"Rick, we never cease learning more about ourselves from the example you set. You put the bar up higher than most of us can reach, but it was an amazing privilege to watch you go over it so easily and so frequently."
- Westwood Studios
Robert Richter Parks or Rick Parks (November 5, 1950 - December 15, 1996) was an artist, story-boarder, and animator in 2D and 3D at Westwood Studios. He was lead artist on Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos and Lands of Lore: Guardians of Destiny, passing away from leukemia ten months before the sequel's release. The Guardians of Destiny manual, credits, and a short video in the menu's extras are dedicated to him in loving memory.
Youth
Parks was born in Pasadena, California in 1950. The protege of a scientist, he developed an interest in arts at a young age. He began his career in 1969 when he entered Occidental College in Los Angeles as an art major, and for a time studied at the Fine Arts Academy of Vienna. His talent for realist painting was noted as early as the 1970s. Before his career at Westwood, Rick Parks was well-known for his paintings in traditional media such as watercolor and oil. Parks' work has been described as detailed, photorealistic, and creative in his use of lighting.
Parks gained recognition doing mural and ceiling art for casinos, especially on the Las Vegas strip and in Atlantic City. Celebrities who owned or commissioned his original work included performers Siegfried and Roy, actor Sylvester Stallone, and then-casino owner Donald Trump. According to another former Westwood artist, Parks painted a mural at the Mirage Casino "where the young King Arthur is trying to pull Excalibur out of the rock but having trouble and even his horse is holding onto his cloak and trying to help pull." As of 2022, several of Parks's traditional oil portraits depicting historical world leaders were available for sale through the Gallery of History's storefront. Beyond this, Parks's artworks have not been made available to the general public.
Westwood co-founder Louis Castle reportedly met Parks at a CES show, when he was already an established artist in the Amiga graphics scene. Castle and fellow co-founder Brett Sperry quickly realized that they could not afford to pay him "what he was worth." Parks later returned to them, requesting a deal where he could continue his painting career alongside working at Westwood full-time.
Park's signature portraiture and landscape styles were prominently featured throughout the cutscenes and backdrops of Lands of Lore: The Throne of Chaos. Parks was lead artist on the first two Legend of Kyrandia games and employed a similar aesthetic in both series; Kyrandia and Lands of Lore were both written by Rick Gush and also contain canonical references to one another. Parks did background art for the first Legend of Kyrandia game, as well as some character design and animation, while concept art for the latter two games in the trilogy was largely done by Jack Martin with decreasing input from Parks over time. As lead artist on Lands of Lore 2 he contributed to the City of the Ancients cinematic, as well as and others.
Videogames
While at Westwood, Parks worked in Deluxe Paint and learned the first generation of Lightwave 3D for creating more cinematic animation on the Amiga. Early examples of Rick's 3D work include Dune II's ornithopter and the introduction sequence for The Legend of Kyrandia: Malcolm's Revenge. He also created an early pitch trailer for Blade Runner that investors mistook for the film, and which impressed them so much that Westwood was granted rights to make the videogame adaptation. He was a contributing artist or art consultant on BattleTech: The Crescent Hawks' Revenge (1990), DragonStrike (1990), Eye of the Beholder , Eye of the Beholder 2 (1991), Dune II (1992, uncredited), and Westwood's The Lion King (1994) tie-in game.
Parks's early pixel art creations on the Amiga were each limited to palettes of 16, 32, or 64 colors respectively, depending on color modes and resolutions that were tied to the hardware. His work at Westwood was done using VGA hardware, which could achieve palettes of up to 256 colors. Unlike many pixel artists of his era, he employed gradient shading over dithering, placing all shaded pixels by hands individually when drawing light in a limited palette. This approach can especially be seen in the menu backdrop of Eye of the Beholder and background mattes for Legend of Kyrandia 2. While making pixel art, Westwood artists would work on each other's art in order to maintain a more consistent look, and former employees have stated that collaborating with Parks in this way helped hone their skills. In order to improve, other Westwood artists would occasionally directly copy his pixel art or style. Parks was a left-handed artist and used a computer mouse left-handed as well.
Park's enduring positive attitude is often remarked upon in interviews, and former Westwood artists have also noted that the opportunity to collaborate with Parks was itself inspiring. He is often described as an "art god" by ex-Westwood employees. Several playful incidents of Parks's have been described by coworkers including adding fish to a local fountain and throwing a fake snake into a Westwood office. He enjoyed both waterskiing and ultralight aircraft. The credits of Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection (2020) includes a posthumous dedication to Parks. Rick’s love for his craft, even toward the end of his life when his friends were sneaking puppies into the hospital to visit him, was absolutely clear.
"Rick Parks Autographs, Memorabilia & Collectibles." February 7, 2022. History for Sale: The Autograph & Manuscript Leader, division of the Gallery of History, Inc. Accessed February 2022 at https://www.historyforsale.com/signer-memorabilia/rick-parks/16968.
StSam. Rick Parks. Published November 5 2015. Vogons. Accessed February 2022 at https://www.vogons.org/viewtopic.php?t=45499.
"Noted artist Parks dies at 46." January 21 1997. Las Vegas Sun. Accessed February 2022 at https://lasvegassun.com/news/1997/jan/21/noted-artist-parks-dies-at-46/.
Hewitt, Joseph. Ode to Rick Parks. Published 24 April 2007 on Working As Designed. Accessed on September 2020 at http://working-as-designed.blogspot.com/2007/04/ode-to-rick-parks.html
Jarratt, Steve. The Art of Point & Click Adventure Games. 2018, Bitmap Books. Pages 186-9.
JamminJack. "Jack Martin and 13 kyrandian concept arts that haven't seen the light of day since 1993 till 2019!" June 14 2019, VK. Accessed on September 2020 at https://vk.com/@kyrandia-jack-martin-en.
Klepacki, Frank. Reddit IAMA. Accessed on February 2020 at https://i.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/11n1xk/i_am_frank_klepacki_audio_director_composer_and/c6o6fy6/.compact.
Mighty Kmuzu. "Rick Parks." June 14, 2009. Mighty Kmuzu: Kind of the Savage Land of Creativity. Accessed February 2022 at .
Fred, "POSTER.info." People Link Amiga Zone library, 1991. Retrieved from archive at http://aminet.net/search?query=rick+parks. Archival backup here.
Hewitt, Joseph. "Need some insight about Westwood's pixel art." Reddit. Accessed on February 2022 at https://old.reddit.com/r/PixelArt/comments/932l1s/need_some_insight_about_westwoods_pixel_art/.
The Intersection of Art & Tech: Game designer honors artist friend with scholarship
Manuals:
Fables & Fiends: Legend of Kyrandia Book I Game Manual. 1991, Virgin Interactive.
Fables & Fiends: Hand of Fate Book II Game Manual. 1992. Virgin Interactive. Accessed on September 2020 at https://www.gog.com/downloads/legend_of_kyrandia_hand_of_fate/.
Fables & Fiends: Legend of Kyrandia Book III Game Manual. 1994. Virgin Interactive.
Battletech: The Crescent Hawk's Revenge Player's Guide. 1991, Infocom. Accessed on September 2020 at http://www.abandonia.com/files/extras/27102_Manual.pdf.
Primary Sources:
MobyGames credits:
"The Lion King (1994) SNES credits." MobyGames. Accessed on September 2020 at https://www.mobygames.com/game/snes/lion-king/credits.
"Command & Conquer: Remastered Collection Credits." MobyGames. Accessed on September 2020 at https://www.mobygames.com/game/windows/command-conquer-remastered-collection/credits.