



For the last couple of weeks I’ve had this idea floating around in my head for Beyond Good and Evil 2, a little project to keep me busy during the holidays and spice up my portfolio a bit. It’s a game that’s very close to my heart and basically motivated me very early on in life to become a game artist. So with my search for an internship starting soon I wanted to add something to my portfolio that could display that passion. This will also give me the opportunity to grow and display my work on here to hopefully get some feedback what works and what could be better (tips are always welcome).

So please let me know if you got feedback/ideas/etc

Goals:

-Build a world based on the Dutch culture infused with elements from the Beyond Good & Evil world

-Make it fit within the currently known plot and lore of System 3

-Modeling in Maya

-Texture workflow in Substance Painter & Designer

-Build it in UE4

Lore:

At the end of the 21st century the countries that formed the Benelux Union, Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxembourg officially merged into one country the Benelux. Their governments & resources merged and their mother language became Dutch, these negotiations of the language was something that withheld the merging for many years because the three countries couldn’t agree which one of theirs would became the official language but after a lot of discussion the decision was finally made.

The Netherlands have always been a culture surrounded by the creation of Dikes and land to protect themselves from the oceans that surrounded the land, their history of dike building goes as far back to the Roman era. They even created a whole new province in the Ijsselmeer called Flevoland, so when the earth was on the verge of overpopulation they started creating whole new masses of land for people to live on. It became their number one industry within the Benelux.

When China and India became the two superpowers of the 22nd century they started colonizing many different star systems, from earth-like planets to giant ice planets. The Benelux was brought on board by the two giants to help them with the planets that were covered in oceans and make them viable for colonization. Next to a vastly growing business the Benelux got a planet within System 3, an ocean planet called Exo-0227 that only had small pockets of land, mainly islands. The planet was later renamed to Flevo.

But when the creation of Hybrids began for slavery conflict arose between the business partners. The Benelux couldn’t agree on slave labor and were firmly against it. Their history was already blackened by slave labor a few centuries ago, a mistake they vouched and promised to never make again. Due to contract obligations they stayed business partners until all the work was finished. They parted ways after that. In the years to come the Benelux started to grant asylum to Hybrids that got away from their “masters”. They were granted homes and jobs within the many home worlds controlled by the Benelux. The court gave the hybrids basic “human” rights a few years after the first asylum seekers came to Flevo. But word traveled quickly of the safe haven the Benelux created for the hybrids and it didn’t take long before there were too many.

Many cities created Havens, a city zone for hybrids and the poorest of humans to live. These havens were crowded parts of the city, claustrophobic and dense city areas packed with giant apartment building. It was nowhere near perfect but many hybrids were at least happy to have a home.

Planet Flevo:

90 percent of the planet is covered with water, only small landmasses cover the almost endless oceans of Flevo. Due to the planet’s orbit around the sun the climate is known for its extremes. While the seasons are earth-like, wind speed and storms aren’t.

Due to a lack of giant continents the planet is known for the giant storms that occur from time to time. While it’s rare for these types of storms to happen often, when it happens the oceans become very wild and the waves get to extreme heights.

World Design:

I want to design the city based on the architecture of Amsterdam, mainly the canals of the city and the many different houses around it for the wealthy/rich districts of the world. I want to display a beautiful canal with different houses, shops and props bases upon the different things you can find in Amsterdam. But I also want to play with the futuristic setting, like hologram ads, posters and ads for hybrids. I especially want to sneak in some Easter eggs regarding the first game, items like mDisks and food like Starkos and K-Bups.





I want to create depth by adding verticality in the design, think of the city in a few layers. The serene beautiful canals on top and the lower incomes at the bottom. I envision the poor part of the city really dense and claustrophobic, all the different people and hybrids stacked together in giant apartment buildings with little room to spare. I want to have stark contrast between the two parts of the city to display a conflicting world.





I will update this page with concept art, models and ideas that pop up in my head. If you're still reading all this then thanks a lot for your time and hopefully i'll be able to share some stuff later this weekend.



