Shadows in Super Mario 3D World

[thop]

I can't exactly pinpoint it, but the long, wrapping shadows seem off.

This is especially noticeable when characters jump up walls or obstacles. Many such examples from 0:40 to 1:00 in this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iywt4cNb650#t40

 

[sebbbi]

The shadows are "correct", assuming there's a single light source directly above (infinite distance). However if there's only a single light source directly above, the lighting is incorrect, since the wall normals are in a 90 degree angle to the light source, and thus should receive no direct light (be completely black even without shadow casting on them).

Of course these walls should receive ambient (bounce) lighting. The shadows should only affect the direct light contribution. In this case it seems that the shadow just darkens all the pixels equally. The lighting formula doesn't separate direct lighting from ambient lighting at all.

 

[milk]

This type of shadowing has been used on multiple Mario games now. Sunchine, Mario 64 Ds, Galaxy 1/2, 3d land... Seems to be volume based, and those volumes seem to be alongated spheres or cylinders.