"XCurse" is a computer game that two friends of mine are programming and for which I'm creating the graphics in Blender. It is a 2D space shooting game with pre-rendered sprites over tile-based backgrounds. However, to add a kind of "3D feeling" we use DirectX for special effects like dynamic lighting, volumetric clouds or environment mapped reflections. None of these effects will be real 3D but tricks with image maps.
Please click on the thumbnail for a full-size screenshot.
We had this game in our minds since 2001 when I was creating 3D graphics in POV-Ray. Therefore I began doing test renderings for the game in that software. In 2003 I switched to Blender which I knew before. But I never felt the urge to try it because I was so familiar with POV-Ray's script language. But I reached a point where certain tasks became extremely difficult to achieve in POV-Ray, especially animation. So I gave Blender a try and finally switched completely.
Now I'll explain how I use Blender to create the game graphics and the normal maps for dynamic lighting, which is the only implemented effect at the moment.