One of the most talked-about titles of this period is undoubtedly Dishonored , the amazing action-stealth game in first person released last week. If you are curious to learn more about the inspiration and creative process that has led to the creation of the fascinating game scenarios, Bethesda has given us a gallery of commented images by Art Director of the project, Sebastien Mitton. Find it all here.

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This was the first pencil sketch that we drawn when the game was still set in London in 1666. I put a bit of nostalgia, but in a positive sense. There are many excellent drawings derived about environmental architecture. At that time, on the line of the horizon you could see more than 80 cathedrals. The facades have a skeletal appearance, the streets are reminiscent of canyons and shadows are very particular.

In our game, the plague plays a very important role. After many hours of research on reports of the black death, we used some of those examples as a starting point for expressing ourselves visually. The purpose of the research was to provide the player with a huge Visual impact, accentuating the dystopian vision of the city. The inspiration for this example in particular (deleted to maintain consistency of the game) came to us from the works of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, who worked with the quicklime used in mass graves.

Being a designer, I find it a very fun challenge combine intriguing appearance, functionality, mechanics, good animations and a feeling of power into a weapon that can be upgraded in many ways!

I love this ship. His bow mobile can capture whales after they are harpooned. I got the idea by visiting our offices in Austin.

I noticed a guy on stilts, which cleaned the facade of the building. I said to Harvey (Creative Director) that we could put on stilts the newsboy cap (at the end, we chose to use the speakers). He was agreeing with me and so the boy became immediately a Tallboy. Over time, the designers changed its function within the game, turning it into an armed guard at arco.

I then proposed to place a container filled with phosphorus back to get a nice visual effect at the stroke of the arrows. Harvey wanted the whale oil. OK, but then there were whales. Right? And it's hard to find whales, if not swim in the middle of the ocean! So it was necessary to create a whaling ship and here is the result!

At that point, I realized that the game was set in its own universe and there was no need to add anything from the real world: already contained all the solutions to your needs.

This is a detail of the painting of the Regent, ran from Sergey Kolesov. In my opinion, is one of the most talented painters and illustrators in the world. This painting won the "2012 into the pixel" at E3. There's everything I love in the paintings. Looking at the bodyguard, a second layer of Visual storytelling. You don't notice immediately but, if you take the time to examine it thoroughly, it's there. A good bodyguard has to be discreet!

It is always very sad having to delete features, ideas or concepts. Nevertheless, this is our role! A graph must always be very open and react positively to changes for the good of the project.

In this case, we had to remove an asylum haunted by some locals: lunatics. I loved the mechanics of these characters: they were extremely sensitive to sounds and not fought, just push the player into a corner and to launch a cry as soon as discovered.

After a long phase of research in museums and libraries, it's time to put something on paper that is consistent with the key points and Visual filters that we have established.

I like this Panel, because it shows how far we can get during creative meetings.

Jean-Luc, my assistant, doesn't just take notes: fills pages and pages!

One of the main goals that I had set when creating Dishonored was to create iconic characters.

This girl is the result of extensive photographic research in London and Edinburgh. I analyzed the close-ups and studies of typical Anglo-Saxon features, as well as in books and illustrations of pulp novels.

If you based on universally known characteristics, emotions veicoleranno your characters before you even speak or move. This is Visual storytelling.

In this picture we see one of the first integrations of a character within the game. When you see that everything comes together, it is a time of great joy. You're going in the right direction and, all of a sudden, you don't care about the long and difficult days await you.

I have already spoken of Visual storytelling and here's a perfect example. Here at Arkane adore create dense and visceral universes!