art book

OBSIDIAN

PARADOX INTERACTIVE

project lead

project lead

B rian H eins

G ustav G roth

production

layout and design

R ose G omez

C hristian G ranath

artwork

editors

B. R. G uthrie , B obby H ernandez , P olina H ristova ,

L indsey L aney , B rian M enze , M itch L oidolt , K elvin N akamura , P aul F ish ,
H ector E spinoza , D emi W arren , J ohn L ewis , J ames M elilli
contributing commentary

B. R. G uthrie , B rian M enze , R obert L and ,

L indsey L aney , M att M ac L ean

M arco B ehrmann , T omas H renstam

the tyranny brand team

Marco Behrmann, brand manager | Gustav Groth, associate brand manager

S taffan B ergln , lead producer | A ngelica U hln , associate producer
Malin Sderberg, marketing | Filip Sirc, marketing | Nikoo Jorjani, marketing
Magnus E riksson , analytics |M ikael B erg , tech and development
P ontus A nehll , qa project coordinator |L oke Norman , qa project coordinator

tyranny leadership

B rian H eins , project lead |M atthew S ingh , lead producer

B rian M enze , art director |M att M ac L ean , lead narrative designer

special thanks to

J oe F ricano

THANKS
Wed like to thank the teams at Obsidian Entertainment and Paradox Interactive for all of their hard
work and dedication in bringing the new world of Terratus to life. To our friends and family, thank
you for your overwhelming support during the development of the game; we couldnt have done it
without you. To our fans, thank you for joining us yet again! Were excited and thankful to be able to
share the story of Kyros Tiers with all of you.

Kyros has no desire to rule an empty wasteland, nor would we wish to build a game with a colorless
landscape for you to explore and conquer. When we embarked on Tyranny with the operative
phrase What if evil won? in our minds, we knew we wanted a cast of evil villains that the player would
have to work for and then most likely kill in some delightful fashion, and we knew world-shaping
curses from some distant and calculating Overlord would be the big, devastating backdrop.
With those principles in mind, a bleak, depressing art style might have been a tempting fit, but
we also knew we wanted to make a game with a darkly optimistic tone not a world where good
will necessarily triumph in time, but a world where life goes on no matter how many times evil
keeps doing what it does best.
The Overlords Edicts gave us nearly limitless possibilities for treacherous, challenging landscapes. The
lava-drenched Burning Library and the storm-blasted landscapes of the Blade Grave were born from
some of the earliest pieces of concept art dreamed up by our art team. The world we sought to
portray needed to be more than just ash and ruins: it needed to have life flourishing between
the cracks of the epic devastation. And from this ambition came the ragtag settlements bristling
between the crags of the Stone Sea, and the denizens of Lethians Crossing
finding shelter in the
Matt MacLean, Lead Narrative
shadow of the foreboding Oldwalls.
Designer
Tyrannys isometric view makes for great RPG adventure, but it doesnt let you pitch the camera up
to see the true height of the Oldwalls, nor pitch it down to see the terrifying plunge from atop
a Spire. Thankfully, this book is a chance to show you those landscapes zoomed out, to provide
glimpses of characters and factions in their conceptual stages of growth, and to show you more
of the rich world weve built for you to light on fire. While the world presented in Tyranny may
be a terrible place to raise a family, its certainly a wonderful place to be evil, adventurous, or
ideally both. We hope your sagas in Tyranny are as memorable and rewarding as creating this
game has been for us.

matt maclean , lead narrative designer

world map

characters

tunon
Tunon the Adjudicator is primarily a creature of law and reason. He is not a
soldier and so does not wade into battle swinging his hammer.
He is the Judge, Jury, and Executioner behind all things in the Tiers. We
wanted him to always be in a higher position than everyone else in a scene
to emphasize his position as the Adjudicator. This is why he stands on a
pedestal of black smoke and floats while he moves.

Tunons mask was meant to convey a nonemotional approach to his judgment hes always
stony-faced, not letting emotions get in the way of
his rulings on Kyros Law.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

archons
characters

graven ashe
archon of war

Graven Ashe is a general a commander of military

forces. He can engage in direct combat, but he knows
that a generals place is to observe and direct his troops,
not wade into the fray.
When designing Graven Ashe, we wanted him to feel
almost like a fortified castle, which is why all you see of
him is his head peeking out above the fur-lined collar. It
was important that at first glance you get the feel that
youre looking at an experienced war veteran, so we
aged and scarred him.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

archons
characters

voices of nerat
archon of secrets

The Archon of Secrets known as the Voices of Nerat is the leader

of the Scarlet Chorus army. Unlike Graven Ashe, he isnt a regular
military general: hes more akin to the charismatic leader of a
violent mob. He has absorbed the personalities and knowledge
of several military leaders, giving him expertise to lead an army
but these personalities often have conflicting methods
of conducting war.
Nerat prides himself on his personal skills as a torture artist,
mystic, and warrior. Though his work as Kyros spymaster
revolves around convincing others to die for his purposes, the
Archon is a fearsome combatant and finds deep, personal
satisfaction in the practice of bloodshed.
We wanted him to appear crazy from first glance. We convey
the idea that there are many personalities or Voices in
his head by having multiple faces on his helmet and weaponry.

His helmet was inspired by Gemini from

Thundarr the Barbarian, whose helmet spins
as he talks.
p r o c e ss p i e c e s

archons
characters

bleden mark
archon of shadow
Bleden Mark is Kyros Assassin, bound to eliminate those who defy
the Overlords will. At the beginning of the Conquest, Marks leash
was given to Tunon the Adjudicator to enforce Kyros Law. Mark
took this as a sign of disrespect and has chafed at Tunons rule
ever since.
We wanted Bleden Mark to encompass the feel of ancient
magic, as if hes from a different era. If theres an Old Guard to the
Archons, Bleden Mark would be a part of it. We tried to convey an
earthy, tribal appearance, reflected in his clothing and facial
markings.
Bleden Mark can strike anywhere at any time, and the commonfolk
of the Tiers fear him as they would a boogeyman: a shadowy
enforcer dedicated to ending any treason against Kyros, whether
deed or word.
Fortunately for most commonfolk, their crimes are usually beneath
the Archon of Shadows attention, for Bleden Marks attention is
primarly focused on the Archons that refuse to bow to Kyros rule.
Bleden Marks a veteran, professional assassin whos lived for
several centuries and spilled an immeasurable amount of blood, and
hes not very torn up about it. Cynical, roguish, and calculating, hes
an overall unconcerned and often unaffected person. Hes become
bored with life but is looking for entertainment namely in the
form of the player, in whom hes taken a special interest.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

archons
characters

sirin

archon of song

By the time she was six years old, Sirin had already killed over
70 people. Granted, all of these deaths were accidents, but that
just proves how powerful she truly is. Blessed and cursed with
the ability to control people with her voice, she inadvertently
forced people to perpetrate some terrible acts before she learned
how to control herself. Now fifteen, her tragic upbringing has
left her defensive, scarred, and unwilling to trust anyone completely. To give Sirin the proper attitude in-game, we utilized the
animation department to ensure Sirin stood and moved like the
powerful-yet-vulnerable teenager she is.
As the Songbird, we were visually playing up the idea of a bird as
much as we could. You can see this throughout her design, starting
with the feather motif on her dress. Her helmet was inspired by
the flare of a peacocks tail, as were the feather-like fabric pieces
draping from her collar.
The red stone on her forehead was originally intended to be a
collar piece, but it was moved to her helmet for better visibility
the challenges of an isometric game.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

companions
characters

barik

Barik is an elite Stone Shield (one of the Disfavoreds iron-clad

warriors) fallen from favor and trapped in a suit of armor. He
resembles a walking version of the Blade Grave: weapons and
armor interlock, surrounding a human core. Imagine a
walking, talking Iron Throne that serves as his mobile prison.
Barik is sealed inside several sets of Disfavored and Unbroken
armor. They are mystically fused to be his protection or prison
he himself is unclear which it is meant to be, or if meaning
has anything to do with it. Barik is a true believer in the
Disfavored legion, adoring their traditions and forgiving any
and all flaws or hypocrisies his position invites.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

companions
characters

verse

Verse is designed to give context to the Scarlet Chorus. She

believes in the egalitarian promise of the Scarlet Chorus: that
effort and merit are all that matter, birth and status be damned.
She is a Scarlet Fury one of the Scarlet Chorus elite fighters.
Verses armor is a bit of a patchwork, because it is made up of
pieces of her fallen sisters armor. You can see this in the
different colors of leather that she uses. Its a way of keeping
pieces of her sisters with her at all times.
Verse is the only survivor of a disgraced unit and, through some
unknown means, is able to wield the weapons of her dead
comrades with the same skill they once did, as if able to draw
upon their training.
Verse reads her opponents in combat often sensing far more
than where they will strike next or if they are considering a feint.
Unable to reign in this eye for intention, Verse has a complicated
relationship with violence, finding it enlightening, exhilarating,
overwhelming, and violating all at once.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

companions
characters

lantry

We needed to visually differentiate Lantry from the other Sages

you see in the game. To so do, we aged him, giving him a shock of
white hair and a beard to make him very easily recognizable.
After going through the events of the Vellum Citadel, Lantry
has suffered some damage. Hes burned, bandaged, and bruised
compared to the other Sages youll encounter in the game, who
are relatively well-kept.
Lantry isnt actually the oldest character in the game age-wise,
but he is the oldest character in terms of being one of the earliest
concepts on the project. Creating a game in a brand new world
means bombarding the player with details, so its just good
sense to make sure one of the characters in your party happens
to genuinely enjoy being asked simple questions about history
and current events. His look (and the look of the Sages as a
whole) started around an avian theme, because much of the
Sages work requires a good feather quill, something to carry a
message across the mountains, and eggs, which make a great
binding agent for ink.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

companions
characters

kills - in - shadow
Kills-in-Shadow is a monster. Shes frightening and hairy. She
stinks of wet animal and has an insatiable bloodlust for violence
and slaughter. Shes also a clever hunter, and a brutish, skilled
fighter. She is tenaciously loyal (unless, of course, she has
sensed a weakness) to whomever she chooses to follow, whether
that be her ruthless sister Creeping-Death, who was the last
leader of their tribe or a human Fatebinder stronger than
even the toughest of Beastwomen.
As the last surviving Shadowhunter, shes on a single-minded
hunt for blood and vengeance, and will not be satisfied until
each and every Disfavored has been wiped from the Tiers.

p r o c e ss
pieces

companions
characters

eb

In our earliest plans for the game, we knew that wed want one
of the companions to be a representative of Tiers culture: that
they are a bronze-age, maritime people who are overly proud
of their unvanquished status (or so was the case before Kyros
Archons invaded). We also wanted to make sure the Tiersmen
werent the obvious good guys, but rather a group of people with
their own bigotries, hatreds, and contradictions and from
this are you sure you want to rescue these people? notion
came Ebs salty, abrasive personality.
Eb is a water mage, so we could have gone the classic mage robe
look, but that seemed tired and inappropriate for such a nomadic
mage. To that end, we went with ship rigging as the visual hook
for her look. You can see ship knots and ropes throughout her
costume, and a unique use of a stingray as a cloak.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

companions
characters

We knew right away that we wanted to go with a stylized approach to

our characters, initially taking our cues from Batman: The Animated
Series, Hellboy comics, and Star Wars: Clone Wars.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

the player character

characters

Player portraits went through many iterations before we decided on

the final art style you see in the game today.

player portraits
characters

With each portrait, we wanted to reinforce the tattered nature of the

players clothing nothing is pristine in this war-torn world.

player portraits
characters

the disfavored

The Disfavored are one of the smallest of Kyros forces. Because of their
elite nature, they do not accept everyone into their ranks. Every
soldier was well-trained before joining the Disfavored. After joining,
they must master the squad-based discipline of the Disfavored before
theyre allowed to join any conflict.
While their numbers are small, they are the most well-trained military
force in the known world, with a reputation as an unstoppable
military juggernaut that crushes all resistance. Much of this is due to
the powers of the Archon, Graven Ashe, but its also due to the quality of
the soldiers and their training.
The overall look of the Disfavored was inspired by Ming the Merciless
guards in the 1980s Flash Gordon film. Theyre meant to look
intimidating and strike fear into the hearts of an opposing army.

We wanted this helmet to look

like flames coming from the
mouth of a demon.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

the armies of kyros

characters

the scarlet chorus

The Scarlet Chorus is the largest of Kyros forces, mainly because the
bulk of the army is made up of conscripted troops, outlaw gangs, the
scum of prisons, and the insane. The goal of the Chorus is to inspire
fear and overwhelm their opponents with sheer numbers. Voices of
Nerat doesnt care how many die in order to accomplish his goals.
There are always more prisoners and many madmen left in the
aftermath of his attacks, both of which make good new recruits to the
Chorus.
The only thing that keeps the Chorus in line is their collective fear of Nerat.
The Scarlet Chorus is typically made up of conscripted people from the
conquered areas of the world. All of their armors are meant to be
pieced together from the various armies theyve fought, or taken from
the people that theyve killed.
They are designed to look crazy, barbaric, and uncivilized men and
women who look like they will do anything to win. The red war paint
is meant to symbolize the blood of past victims of battles won and raids
completed.

Their appearance was meant

to look just as erratic as the
appearance of Voices of Nerat,
further signifying his insanity
and chaotic ways.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

the armies of kyros

characters

the bronze brotherhood

The Bronze Brotherhood are the last of the Free

Cities mercenaries to survive Kyros invasion of the
Tiers, which is something of a dubious distinction
considering the Brotherhood survived the war by
taking a contract with the enemy. Now the last of a
centuries-old tradition, the warriors who make up
the current company have no home under the new
regime, and few friends amongst their own kind.
As career warriors who take the study of violence
quite earnestly, the Brotherhood worship and admire
the Scourges. While sane human beings live in fear of
these magical monsters, these sellswords find
inspiration in the Scourges rage and tenacity, and
youll see the Scourge face and talons used as visual
elements in the Brotherhoods weapons and armor.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

the tiersmen
characters

The nation of Stalwart has a proud military tradition, going so far as to name
their citizen militia the Unbroken to boast of how they have never lost a war
on their own home soil ... a boast Kyros forces intend to discredit.

the unbroken

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

The Unbroken appearance is modeled after the other Tiersman factions (the chief
detail being bronze armor), but with everything dirtied up and given touches of
desert nomad fashion. This is because the vast majority of Unbroken whom the
player will meet have been living life under the extreme conditions that the Edict
of Storms has inflicted on their lands.

the tiersmen
characters

the vendrien guard

When the realm of Apex fell to Kyros, the remnants of its most elite
fighting force, the Vendrien Guard, refused to accept defeat. Composed
of battle-hardened veterans and idealistic young adults too nave to
understand the meaning of hopelessness, the reborn Vendrien Guard
are less a proper fighting force and more akin to a gaggle of desperate
partisans.
Kyros invasion of the Tiers is one of iron-age belligerents invading a
weaker, bronze-age opponent, so it was important that the Vendrien
Guard (being the players first introduction to the Tiersmen) showcase
lots of bronze armor that contrasts with the iron of the Disfavored.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

the tiersmen
characters

Beastwomen do not think the same way that humans do. As wild,
animalistic creatures, their experience of the world is extremely
visceral and sensory-related. They consider themselves apex predators,
and they take great pride and exhilaration in their ability to stalk and
kill creatures of all types, humans sometimes included. However, they
form strong emotional ties with their own kith, and will often express
a range of complex, intense feelings within their speech, from thrill, to
fury, to easy-going contentment.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

beastmen
characters

We wanted to convey a drab pallet for the poor, with the

clothing becoming brighter and more garish as a persons
wealth increases. Nobles are the brightest because they can
afford the dyes and expensive textiles in this world. Basic
villagers have little in terms of patterns, layers, and
accessories, due to their limited resources.

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

villagers
characters

p r o c e ss p i e c e s

bane
characters

We wanted some sort of non-human enemy for Tyranny,

and we knew we didnt want to use orc-like or zombie-like
monsters, but something in stark contrast to the bipedal,
generic human form. We went with a more ethereal look.
We knew early on that we wanted different sub-species of
ethereal monsters, each a different flavor of unsettling.

weapons and armor

weapons
weapons and armor

We wanted the weapons to feel like they fit into a Bronze

Age world, but not be very culture-specific.

The world of the Tiers isnt very advanced

compared to ours, so we wanted to stick to a
simple armor set helmets, chestplates,
shoulder guards, and greaves.
This world is just beginning to leave the
Bronze Age, so iron is extremely rare and
valuable, and steel is unheard of. To help sell
the time period, we wanted to make sure our
armors did not look technologically advanced.

armor
weapons and armor

environments

edgering
ruins
Here we wanted to encapsulate
all of the visual pillars of our game
the world is war torn, magic is
heightened, and theres a long
history of the world before the
Overlord conquered the area.
To help sell this, we included the
statue of Queen Lycaereus weeping
blood. The area is heavily shadowed
to make sure that its clear from the
opening environment that this is
not a happy world.

environments

spires
The Spires are towering structures created by the same
civilization that engineered the Oldwalls, and which
has remained a mystery for all of recorded history. No
one has ever seen the top of a Spire until the player
gains access to the Spire in Vendriens Well. These Spires
are tied to the magical energy generated by Belief and
allow the player to begin issuing Edicts on the world.

environments

spires
We wanted to give a feeling of ancient technology
and ancient civilizations through these Spires.
These are objects that have been around much
longer than the current civilizations in Tyranny.
They have their own runes, design motifs, and
shape language that differentiate them from
the rest of the world.

environments

blade
grave
The nation of Stalwart was once a proud
country with a powerful army known as the
Unbroken. Now, nation and army are no more,
and the area is a rust-filled wasteland known as
the Blade Grave.
A massive tornado rages in the center of the
region, spreading out rust storms in random
directions for miles and miles. While it is
commonly believed that Kyros Edict created the
storms that displaced the armies and formed the
Blade Grave, nobody truly understands how the
storms sustain themselves or where the soldiers
went. Within this wasteland, opportunistic
scavengers mine the old battlefields for scrap, and
local Rebel groups clash with Kyros forces in a
show of defiance.
This particular scene was our visual target
during pre-production. We wanted to hit our core
pillars of war-torn areas, heightened magic, and
grand scale.

environments

blade
grave
The Blade Grave is a scarring of the earth on a
massive scale; its a huge stretch of land
devastated by magical forces. The idea behind the
visuals here was to convey blasts of power that
solidified the earth into a horizontal tornado of
destruction fusing the armors of the fallen
enemy army into the ground spikes.

environments

lethian s
crossing
A small trading settlement before Kyros invasion, the discovery
of iron in the nearby mountains turned Lethians Crossing into a
center of commerce.
This independent settlement was built against the Oldwalls
abutting the Sunset Spire. Though an outpost of humble origins,
it has since grown into one of the premiere trade centers of the
Tiers, prized by merchants that prefer to conduct business beyond
the reach of royal decrees. The prominent Spire acts as a beacon
for travelers and traders alike.
Being that our world is war torn and devastated, this is as large of a
city that we wanted to portray in the game so that we would never
display prosperity throughout the world. These arent the typical big
cities you see in RPGs, and these people are poor and beaten down.

environments

burning
library
The Burning Library was formerly
known as the Vellum Citadel. During
Kyros Conquest, the great Citadel
was reduced to an inhospitable sea of
liquefying masonry. Undamaged in the
miasma of fire: the books. Though their
pages burned, they did not blacken,
crisp, or crumble. Floating on rivers of
molten shelving, the books bore the
thousand-degree heat thanks to the
ancient Sorcery that protected the
written word.
While protected from the direct effects of flame, many texts were physically displaced in the chaos. Scrolls
and loose pages not properly weighed
down became airborne embers, borne
aloft by the warm air to the surrounding regions sparking a thousand
small fires in those areas.

environments

burning
library
When we came up with the original design of the Burning Library,
we wanted it to be an actual, functioning citadel. The first step
was to create the floor plan for it in the editor and then to destroy
it, to make the levels you see in-game. Working with our artists,
we took the parts of the building that were below the main floor
and actually rendered them in the scene so we could put effects
and lighting on them to make them look right. If you reconstructed the building from the pieces in-game (plus a few that were
lost to the volcano), you could see how the library looked before
the Edict destroyed it.

environments

stone sea
The Stone Sea takes its name from the shifting tectonics that occurred
as jutting pillars smashed up through the ground and sinkholes
appeared in the wake of Kyros Edict of Storms. The Edict has turned
this realm, once a fertile expanse of rolling plains, into a jagged wilderness, causing massive pillars and plateaus to erupt from the surface ...
and causing other parts of the ground to fall away.
The Stone Sea is home to roving tribes of Beastmen, who have been
instructed to surround and isolate formerly rebellious communities in
the area. These communities stood firm against the armies and, while
brave, Kyros has left them to stand their ground, even if the ground
wouldnt stand with them.

environments

stone sea
One of our goals with the Stone Sea
was to create an area with a great
sense of verticality, immensity, and
hardness. The region predominantly
features kicked-up grit, craggy bluffs,
and steep drop-offs that embody the
perilous nature of traversing the
war-torn Tiers. Once a rolling landscape of winding rivers and fertile
plains known as Azure, the realm has
since been utterly ravaged by a series
of devastating tectonic shifts and
magical ecological transmutations in
the name of Kyros conquest.

environments

vendrien s
well
Vendriens Well was once a frontier outpost of the Northern Empire,
and the size and scale of the structure should raise eyebrows in players
minds that such an outpost says a great deal about the scope and size
of what a true fortification must be in the Northern Empire.
In the Conquest, many soldiers being driven from the north and east
found refuge in the citadel and became part of the famed Vendrien
Guard. They fought fiercely, with no place to retreat to. In a series of
bloody battles, the Well was broken once, twice ... and, just before the
Conquest, it rose up a third time, the remaining Vendrien Guard casting
out the Disfavored occupiers.
We really wanted to reiterate that the people of this world arent as
sophisticated in their technology and architectural advancements as
those in our world. So youll notice that the stones of the walls arent
evenly cut, and overall the buildings are crudely made.

environments

the bastard
city
Named for its position between two realms (the Northern Empire and the
Southern Tiers), the Bastard City (and its surrounding lands, known as the Bastard
Tier) is a melting pot of cultures, and a place of commerce and intrigue.
The Tiersmen of the south view the Bastard City as a place of wealth and excess; to
the people of the Northern Empire, however, the Bastard City is little more than a
sprawling slum.
Tunon the Adjudicator established his Court in the Bastard City. From this foothold
in the Tiers, he and his Court of Fatebinders impose Kyros laws upon the
conquered land.

environments

tunon s
throne
room
Tunons Court, like the Archon that inhabits it, was
designed to look regal but unsettling. Tunon maintains
the veneer of an orderly environment, but the
shadowy pits that flank the halls petitioners remind
us that a cruel end is but one judgment away. In many
ways, the court is an effective metaphor for life under
Kryos rule: society appears well-governed and stable,
so long as you ignore the gaping abyss that can swallow
you at any moment.

environments

the
oldwalls
The Oldwalls are one of the most enigmatic elements in
Tyranny and were always meant to be imposing, ancient
spaces that raised more questions than they answered.
When concepting the space, we tried to find ways to impart
a deliberate creepiness to the area. Elements like the eerie,
unnatural lighting, the maze-like construction, and the
ritualistic decorations in the chambers were intended to
convey a felt-but-unexplained purpose. The Oldwalls are
indeed old, and they house many secrets.

environments

the
oldwalls
The Oldwalls were meant to feel maze-like, almost like an
M.C. Escher drawing, in that the player and the dead that
reside within could feel lost once theyve gone inside,
trapped in a never-ending maze.
The interior of the Oldwalls is massive compared to what
the player is able to walk through in game. To portray this
to the player, we made backgrounds to show multiple levels
of the Oldwalls that are inaccessible. The player is never
meant to know how high up they are inside the walls.

environments

misc .

Here you can see a variety of concepts for areas that we

were considering using, but which didnt make it into the
final game.

environments

cinematics

Greek and Roman drawings were the inspiration behind the

cinematic and Conquest imagery. We added color to the drawings,
rather than just going with the original monochromatic style.
Its sort of an amalgam between the stylization of the game and the
Greek and Roman pottery drawings and stained glass windows.

intro
cinematics

Because the art style is kind of flat like paper cut outs the
challenge was to keep things interesting. We did this by
creating interesting and challenging compositions.

act i
cinematics

The challenge with these was figuring out how to make a

dynamic composition that could be reused to display all of the
possible choices that the player can make at the end of Act II,
while making them unique enough to feel different.

act ii
cinematics

For these we needed to pick a composition

that would show off the Spires, but which
would also work from a middle-ground
perspective to show off both Edicts that
affect the ground and the sky. It was
challenging to depict a very vertical object
from a horizontal aspect ratio.
Figuring out the dominant colors in each
piece to make them distinct from one
another was another challenge. We
wanted the colors to thematically represent
the Edicts, rather than directly represent
them. We reinterpreted them in a way that
worked for a 2D stylized image.

act iii
cinematics

We also tried to reuse as many parts as possible, to allow for all of the possible
faction combinations.

act iv
cinematics

These cinematic slides were also one of the places where we were able to get gory.
Even though we were using brighter colors, the overall imagery was rather dark.

act iv
cinematics

bastard city
conquest

Developing a believable world requires using every

opportunity to bring it to life, which is why we chose to use
the Conquest illustrations as a means to show what kind of
art the people in the world of Tyranny might be creating.

A hieroglyphic approach reflects how they, the denizens of

Tyranny, havent yet reached the point at which we, in the
real world, began to understand perspective drawing.

blade grave
conquest

burning library
conquest

Art from the Bronze Age sometimes takes the form of

symbols or pictographs, with some cultures utilizing almost
stamp-like repetition. In the same vein, we used repeating
elements where possible, be it in figures or patterns.

These tight, noisy patterns (and emphasis on line

art and color) evoke comic book half-tones: another
source of inspiration for Tyrannys art style.

lethian s crossing
conquest

A favorite challenge was finding a way to abstract the figures so that they had
the simplicity and stiffness of a pictograph, but also the flexibility to be posed
whatever way we needed to keep the illustrations from becoming repetitive.

stone sea
conquest

vendrien s well
conquest