Warbreakers - New direction

After talking to Alan, I tried to come up with designs that were more obviously "radio-controlled", including the idea of a "standard" reciever unit that all of the vehicles would have (larger vehicles would have more of them, to emphasise the scale)

However, Alan still thought that my ideas were to "logical" (boring) and suggested that instead of trying to design something that looked like a normal vehicle adapted to radio control, I should try for a more "cobbled-together" look.

One of the bigger challenges of this approach was coming up with a visual shorthand for "explosive" (since they don't really look like much, unless I have a sphere with a fizzing fuse and the word "bomb" on the side, which is too cartoony).  For the cruise missile, I used the idea of building the missile around a standard air-dropped bomb (rather like the fritz-X or HOBOS system).

For the ground unit, I decided to focus on the "radio-controlled bomb on tracks" idea first, since the basic idea is similar to the guided missile, except with "tank" replacing "plane".  I also played around with different types of explosive, from entire aircraft bombs to artillery shells.

Warbreakers - concept thumbnails

Thumbnails for the cruise missile, because it's the most clearly-defined vehicle role

Concepts for ground vehicles; everything from radio-controlled bombs on tracks, to remotely-operated flame-thrower tanks.

After talking to Alan, he suggested that none of the designs really showed the "gimmick" of radio-control, and that I needed to redo the designs in a more exagerated manner

Warbreakers - Style Experiments

Experimenting to try out different levels of "realism" for the game (along with different Aerial concepts).

Which do people like best?

Warbreakers - Radio Research

Since one of the key feature of any german vehicles is going to be the radio equipment (either transmitter or reciever), I did some research on what radio equipment of both WW1 and the 1920s looked like (the later date because you can get away with a lot by claiming someone was ahead of their time)

Reciever to allow Radio Control of  a battleship

Interestingly, there appears to be a strong tendancy towards sturdy wooden boxes for containing the apparatus, which gives a starting point for any personal transmitters; Valves also appear to be a recurring theme, and seem to offer a nice visual flourish.

Warbreakers - MacGuffin Development

Trying to decide upon which Macguffin to use for the german wonderweapon, I doodled trooper designs based on various ideas

My favourite idea was the two-man lightning-gun team at the top of the second image, but I kept doodling and was struck by the idea of a radio-controlled drone-type weapon (this came from the guy bottom left of the second image, with the massive backpack radio).  I've decided that this is the wonderweapon for me, as it a) is pretty realistic (certainly compared to some of the ideas I came up with) and b) allows me to invoke every geek's favourite genius, Nikola Tesla, as the brains behind the technology (since he demonstrated radio control back in 1898).

Warbreakers - MacGuffin ideas

After talking with Alan, he suggested that I need to decide what the "ominous rumours" from the Austrian Alps actually are, on the basis that this will help inform the design work.  Since the idea is that the "rumours" are a way for the central powers to win the war, the ideas will fall into 2 categories - superweapon, and technical breakthrough.

Superweapon ideas

• Giant supergun able to shell London and force the british to surrender.
• Massive zepplin aircraft carrier able to launch devastating airstrikes.
• Superheavy mobile battlefortress that will be able to single-handedly defeat the british army.
• Superheavy artillery to pound the british trenches into oblivion. 
• Cruise Missiles
• Mechs

Technical Breakthrough ideas

• Atom bomb
• Super-armour (something like titanium, to make personal body armour practical again)
• Directed-Radiation weaponry (Radium-based death rays)
• Practical Military Rockets
• High-capacity electricity storage devices (supercapacitors?)
• Lightning guns
• Contact neurotoxic gasses
• A Superexplosive
• Computer
• Submunition Artillery Shells
• Napalm
• Cold Fusion
• Practical Exoskeleton

Now I just need to choose one, preferably one that hasn't been done to death...

Warbreakers - infantry concepts

British Infantry

German Infantry

These are just rough ideas to work from; the main thing is the idea that the British are shades of brown, while the Germans are shades of grey.

The next step is to start working on vehicle concepts - one useful idea I discovered in my research is that the germans regarded their tanks as mobile fortresses, whilst the british thought of them more as land-ships.