An Interview with Artist and Game Designer Eric Torres

Eric Torres is a true desert dweller who believes in the magic of the Sonoran Desert. Born and raised in Arizona, he was shaped by daydreaming, creativity, and his love for books. He is an illustrator, designer, and indie game publisher. This is his interview, and here is what he had to say about his career, art, design, the creative process, and life as a creative professional.

How you start often determines where you end up. Growing up, you shared that your parents and teachers struggled to understand you and were puzzled by your focus on doodling and drawing. How did that influence your daily life as you were growing up?

Well, drawing led to being misunderstood a lot. Back then, drawing was stigmatized in many ways. Maybe that still happens now, though? For instance, most kids my age thought drawing was nerdy and stupid, just like reading. So I was one of those kids who was a nerd before it was socially acceptable. Most of the adults I knew didn't encourage drawing. I heard things like: he's not paying attention, he's distracted, he's wasting time. Oh, and the best one — "You've ruined another math textbook, your parents are gonna have to pay for that." I won't mention what my parents thought of my doodles in those situations.

What was your turning point? Is there a single moment, object, movie, comic book, or other cultural artifact that flipped the switch in your brain and made it clear - I'm going to make art for a living.

Hmmmm, I guess I just decided to remain an artist. But I don't know the exact moment that happened. I was held back in 4th grade due to bad math scores. Perhaps that solidified something for me. Seeing all my friends move on without me did make me feel inferior, dumb, and less-than-normal. But I think at some point in there is where I embraced that. They say kids are resilient, but for me, I think there's some stubbornness that happened too.

Which analog tools have a permanent place in your creative process, and how do they benefit you compared to digital, more modern tools?

Grid paper, pens, markers, pencils. Basic things. I prefer analog tools for capturing my ideas—writing, sketching, and making notes. All the work that happens before execution. I've learned the hard way not to rely too much on stashing ideas in apps and on the computer.

You describe your illustration style as superflat-but-flexible, and that you specialize in vector art. What led you to that? What artists influenced that journey, and what about their illustration style inspired you?

Takashi Murakami is credited with starting the postmodern, Superflat art movement. I'm not the best historian, but in a nutshell, the style was about using line, color, and context to stylize one's art. Murakami was hugely inspired by art from Japan's Edo period. I learned about the superflat movement just as I was graduating college and building my own 2D, flat, graphic art sensibilities. So the timing was just right for me to learn from Murakami's work.

Lots of the artists I admire most are classics, such as Erté, Charley Harper, Chris Ware, Mary Blair, Richard Scarry, Eyvind Earle, and Moebius. I follow many contemporary artists as well, such as Brosmind, Tad Carpenter, Sanjay Patel, and Marion Deuchars, to name a few.

All of these people play a minor role in helping me create my own "style" or flavor of line art. I go between very geometric work and more organic line drawing. I keep everything vector, though.

Life as a creative professional can be challenging, and each day can bring both great highs and devastating lows. What checks and balances have you put in place to keep yourself motivated?

My greatest struggle as an artist is the loneliness I sometimes feel being in my own head a lot of the time. To dream up new game experiences, wander in fictional worlds, write stories, draw things — I need to keep my imaginative energy up. So, your question is a good one.

A few things I've been working on lately: Donating less time to social media. Instead, I post to social channels and get back to work ASAP. It's all too negative out there. I don't get caught up in social controversies or agendas either. I focus on bringing good into the world through my studio projects and connecting with folks in my local community. And last but not least, I'm working every day to not compare myself to others. Fred Rogers was my TV buddy growing up, and I'm thankful for all the times he talked about being ourselves. It's really crucial for finding meaning in our creative pursuits.

Can you think of a moment in your professional career that, in hindsight, ended up defining your career?  (This could be a positive experience, a negative experience, a client, a lack of clients, something someone told you, a life event, etc.)

Well, I would say it was the moment I realized I wanted to get out of the marketing world as a creative. For a long time, I thought marketing and advertising were good for creativity. But over time, we've all seen how broken our society is. Marketing and advertising have a lot to answer for, especially in the way we've been conditioned to put ourselves first and get whatever we want.

I've been in boardrooms where those who hold power are excited most about ideas crafted to mislead others. I heard it once said: "No one should be able to profit from the gullible." But that's really what drives our economy. Mix in AI, politics, and me-first thinking, and you've got a commercial machine that is currently very toxic to the everyday creative.

So, while I think marketplaces are a good thing, I no longer spend my time trying to think more like a corporate marketer as a creative professional. My career is more than that. I'm more than that.

You are an indie game publisher, as well as a designer and illustrator. From the outside looking in, designing games, the worlds they represent, and the rules that govern them seem to have a strong analog to the creative process. Both involve elements of control. Can you talk about the battle between controlling elements and the freedom required to think and create entire worlds without overplanning the magic out of them? 

Placing limitations on our creativity helps focus our efforts. For example, game design shouldn't be work. You have things like probability, percentages, math, and rules of play alongside things like player choices, flavor text, illustrations, and icons — and somehow it's all supposed to be fun.

My favorite games offer players a sense of control and interesting choices to make, but at the same time, there are surprises and player interactions that cannot be planned for. For me, game design is an opportunity to create something others can have a shared experience with, while also enjoying some elements of story.

Game balancing is crucial in the creative process, but I've found ways to allow for the unexpected to occur without making games feel unfair or too swingy. Mostly, it's about creating interesting choices for players. An example might be: do this and gain that benefit now, OR do something else and gain a bigger benefit later. Presenting players with more agency is a big part of creating "magic" within the rules of the game.

Going back to tools, you are an artist, you must draw and keep notebooks. Can you tell us a little bit about your relationship to paper, revisiting old ideas, and how that helps your creative process?

As a kid, I remember someone, I think it was my uncle, giving my mom lots of grid paper for us kids to draw on. Well, I used most of it. And it stuck. To this day, grid paper is my favorite for notebooks.

I doodle in all sorts of scenarios. During meetings, in the car, at coffee shops, listening to podcasts. So I'm always carrying a notebook of some sort. At times, I look back at doodles and can recall the subject of the meeting I was in or where I was. Kinda like how all those grooves work on a vinyl record. It's odd.

Notebooks are crucial to my creative process because I have gotten used to them being such. But also because they become these artifacts of my growth. They're markers on my creative path in a way. I look back at some things, and I can't believe I drew them; they look bad! Then other times, I find I've forgotten just how much thought I put into something. And I'm so glad a notebook can remind me.

The creative world is evolving rapidly. AI is here; creative software is more accessible than ever, and the gap between amateurs and professionals is narrowing every day. What straightforward advice would you give to artists trying to break into and make a living in this industry today?

Well, first, I might see things a bit differently. It seems to me the gap between amateur and professional is merely being papered over or hidden better. We all know software competency has never been evidence of design thinking, or a compelling story, or deep imagination. All of those things are shown and demonstrated by the individual. (In notebooks!)

Regardless, the only attempt at advice I might make is — grow your own ideas, exercise your imaginations, and be yourselves. Remember too that machines are tools, like microwaves. But even the amazing microwave didn't put Gordon Ramsay out of a job.

To wrap up, I want to ask a simple but meaningful question. When you look back on your career, what's the single most powerful memory that comes to mind?

What comes to mind now is a quote from Marion Deuchars. Years ago, she said: 

"Stop attempting to make more realism in your drawing. Drawing is about the absence of fear. Draw with no inhibitions and all your imagination." 

Strangely, her quote means a lot more to me these days.

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You can find more about Eric Torres and his work at his website ericimagines.com and on Instagram at @ericimagines. We also collaborated with Eric when we launched our new Artist Trading Cards, which can be found here.