Ripping Art Off

The walls. Almost literally.
There is something great about making a painting about something that I've encountered in a video game. It's especially gratifying when it's a game that I've played all the way through. Beaten. Because most games don't have scores of course. It used to be that you'd get a high score and that would not only be your reward, but a testimony to your ability to beat the game. Not a bad deal, because video games by their nature don't provide anything tangible in the form of a reward for overcoming all the obstacles the game threw at you.
Now there was a game (whose name I can't remember for the life of me) that had a screen pop up at then end asking the player to take a photo of their monitor and send it to the company for a reward. After a week or so, the player would get the coolest thing in the mail from the company. A medal! How awesome is that! I've never seen the medal in real life, but even if it was the cheapest Chinese knock off, it would have been so cool to have a token of accomplishment from the designers of the game.
But no one does that. I'm sure there's good reason for that. For one thing, games are made to be won now. Early games could theoretically be won, but it wasn't an expectation when being played. For the most part, you played as much as you could and got as far as you could and hoped for the best.
But that's OK. Things change, and beating a game feels pretty good.
Except you don't get a medal.
So I like painting something from the game. Not only does it bring back some fond memories, but it's a great token that I was there and had a heck of a good time solving all the puzzles and overcoming all enemies. Think about it as a vacation photograph.

So with "Beyond Good and Evil", I won the game. Not that difficult to do, but a great ride while it lasted. Of course, once the game is done there's not much to do except wait for a possible sequel. In the meantime, there were plenty of little touches in the game which were artistic in their own right and deserved to be painted.
What I've noticed is that many games have digital paintings or posters throughout the levels to add atmosphere. Some of these are extremely well done and I like the idea of a designer making a piece to be shown in the game. It's a great opportunity to capture the mood of the game in another medium. So if you were making a gloomy horror game, you'd get a chance to make a painting that wouldn't be out of place being hung in an abandoned mansion.
You get the idea.
Some of these digital artwork touches are very cool, and I think I'll paint more as I go along.
I wish I'd thought of this earlier, because "Dead Space" is a horror game taking place on a huge, empty space ship and some of the higher levels have posters for movies that are futuristic- but gaudy. Odd little touches that I wouldn't mind painting. However, after I beat the game I erased the thing from my hard drive. So if I want to paint them now, I'd have to reinstall the thing and then play it most of the way through again.
Still. It's a heck of a good game... And I do want those posters..