A short while ago, we had the awesome opportunity to chat with Brent Swart about the designs that he submitted for PUBG Mobile. He had created two skins to be used in the game, and it was up to the global PUBG Mobile community to vote for which ones they liked best.
Well, the votes were tallied, and, ladies and gentlemen… WE WON! By “We,” I mean South Africa as a whole and not just Brent because he did it all for us, right, Brent?
NAG caught up with our design celebrity, and this is what he had to say:
Cody (Super Awesome Interviewer): How does it feel, having something (his winning design) put into a globally played game?
Brent (Even Awesomer South African Celebrity): It’s a lot to take in, actually. I’m a commercial graphic designer, and I’ve worked with pretty big brands, but this hits very differently. Probably because I play the game daily. It was quite a shock initially, but all the positive feedback so far has really hit home. So, it’s quite an emotional thing for me as it’s always been a dream of mine to have some sort of artwork in a game, let alone one I play every day.
We then proceeded to have some banter about how much cooler it is to have a passion project get accepted by the community rather than getting just another piece of art accepted because it’s what you do for a living.
Cody: What was your inspiration for the design that got picked?
Brent: We were allowed to submit two entries. The first one I worked on for several days and spent a lot of time styling it, whereas this one was an afterthought. I thought, what am I if I were in a game? The original name for the outfit was art-school dropout set. It was a combination of an artist’s mannequin, mixed with high school desks, graffiti, and some delinquency thrown in the mix. So that was the inspiration behind it because that’s how I got into the industry, drawing on desks in High School.
Cody: Now that you’ve got one successful passion project, do you have anything else in the works for other games or PUBG Mobile?
Brent: I am entering again this year, I honestly haven’t thought about what I’ll be doing yet, because we still have about a month and a half left, but I’m definitely going to enter again. Obviously, winning is great motivation to do it again.
Cody: Two questions in one here: A, do you use your own in-game skin, and B, how much has it improved your KPD started using it?”
Brent: So PUBG is definitely going to be losing money from me because I’m not going to wear any other skin again! They gave me it for free, and I haven’t worn anything else. When I started with the skin, my KD was 4.6, and it has slightly improved to 4.64.
Cody: Awesome, we’ve got it officially on camera that using the skin improves your KD!
Brent: Yeah, some pretty influential people have bought the skin and tagged me in their videos. Wynnsanity thought it was really cool; STAR Captain, possibly the best TDM player in PUBGM, is currently wearing it, and Fake Dream, a Japanese influencer, also bought and got hold of me, so it’s been pretty crazy.
Cody: Last question, what are your thoughts on venturing out into other games like COD or Fortnite?
Brent: I have ventured out a little bit. I have tried some other games, but my community is in PUBG Mobile. I’m also an official content partner for PUBG Mobile Africa at the moment. COD is fantastic for Multiplayer, FPP (First Person Perspective), but I do play TPP (Third person perspective) on PUBG. I fool around on Mobile Legends as well, so yeah, I get around on the mobile esports scene. If I see something trending, I download it and give it a shot to see if there’s a nice market there. I’ll try everything once and see how it goes. Luckily, I didn’t get into Apex Mobile; it seems like that was a good decision.
Overall, Brent still seems dedicated to the PUBG Mobile scene, and Brent, we’re still dedicated to you. We’ve got all our fingers and toes crossed that you can whip up another stunning skin this year that the PUBGM community can pick up!
BONUS QUESTION!
If you didn’t know, Brent designs “Clutch Cards” with Spaza Gaming, and we asked for a little more information on what they are.
Brent: My idea behind Clutch Cards was to try and make the average Joe feel like a competitive, professional player. So, we designed the first set of cards roughly 3 years ago and made the guys look like superstars. We stylised the cards, and put their stats on them and their in-game names. They’re basically digital versions of Baseball Cards. This year we’re doing a set of 100, and we’re going to change the styling a little, but it will have a very similar look and feel to the original sets. The cards also allow the community to see some of the faces of the players that they support.”
If you want to be on your very own PUBGM Baseball Card, send a high-quality photo of yourself with a white backdrop and email it to spazagaming@gmail.com along with your in-game name and a catchphrase.