Review Fix Exclusive: Paul Richards Talks ‘Substrata’

Review Fix chats with “Substrata” creator Paul Richards, who discusses the project, which consists of the work of artists from some of the biggest names in video game art from series the likes of “World of Warcraft,” “Gears of War” “Assassins Creed IV” and more in an effort to create an entirely new world.

Review Fix: What was the inspiration for the project?

Paul Richards: Whenever you leave a studio, you wind up missing all the awesome people you worked with.  Vigil Games, creator of the Darksiders franchise, assembled a top-notch team of dark fantasy artists.  When its publisher THQ went bankrupt in 2012, everyone split up. Substrata was a way to ‘get the gang back together’  — get everyone thinking along those lines again.

Review Fix: For those don’t know, how important is the art in a video game?

Richards: Depends on who you ask!   Great games have been made without great art, but an attractive wrapper never hurts.  It gets your attention, helps set a desired mood, and provides a certain level of immersion.  We tailor reality by what we put in front of our eyes.

Review Fix: How hard was it to get all of these artists together?

Richards: As a former art director once told me, “Talent attracts talent.” Professional artists are often highly restrained by their day jobs, so they’re usually itching to have ownership of something new, especially if they can create it with respected peers.  Once we had a handful of people kicking out content, others could see how much fun we were having and followed suit.  This is how our community grew beyond just the Vigil crew, reaching a global scale.

Review Fix: What were your initial expectations for the book and have they been accomplished?


Richards:
The work itself is always the most rewarding part, and everyone delivered in fine style, with lots of surprise entries along the way.  Michael Scala provided a text logo, Adrian Dadich made the arresting image which became our cover, and my wife Lena miraculously tied it all together with her layouts and sequencing.  Then, as if things hadn’t gone smoothly enough, UDON was cool enough to print the project as-is.  They didn’t ask for anything to be censored or removed.  This kind of thing literally never happens.

Review Fix: What are your hopes for the book?

Richards: I’d like for all the contributors to be recognized, and for their work to gain all the traction it deserves.  Many of them used their now-defunct CGhub profiles as homepages, but their names are all clearly displayed next to their work, which is something not a lot of art books do.  We hope Substrata sells decently, as proceeds will be donated to a charity organization called Gamers For Good.  http://www.gamersforgood.com/

Review Fix: Can we expect more volumes in the future?

Richards: We’ll wait and see if there’s demand for a “Substrata II,” but for now the group is working on a secret project of a different genre, with the same credo we entered Substrata with: make cool, original content.

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About Patrick Hickey Jr. 14262 Articles
Patrick Hickey Jr. is a full-time Assistant Professor of Communication & Performing Arts and Director of the Journalism program at Kingsborough Community College and is the chairman of the City University of New York Journalism Council. He is the Founder and Editor-In-Chief of ReviewFix.com. He's also a former News Editor at NBC Local Integrated Media and National Video Games Writer at Examiner.com where his work was mentioned in National Ad campaigns by Disney, Nintendo and EA Sports. Hickey was also the Editor-In-Chief of two College Newspapers before he received his BA in Journalism from Brooklyn College. Hickey's work has been published in The New York Daily News, The New York Times, Complex, The Hockey Writers, Yahoo!, Broadway World, Examiner, NYSportScene Magazine, ProHockeyNews.com, GothamBaseball.com, The Syracuse Post-Standard, Scout.com and the official sites of the Brooklyn Aces and New York Islanders. His first book, The Minds Behind the Games: Interviews With Cult And Classic Video Game Developers was released in April 2018 and is chock full of interviews with legendary developers. His second book in the series, The Minds Behind Adventures Games, was released in December 2019. His third book, The Minds Behind Sports Games, was released in September 2020. His fourth book, The Minds Behind Shooter Games, was released in March 2021. The Minds Behind Sega Genesis Games and The Minds Behind PlayStation Games were released in 2022 and The Minds Behind PlayStation 2 was published in January 2023. Hickey is also a contracted comic book writer, currently penning his original series, "Condrey," as well as "The Job," "Brooklyn Bleeds" "Dem Gulls" and "KROOM" for Legacy Comix, where he serves as founder, owner and Editor-in-Chief. Hickey Jr. is also a voice actor, having starred in the 2018 indie hit and 2019 Switch, PS4 and Xbox One release, The Padre (also serving as English language Story Editor), from Shotgun With Glitters. The sequel, The Padre: One Shell Straight to Hell was released in February 2021- Hickey also served as a Story Editor and Lead Voiceover performer. He has also done narration and trailers for several other titles including The Kaiju Offensive, Relentless Rex and Roniu’s Tale. Hickey is also the lead voiceover performer on Mega Cat Studios’ upcoming title WrestleQuest, responsible for nearly 90 characters in the game, as well as Skybound's Renfield: Bring Your Own Blood, where he voices both Dracula and Renfield, as well as several other characters. He also stars in Ziggurat Interactive’s World Championship Boxing Manager 2, where he performs the VO of nearly every male character in the game. He also worked on the Atari VCS’s BPM Boy.

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