We tend to recognize animation among films, television shows, or anything we watch, whatever. What about in video games? I’m not saying it’s forgettable but rather it is not as highly appreciated as the ones in films. It is its own separate category. Games today are trying to become more cinematic making have this film feel to it such as Halo 2, Gears of War, or Bioshock. From games being in 8-bit format to them being as closely animated as the quality in Pixar. Last year’s 2009 most critically acclaimed was Naughty Dog’s Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. The animation brought video games to a whole other level making as if the characters were real. The difference between an animation movie and a video game is instead ofsitting you are playing with several buttons, analog sticks, select, and start.
Sometime last year, Playstation 3 came out with this commercial advertising the game. How the boyfriend tries to tell the PS3 company that his girlfriend think it’s a movie. The head guy says how it has everything of course she would believe that, but it has been two days. “Not an issue”. Even they believe the animation/graphics were so good that it looked like a movie. The developers say that when making this game they used “motion capture” which is something the makers of the film “Avatar” also were using. Naughty Dog got the voice actors to wear motion capture suits so they can capture every single action in their body, faces, everything when making this game. Not only that but they maximized the cells in their game engine making the game have this realistic environment. While comparing it to other games just a few years ago, the advancement on the animation has increased by a lot and IT’S BEEN JUST A FEW YEARS!
From the beginning of the scene there is this master shot where we see the main character Nathan Drake walking in the ice storm. From looking at the camera angle, one could imagine if it was real or not. The facial expressions and the body movements in this game are detailed and ridiculous to how close it looks to the real thing. Animation has advanced not only in the film world, but also to the video game world. The great thing about games like Uncharted 2 is instead of watching it, you’re playing it!
-Chuck
I commented on Nicole A and Mike G.
February 1, 2010 at 1:19 am |
I agree that oftentimes video games go unnoticed as a medium for animation. A team of animators is an essential parting of making video games work, without animation one is very limited in terms of what kind of visual representation one can use. Without animation one is limited to games like pong and space invaders. I had no idea Uncharted 2 used motion capture though, sounds like they put a lot of effort into the game.
February 1, 2010 at 7:08 am |
Video games that use animation to illustrate a story are definitely overlooked in my opinion and I agree that without animators, the video game would fall apart. Overall, your blog posting is really interesting and informative. Good job!
February 1, 2010 at 7:36 am |
Video games that use animation for stories are definitely underappreciated and I agree that good video use animation to make good stories. Without animation, video games generally fall flat or lose there appeal. I also found that Uncharted 2 using motion capture in the game was very interesting. Overall, interesting blog posting this week.
February 1, 2010 at 11:06 pm |
I feel that graphics in video games have come a long way across all of the platforms. Although, in-game graphics are progressing, during the last few years cinematics (cut scenes of unplayable video like animation) have made leaps and bonds.
PS3 got in trouble on its launch because it claimed that the cinematics of Killzone 2 were actual in-game content. I feel if this technology continues to move in the direction that it is, the things that look like cinematics today will be the standard graphics for in-game graphics tomorrow.
February 2, 2010 at 1:10 am |
While the animation in video games has greatly increased in recent years it has also had the negative impact of having some games act more like movies then games. Take for example the most recent Metal Gear Solid. While the francise as a whole has been known to have lengthy cinematics the latest game, while heavily anticipated, began to have a negative slant because of the rather long cinematics in the game. The graphics of the gameplay was amazing as has been the case in other games in recent years. Yet the inability for developers to reach the perfect mix between cinematic and gameplay is still being sought. However, I agree that when it comes it Uncharted 2 that mix has reached it’s best point to date. Also the almost seamless transition between cinematic and gameplay adds to Uncharted 2′s appeal.
February 4, 2010 at 2:20 am |
[...] Chuck Soo-hoo [...]
March 18, 2010 at 7:31 pm |
Not being a video gamer, but living with one, I have seen the evolution of graphics in video games take off at a crazy rate. The only system I ever had was the Atari 7800 and I’d still be pretty happy with that!
As cool as video game animation is these days, must everything look like an animation of real-life? We see real life all around us, cartoons have become so ‘real’, now video games are in the mix. Whatever happened to escape from reality? I miss old time(can’t believe I just said that) graphics of video games, the Atari, the Ninentdo, etc. Those really are what made me escape!