u/Last-Total9473

For anyone seeing it for the first time: Rejected Draft is a sketch-themed incremental battler where you play as a discarded drawing fighting through the artist’s sketchbook. You defeat sketches, absorb their powers, unlock new mechanics, push through prestige layers, and slowly turn a weird pencil-on-paper world into a full long-form incremental game.

But one of the coolest things that happened during development was not something I originally planned. Artists from the community started contributing their own versions of the sketches. Since the game is built around “sketches” rather than fixed character designs, different artists can draw completely different interpretations of the exact same enemy, and all of those versions can exist in-game. A simple name like “Curious Cat,” “Buff Beetle,” or “Rigid Reptile” can become several wildly different drawings depending on who interprets it. At this point, every placeholder sketch has been replaced with community-created art!

To make that easier to browse, I built an external All Art Exhibit page that shows every sketch currently used in the game, with artist credits and links. Huge spoiler warning: the exhibit contains basically all current sketches, so I would avoid it if you prefer discovering the art naturally through progression.

Apart from that, I've been putting in hundreds of hours per month, so the actual game is still where the bulk of the work has gone: mechanics, balance, pacing, battles, prestige layers, QoL, and trying to make a very long incremental feel rewarding instead of exhausting.

Game Link: https://kuzzigames.com/rejected_draft/

I’m currently preparing to wrap up the web version and shift more focus toward the Steam version, which will add another NG+ style layer of progression beyond the current endgame. Be on the lookout for Rejected Draft demo on steam on June 15th for Next Fest!

I've got to share this quick postmortem (if you can call it that pre-release) on how the art direction for my current project completely changed thanks to the players.

When I first started building my solo game, I used AI generated images for the placeholders to test if the core loop was actually fun. There was a lot of pushback on early on, which is fair. But the game itself seemed to land, so people stuck around and a Discord community started forming. Some artistically inclined players who enjoyed the game started submitting their own sketches to replace the placeholders.

It started small, but it picked up fast. At this point, over 150 AI sketch assets have been replaced by player-made art, out of about 250 total sketches in the game. Because this became such a big part of the game, I ended up building a system where a single sketch can have multiple versions that rotate over time. That way I don’t have to pick just one interpretation and can include all of them.

The biggest difference isn’t that the player art is “better.” It’s that it actually feels different from piece to piece. The original placeholders all had the same kind of polished look, but they felt interchangeable. The player submissions are way less uniform, but each one has its own take on the idea.

For those interested in some before and after, I put together a quick comparison here https://imgur.com/a/m7sNy6A showing six before and after examples of how much better the player art is (left=placeholder, right=player)

Plague Doctor (by Pfftpffpfft): They added a really cool flair that perfectly matches the in game flavor text "Cures nothing, looks sick."
Mimic Chest (by LustHeart): The placeholder is detailed but kind of stiff. The player version simplifies it and leans into the expression, which makes it easier to read and gives it more personality.
Deep Diver (by Frutchy): The original is basically just a diving helmet. The player version turns it into a lantern fish, which is way more creative and fits the idea in an interesting way.
Demon Hand (by Pfftpffpfft): This human drawn version looks soooo much more menacing.
Floating Eye (by jareth91): It actually has its own character and personality now.
Accessory Assassin (by Stickman with a plus): The original was just a lot of clutter. The player version is much simpler, but somehow ends up being more more memorable.

It has been amazing seeing the game transform from a controversial placeholder situation to a genuine showcase for community artists.

Curious how others would handle this:
If your community started contributing core assets like this, would you lean into it as part of the design, or try to standardize the style?

Rejected Draft became a collaborative sketchbook disguised as an incremental game