starting to think about #towngame again... doing figure drawing sketch practice and thinking about how different head-to-height ratios produce different tonal effects. we're currently leaning towards 1:4ish as the furthest you can push a cartoon before they start to become "chibi"… I like animal crossing but the chibi twee aesthetic in slice-of-life games is overused now and also gives everything a "toybox" effect where I want something that feels more present & honest.
my art skills are "unpolished" to put it very generously and this has demonstrated so tangibly to me that I've spent muuuch more time doing from-life figure drawing than I have cartooning… wanna develop the instincts for how to simplify shapes/lines and exaggerate ratios
avoiding the "toybox" thing is why I'm testing a much more zoomed-in camera than my last experiments. it makes the art more work (detail is hard!) but gives so much more room for expressive characters and really helps you feel like you're -here- and walking around.