Posts with tag process

Blizzplanet's got the tip on a great interview over at CG Channel with the Blizzard CGI team, responsible for, among many other great cinematics, putting together the Wrath intro trailer. We heard from this team back at BlizzCon, and here they give a little more insight into the thinking behind their process, rather than the process itself.

One of the first questions that comes up is one that everyone would like to ask: Why haven't we seen a longer feature from these guys? But they say that, as always, their first priority is making great games, not great features, and as much as people would want to see a 60 or 90 minute cinematic from this team, they work for a game company. They also talk about something they've been working more on lately: in-game cinematics. I saw this at work in Starcraft II back at BlizzCon -- while most of Blizzard's cinematics so far have been completely separate from the in-game art, Starcraft II introduces models that are high-quality enough to be rendered cinematically, so much of the actual cutscenes are in-game rather than in separately rendered CGI. But as the team points out, their goal is to make them no less awesome.

Finally, they do get into the nitty-gritty of designing their cinematics, and 3D animators will enjoy the ins and outs of how Blizzard made Arthas summon that Frostwyrm. We're just in awe of how much great work this team does -- hopefully we'll be seeing lots more of it in the future.

Cecil Vortex has a long interview up with none other than Azeroth's rockstar mastermind, Chris Metzen. He actually describes himself as a "world creator," and that's about right -- he's the guy (along with everyone else at Blizzard, obviously) who's come up with the entire universe that the World of Warcraft exists in -- from Orcs to Dwarves to Titans and Old Gods, Metzen is the guy who dreamed it.

And for a guy who's created everything in this gigantic universe, he's remarkably "geeked" about it -- he still talks like he's a guy sitting at his basement table creating D&D quests (which, don't lie now, we've all done at one point or another). The second part of the interview is even more interesting -- Metzen talks about his creative process and just how much of a group process it is at Blizzard. Since they're all in the target audience, every group member censors each other and pushes each other to bigger and better heights of storytelling.

Metzen also mentions a non-Blizzard project called Soldier: 76, about a guy making his way through a second American Civil War. It came out a while ago, apparently, but would definitely be interesting to see what Metzen does outside of Blizzard continuity. And as if there was any doubt that Metzen was a rock star, he ends the interview exactly the way you'd expect a creative superstar to end it: when "you've tapped into something beyond the individual," then "it's off to the races."

[Via Blizzplanet]

We all come to moments in our lives where we have to make big decisions. The consequences of these choices can change our lives completely, and often the agonising debate over a particular decision can stretch out for months.

Similarly, the characters we shape and nurture in WoW can face tough choices. Which talent tree to specialise in? Which equipment to focus on? Should game time be spent levelling alts, progressing in the endgame or ranking up in PvP?

Worlds apart, you may say. Working out whether to kill some imaginary elves or imaginary dragons is a completely different ball game from wondering whether that promotion is really worth the new commute. Yet recently, while concentrating on an important real life decision, I found myself retreading extremely familiar territory. In fact, when distilled to the pros and cons, it turned out identical to a recent choice I'd had to make in WoW.

Putting aside any discussion of the complexity of WoW, and how one can become invested in the game, I found it fascinating to realise I had already tried and tested an important decision from my real life by making the same choice in Azeroth. So next time you're arguing over a point of raid leadership, or pondering PvPing, bear in mind you might find your thought processes useful later!