Nullpoint Protocol
Cutscenes & Animations
From the months of April 2025 to February 2026, I was tasked with creating 80 unique illustrations for the indie roguelike Nullpoint Protocol. Here is a look into the process along with some of my favorite illustrations from the project.
Cinematic Cutscenes
The Process
When starting work for Nullpoint Protocol, the first thing I did was develop a consistent style for the game’s 2D visuals that would compliment their already existing 3D aesthetics. From the beginning, my director and art director made it clear that they wanted my work to have a more serious comic-book adjacent style than the cutesy in-game appearances.
What was needed from me was a style that would
Compliment the existing style of the game and concept art
Set a serious tone for the plot of the game
Use dynamic compositions and bold linework that best suit the storytelling style of comic books
Storyboarding
Going into the storyboarding process for Nullpoint Protocol, I had to understand the vision for how these scenes were to be animated. Similar to game franchises like Metroid and Infamous, these scenes would be animated in a motion comic style. Each asset would need to be able to move independently and with little to no internal movement. With that in mind, I approached these sequences in a way that was closer to a storybook than a video game.
Customizing
In Nullpoint Protocol, you can play as 9 different species with 4 different classes. Most species have custom helmets on top of the already customizable suit color. To accommodate for this, I illustrated the player’s character in a way that allowed for easy and effective customization.
Each instance of the player has
a separate layer for their helmet
Interchangeable weapons and weapon colors
Customizable base color
And in certain cutscenes, NPCs match the species of the player.
Animating
When reading the scene breakdown from the writers for Nullpoint Protocol, I realized that some scenes were in need of some frame by frame animations. The goal of these sections were to give the the scenes more nuanced movement and timing that could not be achieved with the existing motion comic style. By using this technique, I was able to have more control in making deliberate movements that ended up really bringing this project to life.
