07-2024 Artist Commentary (Patreon)

Kim, is running out of bits: IT IS TIME… THE HOMESTUCK VISUAL NOVEL!!!

James, Director: The first one ever.

Andi, the cursed warrior: It’s crazy how we have never made one before.

Haven, VN enjoyer: I, personally, enjoyed this so much.

Chumi, sad that summer vacation is almost over: Hi everyone, thanks for tuning in! So, we got a whole month of Vriska! We got a lil bit of Tavros, lil’ bit of Aradia as well! Some Davepeta sprinkled in there, how exciting! Thank you for your support as we did something a bit new this time. 🙇 It’s great to see that so many people loved what we cooked up, the team is over the moon!! Anyway, let’s talk about it!

Kim: The sprites for this section were delegated to different artists amongst the art team! Before we get into the actual sprite art of it though, we first all had to decide on a general style direction for the sprites to follow. As the Art Director and, of course, the artist of the sprites that’ll be recurring the most throughout the novel (Vriska’s!) I did several passes on how these sprites could have possibly looked like.

Kim: The style took several different turns until we arrived at the one closer you see in the game itself! We wanted something that felt evolved but reminiscent of the previous Homestuck talksprites. Something not too anime cutesy, but still felt familiar to the comic’s style–something balanced between Guardian mode yet that classic Homestuck cartooniness. Looking at the final sprites, you can tell we were all really drawn to Homestuck’s classic bug-eyed-ness too LOL. Another particular stylistic detail that I’m particularly fond of is that pixel “scratchiness” and ink-like feel of the pen tool, keeping the sprites a little “sketchy” and not too tight.

Kim: As you can see from the prior sketches we opted for a more neutral and universal pose so that we could economically make other expression variants! I initially was thinking of referencing her old Alterniabound sprite, but Vriska being thrown into this hell hole is a bit more miffed than she is her usual sassier self.

There was also an alt expression of her smiling in her god tier outfit too, but I suppose it didn’t make it into the final cut! You guys can have it here as a bonus LOL.

Kim: Enjoy these other unique poses!

Floral, doesn’t usually go here: This was the first update I was able to do some real art on (outside of my silly little thumbnails) and I decided to take on Tavros for the talksprites.

Floral: Going into it, I wanted his talksprite to capture a small part of the Alterniabound sprite charm while falling in line with our style sensibilities. I put some brain power into it, and the baby head with far apart eyes ended up being key to the whole thing.

Andi: AHHHH these Tavros’ WERE SOOOO ADORABLE. They completely captured his vibes.I think Floral absolutely nailed the alterniabound essence. Thank you for bringing him back to us…

Chumi: TAVROS IS SO CUTE I am obsessed.

Haven: So perfect lovely baby boy.

Chumi: I did a few of the featured CG’s, mainly the Tavros vs. Vriska ones. They were all quite easy to do since they were essentially redraws of already existing assets. A few edits and voila!! Throw ‘em into the game guys!!

James: Chumi is like an expert at panel edits at this point. I keep asking her to do them.

Chumi: Of course, these are references to the Eridan vs Kanaya fight. When drawing Tavros, I was looking up a lot of javelin-throwing pictures and thinking “Man this kid must be strong as hell to throw a lance one-handed” LMAO. 

Kim: Tavros is actually the strongest beta troll right behind Equius (this is a lie).

Andi: This scene really hits right for me and feels totally like Vriska to do this. I think Chumi did amazing capturing the simplicity of the nostalgic part of the style and also Tavro’s lancing pose. It’s got a nice line of action!

Floral: The shapes Chumi uses in this silhouette are so chef kiss!! I just love how they read right after the other, the motion is so clear.

Chumi: This CG is an edit of Vriska dying on LOMAP before going God Tier. Her expression was changed so she’s smiling because this “skewering-before-falling-off-a-cliff’ was her plan all along! Too bad it didn't work out as she hoped. 

James: I didn’t ask you to make her smile, you did that on your own and it worked out great.

Kim: The smile is actually such a funny and interesting addition to this because at this point of time you can see how self-assured she is about this Whole Deal when she couldn’t be more far off LOL. It’s like Aradiabot said… you’re not here for “redemption,” Vriska, you’re here to grow up!!!

Andi: I think making her smile triumphantly is the right move. When she does things her way, of course it's going to feel right to her. But in this case, she literally made things last ten times longer than it needed to be. She’s going to have to learn her lessons for as long as it takes.

Kim: And this brings us onto part TWO!!!! (Or is this technically Chapter 1 since the first bit is technically the Prologue? Whatever, ANYWAY–)

Year 2 Vriska Concept Art by Kim Quach

Kim: It’s now been two years since Vriska has been tromping around this hell space… We wanted to show she’s kind of gotten a little “comfortable” being stuck around here. Or rather, just kind of given into the fact this wasn’t gonna be an easy in-and-out situation as she thought it was going to be and has probably gotten tired of wearing her god tier garb. She’s got her hair tied up, jacket tied around her waist– yeah, she’s gonna be here a long time.

Kim: And it looks like she’s not all jazzed about that either LMFAO.

I also wanna take a moment to highlight my favorite sprite I did for this chapter– Vriska’s “Mind Control” sprite!

Chumi: The second and third sprites are so expressive and funny… Girl you are stuck in hell!!!!

Kim: I’m a little sad a good chunk of it gets cut off by the edge within the game because I love the motion her ponytail adds to this sprite, but you guys can appreciate it in full here LOL.

Floral: Everything about this design really is so so good and when I saw this sprite for the first time I went full on heart eyes. The way you can feel her trying to laugh it off and struggle with whether or not to use her powers. It all comes through so clearly!

Haven: I got to do the backgrounds for Vriska’s first two stages. I gave them both black outlines to lend a bit of a video game-like feel to them.

Kim: I’m such a big fan of these backgrounds too. Haven has such a good grasp of volume and the 3D form, I can literally imagine turning these maps around in my mind. I’d honestly be convinced if these WERE video game backgrounds.

Floral: I’m always impressed by Haven’s work and these backgrounds are so awesome, there’s a real coherency to them if that makes sense? Everything works in harmony from the colors to the forms and I love looking at them!

Haven: I also got to do Aradiabot sprites! Here’s my initial sketches

Haven: And the final sprites themselves. 

Kim: The bit of pixel dithering on the metal was such a nice touch for these sprites too (chef’s kiss) MAGNIFICO.

Floral: Actually gasped when I saw these for the first time like SHEEEESH so good.

Andi: This drawing was especially sentimental for me to draw. Make Her Pay feels so sooooo far away, yet Vriska finds herself in this position again, with her fated frenemy. This holds the essence of when Aradiabot socked her in the face, but instead of violence, she holds out her hand to escort Vriska to the next phase. 

Floral: Amazing!

Andi: Funnily enough, this staging actually wasn’t intentional when I first drew it in the sketch phase. It was a coincidence that it was so reminiscent of this scene. But still, I think sometimes we artists have a visual library we can pull from and I think I was subconsciously remembering this as I was drawing it. I fully leaned into it once the drawing was almost finished. I think it’s a very poetic visual. These are Vriska’s core memories and I think reliving them the way she has to is very important.

Kim: I’m honestly so glad you leaned into the visual callback of it… Taking this moment that was once (of many) a brutal moment of Vriska’s life, but this time it is now a moment of kindness… an extending open hand instead of a tightened fist. IT’S POETIC!! IT’S BEAUTIFUL!!!

Floral: Enter the questcoon! I was trying to not be too precious with this background since I could the structure of it would drive me fucking crazy if I did. So instead I picked a picture of a domed amphitheater and layered rock textures on top of each other over and over again to get something that felt naturally chaotic.

Chumi: Gettin’ a lil’ emotion just looking at these CGs again. It’s a really tender moment.

Andi: Floral coordinated this scene for this in text and I followed through with this. This also re-uses some parts of previous old HS1 panels. I wanted to emphasize the weight of this scene and how extremely sentimental and emotional this situation is for her by having Tavros and Aradia lie her down gently on the slab that was probably the most physically traumatic place to bleed to death in the past. A bit of grace while Vriska truly understands her actions. Just a phenomenal moving scene, written by Floral.

Kim: I love the gentleness of this scene… Every time I look at these CGs and especially seeing it all together in the game itself makes me tear up every time. This is such a subtle acting detail but the way Aradia even gently helps Vriska lay her head down… something as small as Aradia not wanting Vriska to hurt her head on the rock flooring because she CARES!!! AUGH!!!!

Floral: Andi once again absolutely delivered with these CGs and completely sold the scene from the gentle warmth coming off the rocks and all the facial expressions and EVERYTHING.

Floral: And to kick off the end of chapter 2, we are bringing back echeladders YAHOOO!! I was in charge of the UI assets and surprisingly this one took the longest. There’s something about these pages that capture a certain vibe and I was really hoping to make people feel nostalgic for it.

We created a “Hell Tier Puns” document between everyone to try and accumulate enough titles, “Dante Basco’s Inferno” in particular getting a good giggle out of me. “8oundary Respecter” of course was the perfect tier to end for this section. 

Kim: We even made a new little sprite for Year 2 Vriska just for the echeladder LOL.

Floral: What other titles can we expect to come? What is going on with this candle? How many of these damn things are we gonna see???

Andi: And now….. DAVEPETA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Chumi: Davepeta… We are winning!!!

Andi: I remember when we were beginning assignments for the sprites, I immediately volunteered to do Davepeta. They’re one of my favorite sprites and I was very grateful they let me. 

Floral: Makes me go uuuwaaaaaaa at the roleplaying and cutesy ones in particular.

Kim: We couldn’t have asked a better person to do the Davepeta sprites… literally SO cute. Big fan of the >3< sprite. Nya nya… Maybe Homestuck can afford to be a little moe.

Andi: It was really fun to try to capture their mannerisms as stoicism isn’t the only defining trait here anymore! (Considering most people see Davepeta as Davesprite with a sprinkle of Nepeta.) But no! Nepeta is just as much in the front as Davesprite is! I wanted to show more of Nepetas' quirks here, her cute expressions and charms. Especially her role playing habits seeping through unapologetically. 

Also, man, I was worried about how Davepetas wings would manage to fit in the scene but I think it's okay if they're a little obscured. Most people went ahead and ripped them and saw it all anyway. Thanks for enjoying the sprites guys! It did make me happy to see our hard work paid off!! You may see a few new unique sprites or two coming soon. Look out for it :3