. I’m hoping over the summer to catch up a bit, as usually my gaming and art slow down due to the hot weather – I don’t enjoy sitting in front of a computer, sweating.

But for my Substack graphic novel / TP schedule, here is my next 5 reads, and my last 5 reads:

Next Read:
Week 26: The Hard Switch – Own D. Pomery
Week 27: Chu – Vol. 1 – John Layman & Dan Boultwood
Week 28: Spider-Man: Noir – David Hine
Week 29: Far Sector – N. K. Jemisin & Jamal Campbell
Week 30: The Watchmen – Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons

Previous read:
Week 24: Phenomena, Vol. 1: The Golden City of Eyes
Week 23: Suicide Squad: Get Joker / Wolverine: Rot
Week 22: Jupiter’s Legacy Vol 1-5
Week 21: Head Wounds: Sparrow
Week 20: The Incal

Also some more recent books I’ve acquired:
The Hard Switch
Homicide: The Graphics Novel parts 1 and 2
Seven Secrets vol 1-3
The Ballad of Halo Jones
20th Century Men
IN.

Looking forward to getting around to reading those at some point in the next few years. Ha!

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I think that wraps up June. Take care. ‘Til next time.
Rogan
G407468

Starfield

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Alright, so this will be a rather large post today. My last update was end of July, and then I was on vacation, so today’s will encompass all of August and first week of September. Lots to share, including my first impressions of Starfield.

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Wrapped up Need for Speed Unbound:

The writing was actually pretty funny in the final act. They make Fast and Furious jokes, and actually said “Need for Speed”:

Overall the game was ok. A little grindy with the constant cop chases, and I was irritated in the beginning when I was making very small amounts of money after races, and by the end, you just make stupid money. I guess because the S cars have more expensive upgrade parts and the final buy-in is higher, but still. By the last week, I was maybe only doing one or two races per day/night cycle because I was so tired of getting chased by cops, and just wanted the story done.

After NFS was done. I had a week or so to kill until Starfield released, so I got Immortals of Aveum, which is an EA FPS High Fantasy magic spell casting game. Pretty decent over-all. But I wanted a palette cleanser before I jumped into Starfield, and nothing else in my queue interested me at the time. And I wanted something that would be a relatively quick completion. Below, the female character is Zendara. She’d be fun to draw.

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In the art studio I’ve been busy. As I mentioned in the last post, I was playing Exoprimal quite a bit, and had the Vigilant class design stuck in my head and needed to draw it:

Then the Blue Beetle movie came out, so I draw Blue Beetle – but didn’t see the movie:

Made a little bit of progress on the colour wheel challenge. Re-did female Riddler, and added Catwoman. 3 more colours left, Purple, Pink, and Red. Purple I think I will do Neo-Joker, Pink will be Two-Face, and Red will be Rose Wilson, daughter of Deathstroke:

Then I got some inspiration by Cammy’s new Street Fighter outfit. She’s chopped off her hair, but the jacket she now wears has this long belt that kind of mimics the long ponytail she used to have, which is a pretty cool design:

After Cammy, I thought, since Drawtober / Inktober is around the corner, that I should get a head start. Populate a list of characters and start sketching them out, so that in October, I can flesh them out, ink and maybe add a splash of colour. But this way it will take a lot of the stress away if the base is already done. So far I have Dove, Zatanna, Spiral, and Fire & Ice. Definitely off a good start. Hopefully I can have 31 ready for October. Having time off this month will help.

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Comics for the week of Aug 2:

Comics for the week of Aug 19:

Comics for the week of Aug 24:

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Alright, the point of this one-sided conversation we’ve all been waiting for: Starfield. A review, of sorts, in progress.

Starfield will be the first Bethesda Game Studios game that I’ve tried, in earnest. I’ve tried Fallout 4 before, for about an hour or so. Got killed by big bugs in the wasteland. Couldn’t wrap my head around the slow-motion gun aiming. Called it quits. Was never really interested in the Elder Scrolls games or setting as I tend to gravitate to sci-fi over fantasy (although I did play Bioware’s Dragon Age Inquisition). But guns and spaceships are more my style, and I did like Bioware’s Mass Effect series, so I have high hopes for Starfield, even though RPG is usually not my first choice.

But so far I am liking it. I appreciate that you can diverge off the main quest and focus on other activities like Faction Missions or other side-quests. I initially started down the main quest, but after arriving in New Atlantis, and meeting the Constellation group, and acquiring Sarah as a companion, she brought me to the UC Vanguard headquarters to discuss a rumour of one of the next artifacts. But mid discussion with the Commander, he had a dialogue option about enrolling into the UC Vanguard services. So I did, and was then whisked away on a side adventure involving Xenowarfare. I guess those weird artifacts will have to wait.

I’m playing on the PC which has been ok so far. I have an RTX 3080 and it handles it decently at 4k, 35-40fps. It defaulted to Ultra settings. But I think I could get more out of it after adjusting some shadow/reflection/particle settings. See if I can get those FPS up. Haven’t tried it on the Xbox Series X. Likely won’t.

Visually the game is both very good looking and also kind of meh, depending on the environment. But I guess with a game this large, it can’t be all amazing. Overall though, very pretty. And it has an in-game photo mode, so that’s a bonus.

I’m not deep into the game yet, but I have time off work for the next few weeks, so by the time my next update roles around I should have more in-game photos and new stories to tell. I’m also thinking about the whole role-playing aspect, and considering doing a short story or Captain’s Log journal, similar to what I did with The Division.

Until then, Above and Beyond.

iRogan
G377,240

Like a Boss

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That’s how it goes
Everybody knows

Art Art Baby
Remnant
Exoprimal
Must Read Comics

Still no colour wheel challenge updates, but I have a lot more art to post. Will I get back to the colour wheel challenge…hopefully?

But first, Hawkgirl. This is an updated version of the work-in-progress from the last post. Still a WIP but at the stage that’s ready to ink and colour:

From there I couldn’t put the stylus down. Next up is Val from the comic Nocterra. This comic is coming to it’s conclusion. Scott Snyder has hinted that the ending is left open for future work but for now it’s wrapping up, so I drew Val.

If you’ll recall, back in May I was doing the May Sketch a Day and planned some art. One of the pieces was Red Sonja. And I got stuck and tried to make it work but kind of just quit and took a break. After Val I decided to try again, and I am now happy enough to share the work and the previous attempt (two previous WIPs and then the new one). Decided to just scrap the original piece and work anew. Much happier with the result. This actually make a good poster once its inked and coloured.

Next up is Angel Breaker, who a member of the League of Shadows. When I was inking I struggled with getting the feet to look right so I’ve just left it cropped.

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In video game land, I’ve been playing Remnant, and Exoprimal. The former in co-op, and the latter mostly just by myself, but it is a unique multiplayer game design. You play with 4 other people in sort of a 5 vs. 5 race to complete objectives and kill the dinosaurs the fastest. You play as a human pilot inside larger exo-suits and fight dinosaurs. The character classes are very similar to Overwatch designs. The story revolves around an AI overseer and you travel back in time to gather intel about the AI so that you can hopefully turn it off in the present timeline. Its a little convoluted but the gameplay is pretty fun, and the matches are fairly short, at around 10-15 minutes.

The character Vigilant which is a support character who carries a big gun is a pretty cool design, seen below in images 1 & 2. I’ll be drawing her next, because why not.

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Comics for the week of July 26:

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That’s all for now. August I will be on vacation with some much needed time off, and September I have some time off as well, which is good timing for Starfield.

iRogan