Morning · Awakening
Bells, birds, and water create clarity and a sense of beginning.
WESTWARD JOURNEY · Online 2014–2024 · Mobile 2024
Tradition.
Made to feel alive.
Chinese craft, mythology, motion, and sound—reinterpreted across a classic online world and its mobile expression.
Art Director · NetEase Games
THE BRIEF
Cultural depth.
Contemporary expression.
Westward Journey is an enduring world of Chinese mythology. My work brought traditional craft into modern production: from NeoX 2.0 rendering and painterly environments to stylized creatures and a pentatonic sound system. This case study brings together two distinct bodies of work, with the online and mobile projects identified throughout.
01 · A SHARED PHILOSOPHY
Reinterpret.
Don’t simply repeat.
A familiar motif alone cannot make a world feel culturally alive. My approach was to study how traditional forms were made and experienced, then use material, light, animation, and interaction to give them a contemporary presence. Heritage became a source of design decisions, not a decorative layer.
02 · ONLINE · 2014–2024
Start with the hands
that made the tradition.
For character hair, we studied actual traditional hairstyles and wig-weaving methods. Looking closely at construction gave the team a stronger foundation for shape, detail, and digital reproduction. My interest in incense practice also formed part of a broader engagement with living Chinese craft outside the production environment.
03 · ONLINE · MATERIAL & LIGHT
Modern technology.
A painter’s sensibility.
In NeoX 2.0, we refined materials, lighting, surface response, and rendering quality while retaining the world’s artistic character. Tools and production standards made small stages of the process visible and controllable. For environments, pre-rendered scenes were combined with hand-painted detail to preserve a painterly quality in the 2D maps.
04 · ONLINE · MOVEMENT
Let the character
carry the culture.
We used motion capture to bring the physical language of Chinese dance into mythological animation. Performance research complemented the work on hair, costume, and rendering: cultural specificity could be felt in movement as well as recognized in a still image.
05 · MOBILE · 2024
A new scale.
A distinct Eastern identity.
The mobile project called for a different expression of the same cultural foundation. Simplified and stylized forms supported mobile performance, while new creature directions drew from mythology and lunar phases. The aim was to make inherited colors, patterns, and silhouettes feel fresh through material, gloss, lighting, and contrast.
06 · MOBILE · FORM & FASHION
Ancient patterns.
A contemporary attitude.
Fashion design offered another way to rethink creature forms. We paired traditional references with modern textures and contrasting surfaces, preserving a sense of recognition while introducing strangeness and surprise. The Art Bible carried those decisions across modeling, animation, and interface work.
07 · MOBILE · GOLDEN CHRONICLES
Hear the passage of time.
For the Golden Chronicles theme, I developed a sound-design system around the Chinese pentatonic scale: 宫、商、角、徵、羽. Loops followed a cyclical rhythm, while guqin, xiao, and bianzhong shifted roles with changes in light and mood. Sound and motion became part of how the player experienced time.
Noon · Vitality
Strings and winds bring energy to the middle of the day.
Dusk · Reflection
Percussion and resonant bells move the experience toward calm.
08 · MY CONTRIBUTIONS
Keep the vision coherent.
Help the team deliver it.
Across the two projects, art direction connected cultural research, hands-on visual development, technical iteration, and production leadership. Each project needed its own visual solution and practical standards.
Westward Journey Online
Directed visual modernization; developed 3D characters and environments; established the Art Bible; led NeoX 2.0 material and lighting iteration.
Westward Journey Mobile
Directed stylized adaptation and summoned-creature redesign; developed models and environment polish; authored standards across modeling, animation, and UI.
Production leadership
Recruited and managed artists, aligned budgets and schedules, and balanced visual ambition with team capacity and efficiency.
“Tradition isn’t what survives unchanged — it’s what evolves and still moves people.”
Artworks and results shown here are collaborative project work. Role descriptions and project figures are adapted from my original portfolio. Westward Journey and related IP belong to their respective rights holders.