While it's clearly just my little clipart spaceship with the border removed, I do like the big concentric circles in the back. Gives it a bit of a kitschy "outer limits" feel, although I don't know if that really works in space. It's inspired by this movie poster, which certainly fits in with the theme I was going for.
Next we have our venerable gamedev artist Noaktree. While his rocket looked a little more Estes than I'd hoped, I loved the strong text. Here's his.
Next is Suzanne. While I do like her use of color and the power you can get from only using one color, it didn't really have the cheesy science fiction appeal I was seeking.
Next I have David Baumgart. He posted several entries, and I did like the look. I especially liked the planet and the use of text that interacted with the rocket.
Next is gamedev user "demosthenes". While I liked the color-scheme, which reminded me of a 1960's pulp science fiction novel, most likely with the word "Mars" in the title, it otherwise didn't feel right.
Finally, I have an entry from Steve, posted at the last minute. While I appreciate the effort, I fear that Space Invaders are overused. I'm also not convinced that the canonical Space Invader bitmaps won't be declared to be IP of Taito.
So that's where I am. I think the two rocket logos (Noaktree and Baumgart's) are my favorite, but neither rocket had the bottomless kitsch of my existing clipart rocket. It just looks like something made out of an old coffee-can and held up with wires in an impossibly cheap movie.
So I grabbed a couple of the ideas and slapped together what might eventually be the canonical logo.
We got planet in the background. I originally wanted Saturn, but I thought that'd draw too much attention to itself, so I went with cratery moon and turned the alpha way down. We got Noaktree's text. And we got cheesy-looking rocket that looks like it oughta be supported with wires.
I took out the rocket's flame because I thought that if I ever went with a Flash version for a splash screen or something, I could add some rising puffs of smoke. And you just know you can't have a cheesy sci-fi rocket without the obligatory "smoke rising in space" effect :)
So I think this one is close. Mind you, this is just something I slapped together in a few minutes, so I know it's got a bit to go.
Noaktree, if I can get a vector version of the text, that'd be awesome. Everything in that logo is vector save for the text. I might change the text to brick-red, thus giving it a bit more of the "The Day Mars Invaded Earth" feel.
As for the prize, since I plan to borrow (and have borrowed already) most liberally from Noaktree (aka Neil Kemp) and David Baumgart, I think it's only fair that they split the prize. Since Neil's in the US where shipping's cheaper, he's gonna get the box-o-trinkets.
And since the box-o-trinkets isn't worth $100, it wouldn't be fair just to split things down the middle. So I'm splitting the whole mess into four pieces. Neil gets the box-o-trinkets plus $33. David Baumgart's getting the remaining $67.
Neil's getting a check with his box-o-trinkets. David's gonna get his piece with paypal.
Everybody happy?
Good. I got games to write :)
