Playbook · Strategy / Sim / Builder
Strategy / Sim / Builder Steam capsule art: four directions from your own assets
4X, RTS, city builder, management, colony sim, grand strategy.
Make my strategy / sim / builder sheet
First sheet free. Paste a Steam link on the home page instead.
The four directions every strategy / sim / builder sheet gets
One panel each, in this order, so the four are built to disagree: commercial, atmospheric, poster, and one swing.
Direction 1
Grand Panorama Key Art
The whole civilization in one frame.
- ·Sweeping wide view of the city, battlefield, or colony
- ·Clear focal landmark
- ·Depth haze and layered scale
- ·Bold logo with room to breathe
Direction 2
Commander Portrait
A leader or hero unit with the world behind them.
- ·Figure or unit large on one side
- ·The world they command as backdrop
- ·Confident lighting
- ·Logo opposite
Direction 3
Diagrammatic Blueprint Poster
Clean, systemic, design-forward.
- ·Map, blueprint, or schematic aesthetic
- ·Restricted palette, precise lines, generous whitespace or blackspace
- ·Type technical and elegant
- ·Feels intelligent, not busy
Direction 4
Concept-Driven Angle
The wildcard.
- ·Pick ONE: a single unit hero close-up, a cutaway cross-section, top-down satellite frame, a hand moving a piece on a table, a lantern-lit war table, dawn over a half-built structure
What the art director is told
The playbook below is the actual guidance the model receives for strategy / sim / builder games, minus your brief and assets.
Compositions that work
- Wide panorama with low horizon
- Figure left, world right
- Centered schematic
- Top-down frame
Lighting
- Golden dawn
- Overcast strategic light
- Torch-lit war room
- Clean studio light for blueprint
Palettes, one per panel
- Imperial: navy, gold, parchment, crimson
- Industrial: steel, rust, smoke, safety yellow
- Blueprint: deep blue, white lines, one orange accent
- Frontier: earth brown, sage, sky, cream
Typography
- Classic serif with small caps
- Technical grotesque
- Engraved caps
- Wide geometric sans
Typography to avoid
- Fantasy clichés on non-fantasy
- Chrome
- Excessive glow
Texture that helps
- Paper grain
- Map linework
- Fine grain
Texture that hurts
- Grunge
- Random particles
- UI screenshots pasted in
Never
- Pasted-in UI
- Cluttered tiny units everywhere
- Generic epic grading
- No focal point
Your strategy / sim / builder game, four ways, in about a minute.
Built from your own screenshots and logo. Sizes Steam actually uses. No key, no account for the first sheet.