Sims 2 for the PSP I worked with EA again, but this time as a lead. The environment art team made nineteen unique locations based off the PC game's Strangetown. There was also an extensive menu system. Many of the objects and animations for them and the characters came from the PC game, but were modified for the PSP. This was a huge undertaking, and the game has it's flaws, but I think it looked pretty nice. This game was developed using Amaze's proprietary engine.
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I was promoted to art lead for the Lemony Snicket game in 2005. I directed the look and feel of the game and tied it back to the movie and the books. I took advantage of UnReal's detail texture to get the environment artists to put cross hatching in most of the level textures. It was subtle so it wouldn't get annoying, but I felt that tied the game back to the book illustrations. This was a game of a lot of firsts. The anim lead and I were both first time leads, and the environment team consisted of artists with little to no 3D modeling experience. In the end I think we produced a game that looked really good.
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Between Lemony Snicket and Harry Potter I helped out on Brother Bear for PC using the UnReal engine. I made most of the props/actors for this game, the trees, rocks, bushes, fungus, totems, etc... I also helped light a few of the levels.
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2002 I worked on Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets for PC. I textured, lit, and created objects for six levels and two cutscenes. Many of the objects I created for the first game were used again for this game. This game was also made using the UnReal engine.
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In 2001 I was given the opportunity to work on the Harry Potter PC game. I made almost all the objects (over 100 props, 'Actors' in UnrealEd speak) in the Harry Potter game. I also textured a few minor characters; the chess pieces and the lumos gargoyle for example. The sceen shots below feature objects I made. Common objects you run into that I made that aren't shown here are all the beans, cauldrons and chests, plus the Snitch, Bludgers and Quaffle.
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After Slot Car Racing I worked on a PC game called Williams F1 Team Driver. It was only released in Europe. I modeled and textured two environments, and cleaned up a couple of other environments. I hand sorted alpha layers for performance optimization. This game used the NetImmerse engine.
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I joined Amaze Entertainment (at the time it was known as KnowWonder) in February 2000 to work on a couple of racing games. Below are the four cars for Slot Car Racing I created textures for. In addition to texture creation I optimized environments for performance on the target machine.
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In October of 1997 I joined the now defunct Looking Glass Studios to produce 3D graphics for a Nintendo 64 game. Mini Racers was shown by Nintendo at E3 in Los Angeles in 1999 to a very positive reception. WildWaters, another Nintendo 64 game, was also shown at the 1999 E3 by Ubi Soft. I created three cars, helped out with enviornments and did some interface processing on Destruction Derby 64. I created seven unique environments for Mini Racers, the texture sets from which are reused in other tracks. The environments for WildWaters were much larger, I created two of the six rivers. In both cases I worked very closely with the Designer and Lead Artist to create environments both visually exciting and fun to play.
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Below are some screen captures from Mini Racers, though the game was completed Nintendo never released it.
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Below are some images from WildWaters, the kayaking sim Looking Glass was developing for N64.
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In November 1995 I joined Lizard Lounge Graphics, Inc. While there I helped to contribute to quite a few projects ranging from a Spanish language CD-ROM to animated corporate presentations. The eight images below are from the major project I worked on while with the Lizards. They are for an interactive CD based on the popular children's show The Puzzle Place produced by IBM that was never released. To see larger images of the thumbnails below just click on them.
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All contents copyright © Lorian Kiesel, all rights reserved, except where copyrights are owned by the game publisher; IBM, PBS, Nintendo, THQ, UbiSoft, Mattel, EA, Warner Brothers, J.K. Rowling, Scholastic, Paramount, Activision, Daniel Handler & Harper Collins.