The visual jazz of Genesis Noir

Genesis Noir it is defined in the beginning of existence, reimagining the Big Bang and the natural expansion of the universe as the violent end result of a love triangle that went wrong. It is a marriage of jazz and film noir in a point-and-click adventure game that sometimes works better as an audiovisual toy than as a series of puzzles. But the visual style of the game is a clear highlight.

The monochrome, abstract and drawn appearance of lines that makes Genesis Noir so unique comes from a series of influences: classic films, Italian literature, other independent games. The real mystery to be solved was to combine these ideas in a way that made sense – and it really ended up in a playable game.

Genesis Noir The starting point for creative leader Evan Anthony was Cosmicomics, a collection of scientifically inspired short stories by the Italian author Italo Calvino. “I think I was initially trying to translate what I was imagining when I was reading that book,” says Anthony The Verge. Calvin’s writing, even in the English translation, is “a visually rich narrative,” says Anthony.

These ideas started to solidify in a style when Anthony and technical leader Jeremy Abel saw Umbro Blackout. Made by Buck, a creative studio specializing in animation, Umbro Blackout tells the story of a football player who visited New York during the 1977 blackout. “They are just very simple black and white graphics. I wanted to bring that kind of smart transitions and juxtaposition of settings and scenes in an interactive space, ”recalls Anthony.

The true genesis of Genesis Noir initiated on newsprint. Anthony and Abel sketched the first character designs that would become Genesis Noir ‘s initial trio of film noir archetypes – transformed into “gods” in the language of the game – into charcoal. They would become No-Man, the player’s character and a manifestation of Time; Miss Mass, a femme fatale jazz singer and representation of gravity; and Golden Boy, a star saxophonist and a kind of creative god whose attempt to assassinate Miss Mass triggers the events of the game.

The indie games also served as a guide for Anthony and Abel, neither of whom had any gaming experience or designed a level before. You can find some Kentucky Route Zero at the Genesis Noirinteractions, fixed perspectives and transitions between scenes. Children, the 2019 short-film / video game hybrid, was also a big star from the north for doing too much with little. “[Kids] it was definitely a great reference on what you could do with an asset, ”says Anthony. “How can we be economical, very economical with the assets we have”, continues Abel.

Image: Feral Cat Den

Although Abel and Anthony embarked on some ambitious creative projects before – notably, a pinball machine from Google Maps to Google – the visuals of Genesis Noir they were a different beast. They realized that the game engines are not really designed with hyper-stylized visuals in mind. “There is a reason why games don’t really look like this,” says Anthony.

Some of these difficulties came, admittedly, from the inexperience of the duo and the abstract direction they decided to take in the game. An initial level called “Seeding”, defined in the first microseconds of the Big Bang, had to be reworked several times from Anthony’s initial idea of ​​a level made up of “vibrant lines and strings”. Creating a level of wavering lines that not only could run, but that players really wanted to explore, was an obstacle.

Image: Feral Cat Den

According to Abel, the biggest technical considerations they had to manage were the performance and translation of the art that Anthony was creating in Flash for the game engine. On some platforms like the Switch, this meant adapting and falsifying some visual effects. For 2D animations themselves, Abel also had to create more personalized solutions. “I worked with a friend of mine to develop a solution to actually export all Flash animations and draw them as vector art on the engine,” he says.

Anthony and Abel’s multiyear journey to create Genesis Noir provided them with some valuable design lessons and a charming final product. Even if you don’t relate to the variety of sources Genesis Noir is pulling, playing the game really captures the feel of an interactive animated film. And the goal of expressing big, abstract concepts with a genre and family atmosphere also pays dividends. I will not spoil where Genesis Noir goes on its final levels, but there is more here than scientific facts and noir stories. “I think my goal was to find a little poetry between comparing two very different things,” says Anthony. “I am very happy with how everyone perceives this.”

Genesis Noir is now available for PC, Xbox Game Pass and Nintendo Switch.