Uncharted 4: A Thief's End [PS4]

[Laa-Yosh]

Actually there was some interesting info on ragdolls and such from Mad Max - the short story is that while the physics may be realistic, we've all been trained by the movement of movie stunt guys, and they're always moving very consciously to direct their movement and minimize risk of injury. Stuff like falling from a high point and making sure they land on their back. There's also a lot of wire work usually for safety reasons and other trickery which is always invisible because they can paint out everything in post. So for movies and video games as well, completely realistic may actually look totally off...

 

[Karamazov]

yeah just look at knocked out boxers, they fall like puppets, and that's why you can get badly injuried just by falling from your height.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Knocked out boxers is a good example of an unconscious, limp 'rag doll', although not with the limitless range of limb motion that is synonymous with the techniques. Conscious people don't fall like that however. They instinctively try to minimise damage, making the traditional rag-doll a cute video-game meme.

 

[Laa-Yosh]

Yeah, and also, boxers may get hit very hard, but the forces are nowhere near what happens when for example someone falls off from a fast moving vehicle, especially when he's also knocked unconscious. That kind of thing will never happen to stuntmen so we don't get to see the full effect of the movement on their limbs and such.

So basically, even video games don't have the option to go cheap and "only" use realistic physics. You need to match the performance of stunt people because that's what everyone is used to see, whether it's going to be keyframe animation or something more procedural.

 

[Arwin]

Most game people fall to never ever get up again though. I'd kinda like if some of them didn't die and just lie moaning or asking for a doctor or for you to text their relatives or something like that.

 

[Cjail]

Most game people fall to never ever get up again though. I'd kinda like if some of them didn't die and just lie moaning or asking for a doctor or for you to text their relatives or something like that.

MGR, Ground Zeroes and Ninja Gaiden 3 have that, I think it was removed in NG.

Surely I saw no blood sprouts or blood puddles in UC4, I guess that would make it too "realistic" to be implemented.

 

[Arwin]

I don't want that in UC4 tbh, it's just about so that I can play this with my son present now. The blood in AC4 Unity was already a bit too much (although nicely done). I can ser that dying in that game still unsettled my son (heck it unsettles me a little)

 

[Laa-Yosh]

I don't think these kinds of things would be beneficial to most games. There should be a certain level of detachment from reality to keep them enjoyable.

If the grunts in UC or such would be given more personality, that could make the player question his actions of shooting and beating them down, for example. It's okay to add depth to bosses and villains, because they are single encounters; but the rest of the enemies are basically animated obstacles, and they should remain like that...

 

[L. Scofield]

I don't think there's anything standard about ragdoll physics. It's been around for years, even decades but apparently it's quite difficult to get looking right. Usually bodies float too much, have little weight to them and just don't quite react as they should based on position, inertia etc. One thing I noticed from the video is that their ragdoll is more impressive than most.

Ragdolls have been done fine since a decade ago. A lot of developers choose floaty ragdolls but the tech has been solid for a long time. HL2 is a good example. KZ2 is another. Even further back Metroid Prime 1 had great weighty ragdolls for the space pirates.

 

[VFX_Veteran]

I don't think there's anything standard about ragdoll physics. It's been around for years, even decades but apparently it's quite difficult to get looking right. Usually bodies float too much, have little weight to them and just don't quite react as they should based on position, inertia etc. One thing I noticed from the video is that their ragdoll is more impressive than most.

Actually the most impressive ragdoll physics I've seen is Dying Light's zombies.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Ragdolls have been done fine since a decade ago.

Just because some tech isn't new, doesn't mean it's not good tech worth noting. If we ignore all the good tech used in a game during an analysis when that tech isn't unique to that game, we wouldn't get much of an analysis!

"Tessellation that...oh, been done. Great physics that...oh no, that's be done too. The AI is cleverly...old news, not worth mentioning. AA technique is the best...oh, beaten two months ago by another title. Particles...like every other best particles game. In summary, the perfect collection of the greatest techs known to man, but a mediocre game because none of it is new. Nothing to see here. The whole is nothing more than a set of recycled parts."

 

[L. Scofield]

A standard feature that games have had for a decade is hardly worth noting much less impressive.

 

[AlNom]

Just because some tech isn't new, doesn't mean it's not good tech worth noting. If we ignore all the good tech used in a game during an analysis when that tech isn't unique to that game, we wouldn't get much of an analysis!

Fish A.I.

 

[idsn6]

Actually there was some interesting info on ragdolls and such from Mad Max - the short story is that while the physics may be realistic, we've all been trained by the movement of movie stunt guys, and they're always moving very consciously to direct their movement and minimize risk of injury. Stuff like falling from a high point and making sure they land on their back. There's also a lot of wire work usually for safety reasons and other trickery which is always invisible because they can paint out everything in post. So for movies and video games as well, completely realistic may actually look totally off...

Yeah, and also, boxers may get hit very hard, but the forces are nowhere near what happens when for example someone falls off from a fast moving vehicle, especially when he's also knocked unconscious. That kind of thing will never happen to stuntmen so we don't get to see the full effect of the movement on their limbs and such.

Incidentally, Mad Max 2 had a stunt go wrong that resulted in a stuntman thrown off his motorcycle at speed and pinwheeling in full ragdoll to serious injury. The take was kept in the movie.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

"Nothing is more exciting or dangerous than the make-believe world of the movies." Except that seeing that poor guy get spun through the air and knowing it's real is far more 'exciting' than seeing the same thing faked a la Hollywood!

 

[chris1515]

https://www.gnomon.edu/community/events/headspace-an-evening-with-naughty-dog


An event about working in Naughty Dog


http://m.neogaf.com/showpost.php?p=169991900

Vidéo from the event

Many dual shocker article with slides inside and explanation

http://www.dualshockers.com/2015/06...etween-shading-for-games-and-movies-and-more/


http://www.dualshockers.com/2015/06...tastic-environment-artists-give-more-details/

http://www.dualshockers.com/2015/06...liage-animation-and-water-puddles-technology/

http://www.dualshockers.com/2015/06...ed-jeep-bike-ak-47-and-more-from-the-e3-demo/

Many dual shocker article with slides or image. Many cool infos. I think Laa Yosh will like all of this.

 

[chris1515]

_ The team was initially tempted to rig the foliage in the whole game (basically setting up the foliage with actual animations), but that would have been too expensive performance-wise. That’s why Maximov created a “shader foliage animation” (which you can see in the first video below) that is much more affordable and still very interactive.
_Leaves have particle emitters on them, so if there’s a gust of wind, they actually drip droplets of water.
At Naughty Dog developers are very happy to share their knowledge and share ownership of a project. Desse, Maximov and Naicker do it all the time.
_ The fly on Drake’s forehead in the first cinematic trailer was made in the span of a day at the very last moment.
_The grain sacks used as cover in the E3 demo are physics-based as they react to bullets, but also simulation-based as they deflate when they get hit. Those are two different animation layers on top of each other.
_ They didn’t really need to have the clothesline that gets ran over with the jeep in the E3 demo, but they still wanted to put it in. It was initially started by Desse, and then Naicker completed it.

We didn't see everything's in term of physics...

 

[chris1515]

The article with comparison between working in movie industry and video game industry is very interesting and the presentation was done by an artist working in ND but before in Disney and ready at Dawn for The Order 1886.

 

[L. Scofield]

The grain sacks used as cover in the E3 demo are physics-based as they react to bullets, but also simulation-based as they deflate when they get hit. Those are two different animation layers on top of each other.

What's the difference between "physics-based" and "simulation-based"?

 

[Shifty Geezer]

I'm guessing physics is typical rigid-/soft-body physics while simulation is volume simulation of the sand. Physics will apply deformations based on the physics solve and mesh, and simulation will apply deformations based on volumetric calcs.