CGSociety :: Special Feature
16 June 2009, by Paul Hellard
Rob Watkins is the Senior Environment Artist at Lionhead Studios, working on the 'Fable II' game being produced by Peter Molyneaux. Previously, Watkins was down in London for several years training as an architect. While there, he picked up an award for his short animated film, and he realized that film-making was what he actually wanted to do.
He worked at Pepper's Ghost as a lighting specialist for a while, then joined Lionhead Studios as artist/animator working on a version of 'Black & White' for the Playstation. While this was short lived, he was then selected to work on the 'Fable' world. Job well done.
Rob Watkins tells me the cool thing about the design brief on 'Fable II' was that it was somewhat completely open for interpretation from Art.
As long as it looked good and played well, there weren't any issues about what direction they could take. "Obviously though with that in mind we couldn't just suddenly rock up and start building a bunch of crazy looking space ships in the Fable style," he adds.
'Fable II' still had to be true to its origins but with the added bonus that time had moved on and we were beginning to see the signs of technology creeping in."
This was perhaps the most exciting element for the Art team. "I always personally felt that Fable II was set on the cusp of the industrial revolution," says Watkins.
"You might have noticed my sneaky inclusion of early steam type locomotives and the large steam powered Dock Cranes in Bowerstone Market, and Bloodstone. "
'Fable II' was hugely ambitious in comparison to the original 'Fable', the levels were at least four times bigger on average and there were five times as many levels as in the first game.
Bloodstone and Oakfields are both villages that are very different in there architectural aesthetic," says Watkins.
"I remember building a ruined Abbey as I felt we needed a filler type piece of architecture that we could place in a level somewhere.
It ended up being more than the filler object I'd intended though when it was selected to become the main asset in Dunecrest; the imaginatively named Temple Of Evil."
"Something I was really keen to push for in 'Fable II' was different styles of architecture in different regions, so it was an awesome opportunity to design the architectural style for both settlements," Watkins adds.
