Art direction

Optional

Art direction says what the game must look and feel like, without saying how to make it. You decide the intent, and the builder decides how to achieve it. The builder is the person, team or AI that turns your package into a game.

Art direction is optional. Structured art direction is written in one direction.json file, next to the chapters. People judge four kinds of entry in it, and a fifth kind says how to judge them:

A pillar is a visual priority. When two art direction goals conflict, the builder follows the pillars in the order you wrote them.
A mood names a feeling: its intent, what it borrows from, and what it must not become.
An anti-reference names a result you do not want, such as the genre's usual bright adventure-poster look.
A must-keep is a visible quality every build has to preserve.
The optional viewing entry says how someone should watch the game when judging it: how fast, how big, and on what kind of screen. The file holds at most one.

direction.json

{
  "pillars": {
    "weather-stays-readable": "Severe weather changes the view without hiding the safe route.",
    "equipment-feels-used": "Every tool looks maintained by hand rather than fresh from a shop."
  },
  "mood": {
    "cold-focus": {
      "intent": "A clear, quiet climb through severe weather.",
      "anti": [
        "No warm holiday imagery.",
        "No heroic summit spectacle."
      ],
      "borrows": [
        {
          "from": "winter climbing field photographs",
          "what": ["flat winter light", "worn fabric surfaces"]
        }
      ]
    }
  },
  "anti": {
    "no-adventure-poster": "Do not turn the climb into a bright adventure poster."
  },
  "must_keep": {
    "rope-stays-legible": "The rope between climbers stays visible in every weather."
  },
  "viewing": {
    "speed_and_size": "the normal climbing camera at play speed",
    "calibration": "an sRGB display at standard desktop brightness"
  }
}

Each mood has its own anti list for that mood. The top-level anti block is for the whole look, and those entries have names you can point at.

The presentation chapter then points at these entries. A citation is an entry's dotted name in backticks, such as pillars.weather-stays-readable.

Write the passage inside a > DELEGATED: blockquote, because the builder decides how to achieve the intent. Presentation text that no tag covers is Fixed: the builder follows it exactly. The Who decides chapter explains the tag.

04-presentation.md

DELEGATED:

Keep the safe route readable through blowing snow, with edge detail that stays calm rather than glowing, as guided by pillars.weather-stays-readable.

Show repaired seams, replaced buckles, and uneven wear on every tool, as guided by pillars.equipment-feels-used.

Let the wind drop out near each handhold so the climb feels concentrated rather than frantic, following mood.cold-focus.

Keep the framing close to the climbers and refuse triumphant summit poses, following anti.no-adventure-poster.

Keep the rope darker than the snow and clear across each climber's body, preserving must_keep.rope-stays-legible.

A pillar, mood, anti-reference or must-keep that no chapter cites gets a warning.

Pillars, moods, anti-references and must-keeps are read and judged by people, not by a machine. Measurable promises about color, contrast and timing use the same file and are checked by acceptance tests. The Palette and color promises chapter covers them.

Full rules: OpenGDD specification, §9.