Report (2500) Words

Introduction

Creative Assembly is a Multiple award-winning BAFTA British video game

developer who have created successful triple A game titles. This report is

designed to give a clear understanding on what it’s like to work for them.

Creative Assembly have some of the most interesting character design work

within the industry they use a high level of design depth and research to bring

their characters to life. They also keep up to date with technology and trends

so that the games that they create are visually amazing all the time.

Total War series has documented the history of human warfare through real-

time strategy since 2000, covering events in times such as medieval Europe,

feudal Japan, and ancient Rome.

The company was founded in 1987 and has 500 plus employees with 170 of

them building the total war empire as of 2017. Creative Assembly was brought

out by the company Sega in 2005 and since then they have been cashing in

with multiple times coming out at the same time.

There hasn’t really been any competition that Creative Assembly has faced

Mike Simpson creative director at Creative Assembly states that ‘There are

aspects of the technology that stretch back all the way across those 15 years. I

think that’s one of the reasons there haven’t been any competing games going

into exactly the same area. It would take them 15 years to catch up.’ He said

this in 2015 which meant that Total War had 15 years of to it.

Total War games have sold millions of units and even still now they still achieve

around 850,000 monthly active players.

Below is a link to Creative Assembly’s website.

https://www.creative-assembly.com/

The game franchise Total war series will be the focus of this report, the series

has a range of realism and history behind them which is educational and

interesting. The historical events of wars that have been captured within the

games show a lot of research and the detail when creating these games is

immense.

Creative Assembly runs Traineeships, one of which is in Character Art. They

want to help develop the next generation of creative minds, so they have a

legacy program which they run to help develop young artists. This is a great

way to help the creative industry within the United Kingdom. Helping to inspire

young minds which one day could lead to them creating their own company or

joining a creative company.

About Creative Assembly

Creative Assembly is a successful games company who create global hits, they

create games that go through the history and story behind some of the world’s

greatest wars. Most of their games are based around strategy and being able

to control massive armies, it is great game for gamers who are looking for a bit

of history and strategy. Within Creative Assembly it has such a creative team

who design the worlds and recreates the wars that once happened across the

world. If you take were to take up a position at Creative Assembly you could be

someone who looks at the research to help make some of their games

accurate to real world events or you could become a designer creating the

character models or the environment that the game take place in.

One of the first goals that Creative Assembly had when creating the Total war

franchise was to show the historical events and wars that had happened. It

was different to other games and they had the foundation to be able to show

the war units and the destruction that it had occupied. This also can be seen by

the level of detail they put into the 3D models and environment showing off as

much as they can so that the audience get real taste and idea of what war was

really like. The game can be very educational to a certain level. The strategy

that is involved within the game help show off how certain units would

struggle against other units, showing off the realism to the game.

They have stated that another goal that Creative Assembly have is to help

develop the creative industries within the UK. We see this because they

mention that ‘14,000 fewer students took a UK creative art and design course

in 2017 and there is a clear drop off between GCSE and degree level’ this

shows that they are concerned and aware of the education for the art industry.

They also mention that they see artists that lack the understanding for the

games discipline and feel that artists need to ‘understand the difference

between these disciplines, focus their efforts early and define their style.’

https://www.creative-assembly.com/blog/creative-chronicles-art

https://www.ucas.com/file/115931/download?token=n-dpq8pP

They mention that they want to hire graduates and that they are keen to look

for fresh talent. We know this because they mention that over the last 2 years

creative assembly has hired 9 art graduates straight from university.

https://www.creative-assembly.com/blog/creative-chronicles-art

Creative assembly also have what they call a legacy project, this is to inspire

and educate the next generation game development talent. The legacy team is

a team from creative assembly and it is their job to educate and inspire young

talent they do this by working with schools and partners which will help

support game related subjects. They offer paid trainee schemes for graduates.

This shows that they are dedicated into helping the growth of the gaming

industry and to help artists develop their work and passion.

They also state that they recognise the UK art skill gap and that they have

experts who visit university’s and schools to share their knowledge to try and

help show the importance of the industry.

Overview: Total war series

Total war started out in June 2000 with the release of Shogun Total war, this

game was helped by Electronic arts for funding after they noticed the success

that creative assembly had had previously for creating sports games. This led

to a boost of success leading to the company’s breakthrough title which helped

start the growth of the company. Shogun total war was nominated for a 2000

BAFTA Interactive Entertainment Award with this it helped give influence

towards the next total war game. It was also regarded as one of the

benchmark strategy games as of its times.

http://awards.bafta.org/award/2000/interactive/games-pc-award

After Shoguns Success Creative Assembly then moved on to using Activision as

a publisher and distributor which led onto the announcement of a second Total

war. With continuous successful hits the Total war series still is going with new

releases such as Total War: Warhammer 2.

Total War: Warhammer broke series sales records at its time which led to it

being the fastest selling total war game. Selling half a million copies within the

first few days.

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-05-27-total-war-warhammer-is-

the-fastest-selling-total-war-game-ever

Out of the series we can see a huge contrast it has from historically accurate to

a fantasy twist. Although the history within the Total war games have helped

develop the franchise to get to where it is today. Warhammer Total war shows

a much bigger range of characters that have been created which a lot of

people might prefer over the historically accurate games. Creative Assembly is

well known for creating strategy based games and has a unique gameplay

experience that other games don’t offer, it allows you to take control of huge

armies and lead them into battle, this is also mixed with the strategic element

on where certain units are better in different situations to other units and it is

all about finding the solutions to give your army the edge in combat.

Case Study: Lead Character Artist Mathew Davis

The artist Matthew Davis has worked for Creative Assembly and has amazing

examples of work. He has been a character’s artists on games such as Civalry

Medieval Warfare (2012), Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning (2012) and Fire fall

(2014) which helped him then to progress to develop character art for creative

assembly games such as Total War: Rome 2 (2013), Total War: Warhammer

(2016) and Total War: Warhammer 2 (2017). We see that he was the lead artist

creating characters such as the forest dragon, Ever watcher and the Chaos

Sorcerer.

Matthew Davis was a Senior Character artist for Total War Rome 2 and has

progressed to become a lead artist for Total War Warhammer, this has shown

that he is able to adapt from Historical accurate events to fantasy war styled

games. Knowing that he was a Senior Character artist and then moved on to

become a lead artist for a future game shows the progression you could take

while working for Creative Assembly. Anyone wanting to go down the

character design root will need to build a portfolio to show that they are able

to adapt and use different designs to create characters rather than sticking to

one style this will show that you have diversity but also you need to keep up

with the trends of what the creative industry is looking for in character. This

will then hopefully show the range of skills that you’ll be able to offer for a

creative industry helping you find work in the area you are interested in.

Conclusion

I decided to choose Creative Assembly because they are within the UK which

makes it easier rather than moving abroad. The work that they create is very

interesting and historical such as the Total war series they also get to work on

projects that sometimes aren’t as historical but are sci fi such as games as Halo

wars 2 or Alien Isolation which shows that they can adapt to new projects and

have a range of experience. They seem to have a strong creative atmosphere

within the teams and studios, which is something that I am passionate to

enter.

I found that looking though Matthew Davis’s work I was inspired and that it is

defiantly the direction that I’d love to go down within the creative industry. I

feel that it is something that I am defiantly interested in doing and I love the

design work that he has created within his models. Although I know that for

that kind of high level detail I will need time to develop myself as an artist and

gain experience to improve my portfolio even more to try and reach the level

that Matthew Davis has. I feel that with my 5-year plan I could work on

developing my portfolio to try and to get it industry level and to brush up my

knowledge using programs such as Maya and Z brush, this will help me create

highly detailed 3D models, which is what a character artist needs to be able to

use as well as having a high understanding of 2D work.

Creative Assembly also offer traineeships for graduate level and experienced

individuals trying to pursue a creative career. I also learned that a lot of their

trainees have stayed with creative assembly and worked their way up to senior

roles which could be ideal for me to be able to work myself up in the creative

industry.

https://www.creative-assembly.com/careers-faq

I love the amount ideas and range of work that they have created. I like the

idea of working within a studio working on a character model for a Total war

game which will be shown to thousands if not millions of people.

Creative Assembly has been a games company that I have grown up with, have

knowledge of and have always enjoyed playing their games that they have

offered over the years. I found that they have been very interesting because of

the history behind them which has helped me get an understanding on what

war was like hundreds of years ago.

Action Plan

Year 1

I plan on developing myself as an artist, looking for inspiration and researching

on how I can develop my portfolio to get it to industry standards. From June to

July 2018.

I will also be looking at how I can develop myself as person and boost my

confidence, this is something that I feel I need to work on and will help me be

able to work in teams better. I will be doing this throughout the years.

Apply for the traineeship character artist role at Creative Assembly which will

hopefully lead to me being able to start my career. August 2018.

I feel that I need to be considering going to festivals more and speaking to

people within the industry. This will lead to connections and help me network

so that I can find work easier and that if I need someone for a specific role I am

able to find them easily. Throughout the year when possible 2018.

Travel more and visit places that might help give me ideas on how to develop

my portfolio and improve on my craft. I feel that I need to get into traveling

more so that I can get use to the system because there can be a lot of traveling

involved with the animation industry. When possible during the year 2018

Year 2

For year 2 I plan on also working more on my portfolio and this will become a

permanent task that I will be doing so that I can keep on top of my work and

develop myself as an artist. Throughout 2019.

Look for voluntary work at festivals so that I can build more connections with

people, this will benefit me with talking to people in the industry and help me

get my name out there in the industry. If I have free time during 2019 this is

what I’d be doing.

If unsuccessful with Creative Assembly I will look for more work and apply for

other job roles which will help me start my career.

Depending on how work hunting is going I might do a Postgraduate teaching

course so that I can then become an art teacher so that I can share my

knowledge and skills. September 2019.

Keep up to date with industry trends and set up a social media profile to

showcase my work to help promote me. Throughout the year.

Work on editing my Show reel/Portfolio and make sure it shows my best work.

Throughout the year.

Learn more about the technology that is used within the industry and keep up

to date with all the new technology so that I don’t use programs that are

outdated.

Year 3

Keep working on my portfolio improving it and making sure it’s what the

industry is looking for.

If I’m in the industry then I keep focussed and meet the deadlines. I also need a

plan for after the project if its only contract work.

Volunteer for more work within the industry developing myself even more.

2020 during free time if I am not working.

Applying myself for my job roles and making sure it meets the requirements of

my portfolio work. June to September.

If I went onto doing a postgraduate course I then I should be finished by this

point and then choose whether to go straight into teaching or to continue my

craft looking for work within the creative industry.