By Autumn Daughetee
Over the past few weeks I’ve shared the first and second parts of my interview with Amelia Woo, penciller and inker for Gates of Midnight. In this final installment, Amelia talks about her work as a fledgling video game designer and offers her advice to aspiring comic book creators.

I’ve been told that you are also a game designer and are designing your own video game. Can you tell me about it?

Everything started when I spent two years developing a fictional world called Copernicus Island. This was originally designed to be the basis of a comic book. But in the middle of the creative process, I thought about the possibility of doing a game based on this world. I read a ton of books, practiced a million of the tutorials, chose my engine (UDK) and pushed myself to the limit to discover what I could do. In the end, I had an adventure/stealth genre game.

Being a “green” game designer with a background in art was pretty hard at the beginning of the project. I had to learn how to program and polish my 3D technique.  I did some animations as part of my Bachelor of Arts degree and that proved useful when I was polishing up the animations.

Creating a game is one of the hardest things someone could do. It’s a marathon and a mental challenge. Without support, it is almost impossible. UDK forums have been a crucial part of my development process since the very beginning. Indie game developers are very supportive, maybe because we love games.

Does designing video games have much in common with creating a comic book?

Both are a marathon! Comic books and video games also both communicate with the audience via immersive worlds. Well, most of them do. I know some designers would mention Tetris, but I think even this game has a “world” to share, with minimalist scenery in the black background and a lot of geometric shapes. The Tetris world has this aesthetic with a purpose, simple and effective.

Another thing games and comic books have in common are what I call the “filling gap” effect. In comic books, the audience has to complete the thoughts and action between the panels, completing the narrative. It is a kind of interactive process and requires the reader to follow the panels laid out by the comic creators. In video games, the players must complete actions laid out by the game designers. A comic book creator and a game designer both have to make sure that their audience can follow what they have created.

If you could give advice to an aspiring comic book artist, what would it be?

Don’t listen to anyone else! I’m kidding … a little. If you ask two different people to describe the same experience, they will tell you two different stories. Am aspiring comic book creator should decide what is best for them by trying different things. You can keep other artists’ words and advice in mind, but sometimes what is good for one person isn’t good for another. Try various ways of doing things and judge what works best for you.

Just for fun, if you were a comic book character, who would you be?

I think it would be Bulma, from the Dragon Ball Z series. She is intelligent, rich, the “princess of all Sayans” and never gets killed by anyone. Maybe her super power is good luck. But I rarely want to be a comic book character, because they always have a tragic story! My life is hard, but those comic characters have horrible lives.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?
Yes! For aspiring comic book creators, I’ll skip the advice about never giving up and being persistent, because they hear it all of the time. (It is true. Never give up!) I’d advise that they don’t go along with things they don’t believe in. If you don’t want to change your drawing style to fit this or that publisher, don’t do it. Make what you create for you and your audience, period. Also, don’t wait for your chance; create your chance. If nobody wants to hire you, make your own comic book or team up with someone else to create one. Learn the business part of the industry or team up with someone else who understands it, paying attention on how to make your comic a viable business. Don’t try to fit your plot into the genre of the moment; everything has an audience. Find your audience to make your goals practicable. Be dynamic and make a move or you will stay static.