Publications

ARTICLES

IGN - MIDAUTUMN (2021)

Midautumn Is a Hades-esque Roguelike About Asian Diaspora and Demon Gentrification

For Mosser's part on the environments, she's been making pixel art since she was young, but with Midautumn wanted to do something that both incorporated the themes and roots of the game while also looking very different from anything else that was out there.

"One problem I have with pixel art games is they can feel very samey a lot of the time, because they all draw from the same references," she says. "It gets into this cycle of people referencing the same few games, like Earthbound or Pokemon or Final Fantasy. So you end up with styles that look very similar to each other."

READ ON IGN

INTERVIEWS

Womenize! – Inspiring Stories

Kiana Mosser

Womenize! – Inspiring Stories is a weekly series featuring inspirational women from games and tech.

Having a background in both science and art is rather rare. Would you say that this combination has an impact on the way you approach your work?
Absolutely! I think art and science are two sides of the same coin. Science is the study of the nature, behavior, and underlying structure of the natural world, whereas art is the creation and depiction of imaginary worlds, in which you get to define your own principles for how the imaginary world should exist. In many ways artists and scientists pursue and utilize the same knowledge and have similar strategies, but for different purposes.

There’s a common misconception that you either have a creative art brain or an analytical science brain and if you’re stuck with one, then you can’t develop the other. In truth, science requires creativity and art requires analysis. That’s why I always feel surprised when someone of either profession tells me that they can’t fathom what the other is like or don’t think they could do it in a million years.

READ ON WOMANIZE!

PODCASTS

ACM STUDIO @ UCLA - GAME JAMMIN (2022)

Episode 2: Animator & Game Artist, Kiana Mosser

Game Jammin is a podcast for aspiring video game developers, aimed to provide encouragement and insight to anyone interested in the craft of making games. Presented by ACM Studio at UCLA, each episode features personal conversations with devs in the early stages of their careers across different aspects of game development.

Peter Sutarjo chats with independent game-artist and animator, Kiana Mosser, about her lifelong fascination with video games and how she learned art, animation, and programming. Together, they discuss her experience as an artist working on Super Meat Boy Rival Rush and Super Meat Boy Forever; how she manages her time between game development and a full-time software engineer; and advice for artists to overcome art block and motivational hurdles.

LISTEN ON SPOTIFY

NEW GAME PLUS (2020)

Episode 243: Joust ft. Kiana Mosser

New Game Plus Podcast is a weekly retro gaming podcast where three guys spend seven days playing one old game, and then they talk about it.

Special guest Kiana Mosser joins the ostrich riding knights in Episode 243: Joust.

LISTEN ON SOUNDCLOUD

RETROSPECT

THE PIXEL PODCAST (2020)

Ep. #9 featuring @KianaMosser

A podcast that brings on people from the pixel art community to talk about things ranging from art to games and everything in between! In this episode, we talked about my work as a coder and pixel artist in the community and our opinions on various topics.

LISTEN ON YOUTUBE

EXHIBITIONS

Frog Con (2022)

Froggy Artist

Frog Con is a virtual convention featuring all things frogs!

VIEW ON EXPOFP

A+D Museum - Designing Worlds Exhibition (2020)

Pinball Gardener Featured

The A+D Architecture and Design Museum is an inclusive center for design
that encompasses architecture, interiors, landscape, fashion, product, graphic, and film/theater design. Their interactive online presence gives them the opportunity to host exhibits and events around the globe. Through exhibits, symposia, multi-disciplinary projects, educational and community programming, the A+D serves as a platform for contemporary issues in architecture, urbanism, and design.

Designing Worlds was an online exhibition highlighting a small selection of groundbreaking video games and their designers as part of a larger narrative about the future of gameplay mechanics, and the importance of virtual space as it relates to communication, culture, and community.

VIEW ON A+D MUSEUM SITE

FILM FESTIVALS