Rare Roots: The Making of Viva Piñata
Navigation:
Part One: Origins
Part Two: Evolution
Part Three: Outsiders
Part Four: Offspring
Part Five: Moving On
Part Four: Offspring
They may just appear to be smaller versions of their grown-up selves, but these Piñatas are some of the cutest things ever conceived. How could anyone not want the Baby Hen in their garden?
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Rather than being shrunken adults, these little darlings were going to be custom-made Piñatas with tiny bodies, large heads and even larger eyes, decked out in pastel shades of their adult colours. The slide also reveals a few of our early attempts at naming – note the baby ‘Padger’ and ‘Vulpin’. We had some slightly catchier ideas during the later stages.
Central, as if babysitting, is Toco, the long-lost pet of Dedos/Leafos. This bird would sit on her shoulder and intermittently fly outside the garden to retrieve seeds. There have been many ideas of how best to deliver seeds to the players: before Toco, any visiting bird would fly into the garden with a seed in its beak and you’d have to tap it to release the seed. This, however, relied on your garden being friendly to birds and so a more consistent source in the form of Toco came along. Unfortunately, Toco him/herself was eventually put to one side too with the advent of Seedos. Or so Leafos claims, but you know what she’s like with the truth.
Now let’s step back from the garden for a moment. Not everything created is done for in-game purposes. Despite art being one of the first things locked down during the run-up to release, there’s still an awful lot of work to be done right up to and beyond the shipping date thanks to all the promotional and commercial material associated with the product.
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What you see here is not just the most horrendously organised slide in the deck but a sample of these items. Moving from left to right, at the top is a Paulie Pretztail costume design, first used at the Santa Monica Piñata party, and below that an early design for the Viva Piñata faceplate.
Pushing onwards we find another Santa Monica Piñata in the huge form of a 10-metre tall Horstachio, and cowering in its shadow is an early toy Cocoadile prototype. Beneath this pair are three alternate Viva Piñata disc designs, each taking inspiration from a specific Piñata.
Finally, on the right is the original concept for the Limited Edition case, a prototype Fizzlybear Piñata and one of many colouring sheets handed out to children at the launch party.