Hey Founders, Builders, Businesspeople! With the release of Good Company 1.0 only a few weeks away, we want to give you some insights on the creation of the new Key Art. Good Company has changed and improved quite a bit over the course of Early Access, with some adjustments being nuances, some others rather profound. In the end, creating a new cover piece to capture the wholesome experience of playing Good Company 1.0 seemed more than appropriate. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33462817/cdadfba5c181a42ca1520d5e0a27eaa783d216db.jpg[/img] As a foundation for the process, Katha scribbled a few ideas in alignment with our visual requirements. The motive is not only supposed to convey the various aspects of Good Company's gameplay, it also needs to be transformable into many different formats, on digital stores, and on social media. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33462817/a4f00351d832d0d88aa277541a6cdf4631acf6d9.jpg[/img] Being in constant touch with our publisher, The Irregular Corporation, was of great help. While they sure know Good Company in and out, they were still able to provide a fresh angle and threw in ideas for improvement. Finally, Katha started laying out the scene, adjusting the camera, and adding background elements. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33462817/449e42f0f988098d3677dbcac156bdf4979ce761.jpg[/img] The next step was the first rough layout in Photoshop, where the main elements – background, foreground, and Good Company logo – got balanced against each other. This gave the team a solid impression of the general look and feel of the new key art. [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33462817/5bed8126db27fed91d2400a5b9b537750f6d5fce.jpg[/img] While the detailed background represented many elements found in Good Company very well; employees, workplaces, and logistics - we felt something was still missing. Then Katha came up with the idea of implementing a blueprint-styled area into the piece. It outlines (pun intended) the careful planning and expanding of your business in Good Company and it turned out, the blueish area even contributed to emphasizing the game's logo. We happily went with that! [img]{STEAM_CLAN_IMAGE}/33462817/a0efc3981b6d0bd17263a447bb73337501cfbfe7.jpg[/img] From that point on, it was a constant refinement. With occasional feedback from the team and our publisher, Katha optimized the composition, improved the coloring, and added tons of lovely details. It was such a delight seeing Good Company's new key art evolving over the past few weeks – and with our release date announced, it's shining on the various platforms Good Company is available and discussed on. In the meantime, we have various quality assurance processes going on. For one, our 3D Artist, Daniel, is making great efforts in improving Good Company's performance. By dissecting specific rendering tasks, he was able to identify bottlenecks and, more importantly, means for optimization. Good Company will be running notably better on many PCs! Other than our internal work, we have external QA teams doing final checks on features and localization. Even after our community spotting lots of things, there are still a few hiccups to refine. This also goes for all texts in Good Company, especially for some languages that tend to take up more space in the user interface than others. You see, there's still a lot going on behind the scenes at Chasing Carrots, and not to forget the awesome support from The Irregular Corporation. But it goes without saying, we want to keep on giving Good Company the best care possible, so that you all have a great time playing the 1.0 version on June 21st! Last but not least: Keep up your support, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/app/911430/Good_Company/]wishlist Good Company[/url] or look forward to playing the demo, or just spread the word. Or all of the above :) Talk to you soon, all the best! Your Chasing Carrots