Video games have brought us an incredible range of memorable and iconic creatures over the decades, from Trico in The Last Guardian, to Creepers in Minecraft, Goombas in the Mario series, Big Daddies from BioShock, Final Fantasy's Chocobos, or Gorons in the Zelda franchise.
In a Develop:Brighton talk entitled 'Bringing Creatures to Life: How to Make Good, Emotionally Appealing Creature Designs', Sam Santala detailed the foundations for making creatures come to life in a way that makes sense for games, whether they're monstrous foes or adorable allies.
Santala has worked as a senior concept artist since 2014, working on games such as Rare's Everwild, Ubisoft's Might & Magic: Elemental Guardians, ArenaNet's Guild Wars 2, or Avatar: Pandora Rising. In 2020, he launched Songhorn, his outsourcing art studio focusing solely on creature design.