#decay being a reoccuring theme throughout the game

[onceinawhilemoon]

(Part 2) Sherlock Holmes Chapter One achievement icons enlarged and upscaled in case you were also curious to see the art in full detail! (Part 1)

[gwfmp]

Research - Sci - Fi Architecture

Science Fiction Architecture can vary as much as real life architecture, even more so since it isn't beholden to our own culture and technology; that being said there are two styles that are used pretty regularly, these being extremely clean, and bright, even sterile or there is the opposite, which is rather broken down, unkempt and dirty. These two styles are often seen within the same piece of media, usually to display the disparity between the rich and poor, or the overwhelmingly strong evil compared to the heavily disadvantaged good guy.

Star Wars:

Given that Star Wars is based in a galaxy filled with countless different alien species, so the range of architecture and environments is vast. I'm going to focus on the worlds seen in the films, because EU and Legends are near infinite.

Tatooine - A consequence of Tatooine being a desert planet, all of the buildings that you see in the films are made of sandstone, with any other building resource rarely being seen. The buildings have a blocky quality to them, often with a domed roof. While looking at photos, most structures don't seem to have windows and those that do only seem to have holes placed into the walls, I assume because when you live in such a hot environment, you'd rarely need to close a window.

Aside from sandstone that dominates the environment, there's a few flashes of metal, mostly making up the doors of the buildings and the antennae esque moisture condensers that poke out from inbetweeners the buildings.

Kamino - The exterior of Kamino's buildings are a dark grey with lights shining through the windows from the interior, the shape the structures are mostly shallow domes, some growing in a point, all of them seemingly designed to allow rain to run off of the roofs into the ocean below. Each of the buildings are connected with walkways, these walkways usually forcing the individual to exit out and traverse through the constant rain. There are also many landing pads dotted through out, on the side of buildings, along walkways and occasionally even making up the walk way itself.

In the interior of the structured, it's all very sterile with white and black walls, with almost empty rooms and hallways, any furniture or equipment is usually scientific equipment, basic necessities like chairs or cloning facilities. While I can't explain why Kamino looks so empty, beside the fact it's inhabitants may be very minimalistic, I can explain the bright white walls; while we only see white walls, the Kaminoans can see th Ultra Violet spectrum of light, meaning the walls are covered in bright, vibrant, diverse colours from their point of view.

Coruscant - Practically the whole surface of Coruscant is made of metal after the entire planet was eventually converted into a city. There's a level, blocky layer of metal that seems to be consistent everywhere on the planet, then theres the spires that raise into the sky, all of which seem to be of a different design; there are more cubic towards, all hard edges and sharp corners and more industrial in appearance, then theres the towers that have plenty of curves, eventually ending in a sharp point, giving it a more elegant appearance. Then there are the towers that seem to have a combination of these two qualities. There are also large channels cut into the metal surface that run further down that you can see and these are used as hover car lanes with streets being built into the side.

Coruscant reminds me of a combination between the two extremes found in Star Wars, those being a galaxy is immaculate, as of brand new and a galaxy that is feeling the effects of entropy and everything is degraded to the point of falling apart. Depending on which level of Coruscant you're on, you'll see an entirely different environment. Any place where you can see the sky is in the best condition, the interior architecture being immaculate and of a faux greek/roman mix style. The further down you go, the worse the situation gets, the style used on higher levels disappears and everything become very utilitarian, it becomes more claustrophobic and cramped, the technology becomes more obsolete and decrepit, the walls are scorched black from pollution and neon lights and holograms light up the otherwise dark interior of the planet.

Desting 2:

Earth -

Cabal - The cabal in Destiny 2 are a very warlike, industrious and reflects in the way they build things,

Awoken - Awoken architecture, which is primarily seen inside of The Dreaming City, seems to follow the same principles of the Elven cities in LOTRs. All the buildings have a very organic shape, avoiding hard edges when ever possible and always having some sort of curve to them. It feels just as if you'd brought the LOTRs elves millennia into the future, there is a giant gazebo found inside of the Gardens of Elisa that looks like it was pulled straight from one of the films. The buildings are a bright white, with blue being the reoccurring sub colour, often incorporating gold trim in some way and they're almost always symmetrical. The blue parts of the buildings are in fact stained glass windows, intricately detailed and made up of many small geometric shapes that create a floral pattern.

The interiors of the structures feel like a fantasy castle/cathedral given a science fiction coat, though it may not even seem like science fiction from a screenshot, that may just be the added context from the rest of the game. The roome have vaulted ceilings and numerous pillars, arched doors and windows, these all add to the medieval fantasy aesthetic and make them seem like a cousin of the Norman style I discuss in a previous post, albeit a more grandiose cousin. The architecture itself is almost like a white marble with a few blue tones here and there, with gold continuing to be inlaid throughout the interior. You may also come across, large, crystal walls that replace the usual pristine white.

What is actually used to decorate the scene is in fact a multitude of different statues representing cultural figures in the Awoken's history, areas where plants are allowed to grow, usually to fill the larger halls or the edges of hallways (Further adding to the LOTR feel), there'll also be minor things such as floating lights, vases, braziers and many of the things you imagine to be in a fantasy castle. The walls are in fact covered in very floral engravings, continuing the theme created by the stained glass windows; these engravings actually serve a function however, as they are the Awoken's written language.

The layout of the Awoken building varies, but a common pattern is large rooms being connected to long hallways through an anti chamber, these anti chambers often having a central piece in the middle of the room, whether it be a statue or a kind of plant.

Vex - The architecture used by the Vex reflects their mechanical state quite well, all of the structures created by the Vex are all made of primitive shapes, namely cubes with cylinders and spheres making; they're the most simple shape and probably the most efficient shape to build structures out of and they're built in a very blocky manner, with parts of the shape jutting out and others receding inwards. The design of the structures varies slightly, they're built in such a way where they have an inner layer filled with technology, then there is a layer that looks similar to a metal cage and then the outer layer seems to be made out of concrete and it varies in the way these layers are shown. This layered system can actually help to display just how old he construct is. If the outer concrete layer is intact, the structure is generally rather new, then you get to the stage where the concrete starts to crack and you can see into the inner layer, then eventually the concrete is gone and you're just left with the metal cage and the tech, even after that the cage can be decayed to the point where there isnt much left besides some metal struts surrounding electronics.

There isn't many ways that the environment is decorated besides the slight difference of colour of the structures, or the overgrowth of plants that can often be found in Vex complexes, however you can occasionally see different stone statues depicting different Vex enemy types. (Which feels a little out place given their very mechanical nature, I wouldn't have thought machines would have much use for statues.) There are also points in the Infinite Forest on Mercury that you can see Vex have decided to put gold trim in their architecture.