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Burnout Paradise is a game that keeps on giving. Last week Big Surf Island DLC came out. Have you had a chance to explore the Island. My favourite is the big ski jump—if you haven’t found that yet, search today. It is the biggest jump in the game and is phenomenal.
There is a great feature on Eurogamer this week and their Digital Foundry section. Richard Parr, Technical Director for Criterion Games and Alex Fry, Senior Engineer, give an insight into Burnout Technology over the years.
As some developers talk about maxing out the limits of the power of the Xbox 360 and PS3, Parr & Fry believe that: “It’s nothing new, you hear it all the time… we’ve maxed out, we’re the best,” says Fry dismissively. “That’s proof that you’re not the best,” Parr chimes in. “It means you’re out of ideas.” “You always find new ways to do things, the constraints lift. Not just with a new console generation but with every game you do,” adds Fry. “Whether it’s a sequel or whether it’s a new game, you learn to do things differently… better. The constraints go away because you learn. While it’s nice to say you’ve maxed something out, there’s not really any point.”
Career choice is not easy. Global Head of Talent Brand, Matthew Jeffery, provides us with an insight into the tough choice many face…working in film or games.
Let me know your views on what he has to say.
EArl
Opinion Piece: Matthew Jeffery…….’Career Choice: Working in games or film’?
Look back a few years. Gaming was seen as the awkward cousin of film. Like the spotty geek sitting at the corner of the school disco, waiting to be asked to dance. Film & film production was seen as the career destination of choice for top creative talent, the hot mover of the disco. People in film looked at the games industry and were frustrated that they could not bring their creative spark across into the industry without being limited by the technology at their disposal. Working on a PS2 or Xbox, challenged creative talent but not in ways they wanted as memory limitations really curtailed what they could bring to the party. Work in film on cutting VFX productions or come into gaming with block text & graphics. Easy choice. Fast forward that to today and how things have changed.
Just consider for one minute how far the games industry has come and the innovations that we have already seen. Look back to the 1970′s when gamers were feasting on the likes of Pong, Space Invaders and Pacman, simple games visually but albeit with fun gameplay. Now fast forward to today when we look forward to graphical tour de force games like Crysis 2, NFS Shift and Dante’s Inferno. That’s a stunning achievement and testament to how far the games industry has come. But this is not just about visuals. Games are interactive, running in real time, with complex AI, physics engines all running online for millions of gamers to play and enjoy….but more of that later!
Only last week the games industry had another WOW moment with the announcement of Project Natal by Microsoft. The idea of playing games with no controllers but based on body scanning technology that records your movement in real time and comprises of voice recognition technology. That’s a WOW moment. Imagine playing football with no controller or driving a car hands free…all now stunning realisations about to be brought to the market. Watching the promo video by Peter Molyneux of Milo was also stunning. Imagine a computer character that you can interact with, that can identify basic emotions and hold conversation with you. WOW. Now imagine working on that technology, making new games incorporating it? Now that’s a fun, creative and intellectual challenge…..and imagine the possibilities of what this technology can create. And this is only one form of technological advancement in gaming, not even mentioning the new games in development with real 3d!
Let’s contrast that briefly with film. There are many WOW moments across the history of film. Who can forget Ray Harryhausen’s ‘Clash of the Titans’ and the stop go motion of those beasts from the deep; ‘Tron’ with the first incorporation of CG…the stunning lightcycle chases; the inspiring effects from ‘Star Wars’ and those mesmerising space battles; ’Terminator 2′ and the liquid nitrogen effects of the Terminator chasing Arnie through the hospital and morphing through the iron bars..then getting his gun stuck; Spielberg’s classic, ‘Jurassic Park’, with Dinosaurs that really did feel real; ‘Toy Story’ the first full length CG animated feature, to this day still stunning. All WOW moments that had us on the edge of our cinema seats in awe and mouthing ’How did they do that’?
But in some ways, the immense trickery and visual brilliance of the VFX houses have anaesthetised audiences, as we are now used to their brilliance. In fact we come to expect it. Take ‘Transformers’, a superb film. But seeing Megatron or Optimus Prime transform is mightily impressive, but we are used to grand VFX and we expect to see it and almost demand more and more effects when we watch a film. Hence, currently, the WOW effects in film feel like they have hit the pause button.
Interaction is a huge bonus for the games industry. In film the film director takes you on a journey, they take you through a roller coaster of emotions, all on their linear ride. They control what you see. In games, YOU control, what you see, what you do, how you interact, the camera angles. Developers are even happy to provide you with the tools to create your own games, like Spore and Sony Classics like LittleBigPlanet. This all involves a lot of technical challenges for creative talent.
So when you sit down to make that career choice, think of the future….think of how much you want to be challenged in your career and where the games industry has come from and where it could be in another 20 years! Who knows. Virtual Reality? Full 3D? Neural Gaming? What we do know that we will have great fun pushing the limits of technology to their limits and beyond as we continue to entertain millions of people. One final thought to leave this discussion on…………….
Burnout Paradise sees the release of Big Surf Island DLC this week…that’s a whole brand new island for the game. Now consider this. Criterion Games, the developers behind this game, are recruiting now, take a look at www.jobs.ea.com Think of the technical challenges they face behind this game including; running the game at 60 frames per second, real time physics, full car deformation & splintering, taking the game online, with 8 gamers racing together, lag free. Wowsers, that some challenges and that is just scraping the surface.
Captured your attention? Join us in a career in gaming…………………..
Burnout Paradise, a year on from release, just gets better and better. How many games can you name that have kept you engaged for so long? Well, the latest DLC is out and its the Superb ‘Cops & Robbers’. Available now on the PSN Store and Xbox Live. And coming soon will be the next big download…..a new Island…Big Surf Island.
Cops & Robbers is a frantic online game for between 2 – 8 players. Gold has gone missing in Paradise City. First up, choose your side. Are you a Cop or a Robber? Then help your team recover the stolen gold and get it back to base. What follows is just a blast—-mayhem…awesome car chases.
Played it yet?……tell EArl your views…..are you a cop or a robber?
Still thinking about buying the DLC? Take a look at this video….
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