Design Notes

November 22, 2023

Announcing Winners Next Week

The Design a HeroMart Poster Contest was a resounding success! The winning entries are testament to the talent within our amazing community… and will also make wonderful gifts to share with the world! 

Hiya heroes! We were overwhelmed by the incredible talent that poured into each submission for the HeroMart Poster Design Contest. A heartfelt thank you to all participants who turned their canvas into a kaleidoscope of creativity! We cannot believe how incredibly talented you all are! The diversity and originality of the entries left our judging panel in awe; even Dage himself was SUPER impressed.

With soooo many outstanding submissions, narrowing down the winners was no easy task. From vibrant designs that caught the eye to emotionally powerful pieces, each poster told a unique story. This is a mere testament to the rich tapestry of talent within our gaming community!

All these artistic endeavors have set the stage (and raised the bar) for a festive indulgence: the winner’s poster will be released just in time for the holidays, AND the runner-ups will have their art pieces made into prints! 
 

We will begin emailing our winners early next week to privately discuss getting their art up on HeroMart. Later that week, we will publicly announce all our winners and special mentions, so stay tuned for that!

A sincere thank you to every participant who poured their hearts and souls into the HeroMart Poster Design Contest. You are all so incredibly talented!! Your creativity made this competition a true celebration of art and our beloved community of gamers. The gift of your artistic expression will be one that keeps on giving, and we can't wait to share it with the world just in time for the holiday season 🎁🎄☃️

Get ready to unwrap the magic and stay tuned for the big announcement next week!

Battle on!
Beleen, the awe-struck judges, and the entire Artix Entertainment team including our lovely HeroMart helpers :)

January 23, 2014

Art Nouveau

Diozz's Dage The Evil Art Nouveau Print Is Coming!

UPDATE: The poster is now for sale on HEROMART.COM

Have you seen this yet? 

By now, you know that I don't work on AQW anymore. For the past 8 months I've been working full time on Battle Gems, but I don't often get a chance to talk about something this exciting so I hopped back onto the AQW Design Notes. Sorry. 

The image above is the finished version of Diozz's completely breathtaking Dage The Evil poster done in the Art Nouveau style coming very soon to HEROMART! 

I know from Twitter that a lot of you are already excited about this poster but a few of you have asked what Art Nouveau means so I want to tell you a bit about the style. 

What Is Art Nouveau?

Art Nouveau is an art style that began in France in the late 1800's and quickly spread around Europe. It was a very brief period in art history but it left such a lasting impression that a lot of people are still in love with the style today. 

The style is usually characterized by flowing organic forms, both in artistic elements and typography. Usually you'll see a symmetrical form in the background laying the stage for an asymmetrical centerpiece up front. 

Art Nouveau wasn't just a fine art style. The style was found in everything from the silverware of the time to entire buildings, like the designs of the Paris Metro kiosks designed by Hector Guimard which you can still see today around Paris. 

When talking about the Art Nouveau, most people think of the art and prints of Alphonse Mucha. Mucha was a Czech artist living in Paris and became well known for his prints advertising the plays of Ms. Sarah Bernhardt who was a superstar at the time. Mucha is also my all-time favorite artist. 

Here is one of his prints called "Dance", advertising one of Bernhardt's plays. 

The style, and particularly the works of Mucha, have always been appreciated but recently pop culture has seen an explosion of art in the style, some even referencing Mucha's works. 

Take, for example, Bill Mudron's Dr. Who themed Art Nouveau style works (notice any similarities?)...

... or Mr. Mudron's Art Nouveau style Minecraft poster (hanging in my living room)...

You can find examples of Art Nouveau all over geekdom, like in the Firefly themed Art Nouveau prints of Megan Lara... 

...Or Ms. Lane's Sherlock themed Art Nouveau shirt design (Wearing it today. Took this in the mirror)...

So, now you know a little bit about Art Nouveau (New Art, in French) and maybe you will be able to more greatly appreciate how freaking amazing Diozz's poster really is. As you can tell, I'm a big fan of the style and I'm almost as excited about this poster as I am about the upcoming release of Battle Gems. 

If you want to talk more about the poster, Battle gems or art history, you can always hit my Twitter. 

If you're excited about the poster, feel free to spam HeroMart's Twitter, or Faith's Twitter (she runs HeroMart). 

If you are as blown away by this design as I am, show Diozz some love in his Twitter. 

UPDATE: The poster is now for sale on HEROMART.COM

May 21, 2012

Status Update

Stuff Happening Right Now!

This is just a quick post telling you some of what's going on right now and some of what to expect.

The Artix and Sepulchure Action Figures are on sale at U.S. Toys R Us locations all over the United States and also on HeroMart.com

People have been mailing us, tweeting us and letting the community know through the AQW forums as soon as they get their own collector's Artix or Sepulchure figures and sometimes they get BOTH! We've even gotten a few YouTube videos of people receiving their boxes from stores or in the mail and letting us watch them open them up!

It's a little early to say but things are looking good for a SECOND SET of collector's figures but that's a LONG way off. Let's not get ahead of ourselves.

We also have a brand new poster for sale at HeroMart.com which is the Good Heroes of Lore poster, drawn, inked and colored by our own Diozz (who you may remember from his Live Draw event!)

Diozz is pretty excited about his first poster!

There are no pictures of this yet on the site but the poster also comes with the Soul of a Hero armor set, including the Great Spirit of Heroism and Valkyrie of Heroism animated cloaks, also drawn by Diozz!

The team only signed 50 of there and half of those are already gone but there are a few hundred of the unsigned ones if you don't want your pretty poster all cruddded up by a bunch of game developer signatures.

We've also got an Art Contest going on right now!

The Themes Are:
1) Artix vs. Sepulchure
2) Zombies
3) Any Combo of the above options

The Contest Info page can be found here! Please read the rules carefully and PLEASE don't waste our time with stuff you rip off from the internet. You'll get caught and we'll spend a lot of time here at the lab making fun of how stupid you are. Don't be that guy.

STUFF COMING SOON!

Now let's hop into my time traveling phonebooth and dial the number for the near future.

This weekend, AQW Zombies continues as the world of lore falls further and further into the clutches of Sepulchure and more and more of your friends succumb to the zombification effects of the vile green mist.

In this alternate timeline, the traveling sales moglin Quibble Coinbiter is still traveling from town to town selling his never-before-seen, slightly-used rares and items and this Friday he returns to Battleon with a load of Zombie and Zombie Slaying themed AC RARES and ITEMS!

We'll also be trying a couple of new things in Quibble this time...

1) INVESTMENT TRINKETS: This is a new idea that I think most of you will like. Quibble will be selling small AC trinkets for about 1000 ACs each/ What do they do? NOTHING! They just sit in your bag and take up space.

BUT... a few days after Quibble has left Battleon, these investments will appreciate in value! You will be able to sell them back for MORE than you bought them for!

That's right! Buy it for 1000... sell it back for more.

There will be two versions of this trinket. A Member and a Non-Member. They will BOTH appreciate in value after Quibble leaves but the Member one will appreciate for MORE than the non-member trinket AND Members can, of course, buy both.

2) DAGE ARMOR SPECIAL: Most of the items in Quibble's shop will stick to the normal pricing that we've been with for a while but Dage the Evil is working on a special Zombie Killer armor that will be 3000 ACS! We expect the higher price to make this one of the rarest AC armors in the game.

Oh yeah, as a Member Bonus, there will be a Member Only version of the Zombie Killer, exactly like the other one... except it only costs 1 AC.

SOON: Looking For New Mods!

Reens and Stratos will soon be in search of new Mods for AQW!

I cannot stress enough how much we appreciate how much the mods do for the game but there is a lot of game to patrol and most of the mods are volunteer staff so Reens has said that she will be looking for a few extra hands.

AS soon as the search has begun we will post all the information that you need to know to apply. Please do not spam our e-mail and Twitters asking to be made a mod. Being able to read carefully and understand what you're reading is a big part of being a mod so read this part carefully. Begging for us to make you a mod now will revel that you did not read this paragraph. That's a pretty good sign that you aren't mod material.

Until we ask for applications, please review the HOW TO BECOME A MOD page.

SOON: DeathKnight Member Only Class

It won't be this released this week and probably not next week but I'm currently building a Member Only Death Knight Class (It will have different art than the DK Armor that came with the Doom Starter Package). It will take Rank 10 Doomwood Rep BUT there will be an AC Shortcut. Both versions will be Member Only.

214 days until Just Another Day