My final batch of research for Tribes of Mexica was online based, although unlike my original approach, this one revolved more around online resources instead of standalone websites.

This is actually an Incan artifact, but virtually all Mesoamerican cultures had a fascination with masks.

First up were documentaries and educational TV shows, both of which were readily available on YouTube. Not only were these fairly credible — and the parts that were theoretical were clearly outlined as such — but they also focused on the details of everyday life.

How did the Aztecs dress? What did they eat? How did they store and transport goods? What sort of tools did they use? Et cetera. These tid-bits were rarely glamorous, but answering such questions is vital to making a world come to life.

Mainstream movies like the Maya-based Apocalypto were also a nice reference, although like any fictional works, they were taken with a grain of salt.

An excerpt from Jonathon Dalton's "Lords of Life and Death."

Google Books was a decent resource as well, although most of its content was fairly limited (a dozen or so preview pages per entry). What it did lead me to, though, were various Aztec-themed comic books. These were a great visual reference as they took place during the civilization’s peak, showing it as a thriving culture rather than focusing on its ruinous legacy.

Finally, I tried contacting some professors and Mexica enthusiasts, but my e-mails wielded few results. However, I had much better luck getting in touch with alternative history writers such as Chris Roberson and picking their brains as to what kind of research they did for their novels.

A map of Lake Texcoco, the heartland of the Aztec Empire, that I snagged from Aliette de Bodard's blog.

As things stand right now, the entire setting and story of Tribes of Mexica is planned out. Now how much of it actually makes it into the game is another matter, but I’d rather do an extra bit of homework than be completely under prepared.

Our initial prototype for Tribes of Mexica was done in a very short amount of time. We were quite pleased with it, but we knew that there’d be a lot of changes going forward.

One of the features we really wanted to improve was the overall art style. After debating it for a while, we decided to give ToM a magical, fairy tale vibe that’s not predominant in videogames. We gathered a variety of references, but eventually settled on James Jean’s work (who, appropriately enough, used to be the cover artist for the ongoing Fables comic book series).

The beautiful, double-sided cover of Animal Farm.

James’ fine linework and smooth fills were quite striking, but his detailed illustrations would be rather difficult to reproduce in a videogame. More than that, though, we didn’t want to force artists to simply emulate another style, but instead to use it as a rough guideline while bringing their own flavour to the look. With that in mind, we contacted numerous illustrators and commissioned a single piece from each one: a coloured sketch of a Cipactli.

Our original Cipactli.

The Cipactli boss fight proved the most memorable part of our prototype, but we thought that his deformed, Godzilla-like design lacked personality. The monster’s premise was interesting enough — a cayman with jaws on every joint and frog/fish like features — but since it didn’t really come through in-game, it became the perfect subject for a makeover.

Out of all the test runs we did, these were our favourites:

Cipactli #1, a villain with a sinister smile and curled eyebrows.

Cipactli #2, a grotesque figure peppered with snarling jaws.

Cipactli #3, a lithe humanoid with a tribal motif.

Cipactli #4, a muscular beast in a comic book style.

Being so close to a project can make it easy to lose perspective, though, so we figured it couldn’t hurt to ask for some public opinions. We’ve created a little Cipactli poll just below, so please cast your vote and leave us some comments!

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In my previous post, I gave an overview of the online research I had done for Tribes of Mexica. While it was fruitful, it wasn’t quite enough for two main reasons:

1. Online research is hard to verify, and doesn’t often go through the same level of scrutinizing and fact checking as a typical book.
2. The internet is filled with a plethora of information on just about any topic, but the “big picture” is harder to come by as the data usually lacks context.

Needing some books, I naturally headed out to The World’s Biggest Bookstore.

My first stop was the military-focused Osprey section. Comparatively speaking it contained very few Aztec books, but I managed to find one that could serve as a great visual reference. It also contained examples of Zapotec, Mixtec, and various other warrior groups, which was a nice bonus.

The world mythologies section was my next stop, and I found it to be surprisingly small. I picked up one short primer on Aztec & Maya myths, though, which did a nice job of trying to sort out the Mesoamerican pantheon. That might sound like something relatively simple, but it isn’t. There’s an awful lot of cross-pollination between the numerous cultures that existed in current day Mexico, and that makes it rather difficult to put together any sort of hierarchy with the surviving information (not to mention weeding out all the gods dedicated to just maize, i.e., corn).

I also spotted a book entitled Latin American Folktales, but it was a huge letdown. As I flipped through the pages, I quickly realized that it was nothing more than a collection of Christian parables retrofitted onto Aztec mythology — not something that was relevant to our game.

Finally, I stopped off at the history section, which actually proved to be most fruitful. The books I found here simply contained much more information, encapsulating mythology alongside a plethora of other topics. One fascinating tid-bit I picked up was the natives’ reaction to Christianity. Granted I just alluded to Tribes of Mexica taking place in a Pre-Columbian setting — and a mythical one at that — without any traces of Spanish colonialism, but it was the reaction itself that was the interesting part.

As a bit of background info, sacrifice played an integral role in Aztec life. Yes, this included human sacrifices, but also relatively tame rituals such as small, daily bloodlettings. The sacrifices were not necessarily meant to appease cruel gods, but rather to pay back for the gods’ own sacrifices. It was something of a trade that the people had a responsibility to uphold; an honourable act rather than a horrific appeasement.

Still, when the natives heard the tales of Jesus’ own sacrifice, many were quick to embrace the religion. An undercurrent of sorts made itself apparent that revealed a certain dissatisfaction with the sacrificial obligations that burdened the Aztecs. This was something that was integral to the story I drafted, so it was nice seeing some validation of the concept.

Another fortuitous find was the imagery of rituals where the Aztecs danced around in circles. Of course this didn’t really have much to do with warfare, but it was a nice parallel to our core gameplay mechanic.

Overall my trip to the bookstore was a relatively small investment for a veritable treasure trove of content. Realistically speaking, only a fraction of it will ever find its way into the game, but it’s always better to have a surplus of ideas rather than a distinct lack of them.