CASE STUDIES : Cube World - Pixel Animation Project

Project

Our company was hired to provide pixel animation services for the Cube World project.

Cube World – Key Facts

• Target Age 8+;

• Game - Each Cube/Character has a game;

• Motion Sensors - Play with and pester each Stick Character by shaking or tumbling the cube;

• Connect - Build a world by connecting up to 16 cubes with the magnetic sides;

• Transfer - Stick Characters can visit connected cubes. Each cube can hold up to 4 Stick Characters.

Each Cube World contains a little stick man who lives and plays inside. There are loads of characters to collect and each one has a different hobby or job. When Cube Worlds are connected the stick men will interact with each other and leap into neighboring screens. You can arrange your cubes in any configuration as long as the cubes are touching squarely. Once linked you never know what the characters will do.

Challenges and Solutions

There were a number of major challenges that we faced as we started working on the project:

• The purpose of the project was to provide the client with a new series of animations for the Cube World project. As the project had already been launched, we had to deal with all the requirements that had been already developed. Aha! Studios provided us with storyboards and designs and our team of animators had to match the style of the specific character and complexity of the previously created animations for Cube World. The flexibility of our animators and artists helped to meet all the requirements of the client and this particular project.

• Time constraints: The project had to be delivered in a short time frame, so we had to work against a tight deadline with no quality deterioration. Our drive and aspiration to finish the project within the deadline predetermined the pace of the exciting and challenging work on Cube World. The team of our experienced artists and animators managed to finish the project in one month.

• The specifics and amount of animations to be done: the total number of animations was close to 120. Taking into account that the number of animations was big enough, we kept paper track of every single animation and its status.

Technologies Utilized

• Macromedia Director;

• Photoshop CS3;

• Flash 9.

Results

Working in close cooperation with Aha! Studios, we succeeded in meeting all the requirements. We produced a huge number of original, interesting and funny animations.

Customer benefits

• Increased quality. The animations were created by a professional offshore company with a long track of animation experience which provided for maximum quality satisfaction guarantee to the our client;

• Decreased time-to-client. All animations were sent to Aha! piecemeal on a continuous basis in order to provide for timely revisions.