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Cinematics in Gaming
iView Author:
Papai
(Hyderabad, India)
Email:
maxratul [at] gmail [dot] com
Cinematics in Gaming
“Most people think time is like a river, that flows swift and sure in one direction. But I have seen the face of time, and I can tell you, they are wrong. Time is an ocean in a storm. You may wonder who I am and why I say this. Sit down, and I will tell you a tale like none you have ever heard….” Thus begins (and ends eventually) one of the most revered franchisees in Gaming, The Prince of Persia series. The above lines form the core of the storyline of the game appear in no less than three cinematics throughout the series.
Cinematics are an integral part of modern video games. They serve as essential means of developing story lines, and delivering over the top events that the game engine cannot handle. Although some games have altogether denounced the concept of cinematics, criticizing them as too non interactive (most notably the Half Life series), most games embrace them as a selling point. Publishers release cinematics in various gaming sites to hype up their games, and these also form the basis for trailers. Cinematics also define the production values of the game.
Shoddy, poorly rendered cinematics are always unacceptable and serve no other purpose other than irritating the players. Now days most publishers insist on cutting edge production values and state of the art rendering that can give lessons to even Hollywood biggies (obviously since the global gaming industry is bigger than Hollywood).
The evolution of cinematics in games can be traced back a long way. The earliest cutscenes may be pac-man chasing Ms. Pac-man through the pac-world. Initially most games had just one intro cinematic, and one outro cinematic. Things started changing as games got bigger, allowing more data to be put in the package. Some games veered from the use of CGI to using live action footage, most notably the Command and Conquer series.
The most important thing to be kept in mind while designing a cinematic is that it has to have an impact. Players tend to view cinematics as a reward or as an “unlockable”, and a bad boring movie is a huge letdown and bad advertisement for the game. Of course I will repeat that there are two schools of thoughts regarding this, and games like Half Life, although not having any cinematic, are by no means less engaging. In fact many people, including me regard Half Life, to be the greatest game of all time.
Making an actual cinematic is a huge job. First you have to decide whether it will be a pre-rendered movie, or an in-game cutscene. A pre-rendered movie is just like a modern animated movie, involving huge amount of CGI. Here you get the freedom of showing any action you want, but the down cost is that it is costlier and takes much more time. An in-game cutscene uses the game engine to display events. Thus the amount of action you can show may be hindered by the capabilities of your engine. Most games now comes with its own editors with which you can create in-game movies.
The next big choice is the story. What other cutscenes do we show apart from the intro and outro. The cutscenes must be shown only at key plot moments. Too many of them dilutes their impact and ultimately hampers gameplay. Then comes the production values. The graphics must be top notch, and stylistically consistent with the art direction of the game. A toon game cannot have a noir-ish video. The human part is dependent upon the voice actors. They must not ham their lines. Many a good voice actors have made cheesy and melodramatic dialogs sound realistic by their acting. The sound design is also an integral part. Many franchisees have their own signature tunes with which the players can relate to instantly. Gone are the days where the sound track of the games meant various beeps. Now days games use music from full blown orchestras (Myst 3, Age of Mythology…) to rock bands (Prince of Persia : Warrior Within) to Hip Hop Artists (Def Jam).
Working in the gaming industry brings me in daily contact with these wonderful works of art, and I thought to share some of my all time favorite cinematic moments in Gaming. This is not a rating in any way – just a list of some very good cinematics.
1. Assassin’s Creed
Although the game had only one old school cinematic, it was a masterpiece. Also the teaser trailer featuring UNKLE’s Lonely Soul set new industry standards.
2. Age of Empires 2
The graphics quality was OK for the time, but the concept was awesome. And it had the legendary Age Of Empires music. A perfect opening to the great strategy game.
3. Ninja Gaiden (xbox and Black)
These cinematics were like the reward for completing the extremely unforgiving and tough levels. These have some of the most brutal ninja action you will ever see, along with a great soundtrack. One of the key things that made Ninja Gaiden the greatest action game of all time.
4. Command and Conquer : Red Alert
This one featured the Reds landing in New York and driving a tank through Texas!!! Add the iconic sounds of Hell March and you got the perfect recipe for goose bumps. The first part of the video is shot in live action and the second part is CGI.
5. Warcraft 3: Reign Of Chaos
The quality of animation is second to none, and the story telling is epic. The movies capture the very soul of the fantasy land of warcraft and its characters, from jaw dropping beauty to delving deep into the psychology of the people. Blizzard cinematics are the best in the world, and this game shows why.
6. Street Fighter 4 Teaser Trailer :
A completely new art style in the reboot of the revered series – fighting does not look better than this.
7. Halo 2
Master chief jumps on an alien bomb and personally returns it to the baddies. With compliments. See this to believe it.
8. World of Warcraft
The WoW has the biggest subscriber base among any MMORPG in the world. One of the main reasons is its instantly identifiable locations and characters, that had scores of Warcraft fans drooling. This video sets up the premise by giving us an awe inspiring glimpse of the dream world.
9. Silent Hill 1
Nurse – Check.
Little Girl – Check.
Haunted houses – Check.
Empty cars – Check.
Add a heart achingly beautiful guitar in the background, and you have a creepy footage that serves to open a terrifying game.
Check out some more beautiful videos from gamespy’s list of 25 greatest cinematics.
http://www.gamespy.com/articles/771/771937p1.html
There you go. There are lots of other games with good cinematics, (like all games from Japan :D ). Mainly you will like a cinematic because you like the game and care about its characters. If you are not into gaming, maybe you can check them out in youtube. You will find a treasure waiting to be discovered.
36 Responses to “Cinematics in Gaming”
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Sweet article. Im getting involved in cinematics to be released as commercials. Looks to be the next big thing. One coming up next month.
Fucking amazing budgets and production values dude. The numbers thrown about make my head spin.
I think the cinematic at the conclusion of Halo 3 is the coolest one I’ve seen. I really need to catch up on my gaming man.
Halo 3 climax is really awesome… What makes it more amazing is that it managed to live up to all the hype… :) Check out Gears of War… you will like it if you liked Halo
After watching Pyaasa (I still cannot get over the film) and now reading this article has made me rethink about an idea which I had for about a year. I will think about the idea today and forget about it tomorrow.
Still it is only an idea.. nothing more than that.
I want to make a film which is a fusion between real and cinematics. Where the protagonist is able to restart his life many times, you know, like you are playing a game and whenever you think you are losing you will restart the game before you lose the game. And whenever you restart the game you will do something different at the point you found it hard and will keep restarting till you go beyond that point. A bit like that.
i know a few films which have done something like that but still…
Sorry for digressing away from the topic.
Sighs.
lite… u make perfect sense to me….
(as i also am pretty high now!!!!)
@Honhaar
Check out the “Deaths of Ian Stone” , “Groundhog Day”, and “12.01″. Each one treats the concept differently.
@Papai
Which console should I buy ? Xbox, Wii or PS3 ?
as of now either xbox 360 or wii… i have a slight preference for xbox 360… however the new Mario game alone justifies a wii… Nintendo Rox!!!!!
I checked wiki on those films (except “12.01″ - cannot find anything on it), Nah Mithoon, I do not have something like that in mind. I want the film to be dark - not a comedy or a horror or a drama.
In fact, I do not want to have any story, just a short story that gets keep repeated a few times because the protagonist does not get what he wants. The treatment will be different. That’s why I think using cinematics would be a good thing.
Im not a huge fan of the homicidal italian plumber. Gimme Master Chief any day.
A cinematic still needs a script. A cinematic is just a short film which is either standalone or fits into the bigger piece.
If you watch the Halo films done by Blomkamp though they don’t even feature Master Chief they tie into the franchise.
Ur idea sounds intriguing. Care to share more ?
Experimental shorts always give me a hard on. :d
@HG
“Run Lola Run”
Mithun, I have shared everything about the idea that I have thought of. Of course, a film needs a script.
But, what I meant was, this concept… just imagine after a long day of work you’ve taken some dope, you start playing the game, and then you start hallucinating that you’re in the game and you cannot seem to go beyond point B, so you keep restarting the game until…
substitute the game with a short story, so showing same story in different ways… like you can play a game in different ways.. now i cannot find a game or a short story that would fit what i want to show..
Basically, the protagnist wants to restart his life and he hallucinates, but by restarting his life he cannot achieve what he wants.. in the hallucination..
sounds stupid does not it…
Amit Singh, yes, that is it. “..the three sequential alternative realities begin…” So something like that has been done…
… oh well…. d’oh!
AOE rocks :)
Of course I have no clue about other things in that list :D
yup AOE2 conquerors is my favorite game of all time….
*starts playing trumpet*
I was actively in the community… scenario design AI etc… also was ranked on the zone server, where my clan used to play multiplayer!!!
*stops playing trumpet*
5. Warcraft 3: Reign Of Chaos
The quality of animation is second to none, and the story telling is epic. The movies capture the very soul of the fantasy land of warcraft and its characters, from jaw dropping beauty to delving deep into the psychology of the people. Blizzard cinematics are the best in the world, and this game shows why.
how true…DOTA any one ?
btw how about quake 3..i think the cinematics they had were waaaaaaaaay ahead of their time
there was a game called no one lives forever which was a very critically acclaimed game and won numerous game of the year awards 6 or 7 years ago. it had the best story i’ve ever seen in a computer game. all it’s cinematics were wonderful too.
and where is the gears of war trailer in this list? i believe it was no. 1 in gamespy’s list.
the most recent addition and the no.1 spot for me is taken by the opening credits of call of duty 4…
@ honhaar goonda
that concept was touched upon in max payne.
and the most recent simpsons super spectacular comic also has a similar concept…
makes me remember the south park episode: the simpsns already did it….
KJ, thanks, so it has been done many times. How come I have not seen the episode of Simpson or South Park? But, if I do get to make a film, that it will be something along that line…
it was the simpsons comic. not tv episodes. the comics are better than the recent tv episodes….
@ vivek
i am a Dota Freak too… Dark Terror and Keeper of the Light :d
@ KJ
I didnt like the gears of War trailer as much as I liked the other ones in this list. I like the game very much though. I played it on the 360 as well as the PC version.
@HG
Check out that episode of south park about world of warcraft… its awesome
This is indeed a topic that needed to be discussed. A well thought and executed writeup:)
Cinematics in game are no longer a credit showing movie.
They are now being put to fascinating use, giving realism to the game.
most used as promo to show the eye candy(Bioshock, FIFAs, you name any),
moves the story forward while giving the gamer a welcome break(POP, godfather) but also could land d gamer in between a gunfight as a movie ends:d,
showing emotions(like in Max Payne, again POP),
warnings(which are now movies which are not ‘esc’ ed due to the character giving u the warning - NFS UG 2, NFS MW.;) )
These also come in flashback(max Payne again, one of my all time fav):d
Cinematics could use real life models shot & then given a animated feel(like in max payne, NFS UG2 onwards)
The difference between films and games are getting erased as film footages are also put inside games(LOTR-battle for middle earth), real life characters are being used to model charctrs on them.
My all time fav would include the cinematics in max payne, AOE&AOM, POP, LOTR to name a few.
oh yes how can i forget
max payne-now that is game cinematics :)
@papai
do you play on gg client ?if yes what us your ID ?
Great post. Interesting fundoo stuff to know. Anything happening on this front in India? I mean you are in Hyd so must be working in here, but who do you work for, what are the products? also, could you elaborate more on the nature of your work?
A friend of mine sent me the music from this game called Outkast. Liked it a lot. Can you recommend me some good game OST’s.
tushar
chronicles of riddick is probably the best game ost ever made. do check it out.
other than that the soundtracks of unreal tournament classic, halo, castlevania, final fantasy definitely rock bigtime…
tushar
Do here the max payne OST and the Unreal tournametn classic OST…both are brilliant
Doom also has a very nice OST
Thanks guys for the OST recos. I will be trying to get them.
imho, the greatest OST for the games are
a) Myst 3
b) Sands of Time
c) Command and Conquer
@ Tushar,
Currently the game dev scene in India is in its nascent stage… The boom is for mobile gaming, which has got perhaps the largest reach among any interactive media… Moreover creating a AAA console game requires huge investment and dev time, not to mention experience… but things are looking up as more and more global players are coming to india…
as for me, i am a game designer working for gameloft, the worlds largest mobile gaming company
Somehow I do get a feeling that RPG/strategy games always had the best cinematics (Taking nohin’ away from other genres though).
Final Fantasy is a perfect example. Any guy who doesn’t know about the game, would surely mistake it for an action game looking at its cinematics. But, they do make a great selling point. How would you justify the movies based on this RPG.
Finally, my fav cinematics: HALO3, GEARS OF WAR, COD4 and STRANGLEHOLD
hi Tushar,
Since you are looking for good and obscure music, i suggest to you the following site.
gh[dot]ffshrine[dot]org[slash]soundtracks
here you can get the OST for practically any game on this planet… arranged alphabetically
Please check out the soundtracks of
Command and Conquer Red Alert (esp hell march imho the greatest piece of game music)
Prince of Persia Sands of Time
Myst 3 (One of the first games to use a full orchestra for its score)
WOW,thanks for this, papai.
we ll stay in touch, I am very interested in this field. may be you can send in an article describing your work, would be great to know. actually I was telling a friend yesterday that I was so dumb that I actually thought you had written an article about cinematics i.e. cinema and relating it to gaming. I never knew what this cinematics term actually means, and I must thank you for introducing me to this field. I kind of understand it a little now. Graphic novels, gaming , animation are some of the things that inspire me, its the direction the creative industry in india should move towards.
Hi Tushar
thx… i thought of writing an article on the movies that had been made from established games, but all of them are sooo bad that i changed my plans… :((
btw i will wait for your esteemed opinion on the soundtracks i linked you too…
I am not getting that URL correct man….
and go ahead with your article, there ain’t nothin like good or bad, we are all rockstars. :)
sorry the site is not allowing me to put that link directly
hmmm, no problem, mail me at blue.tils@gmail.com when you find the link.
Yeah I agree. Gamers these days do want something more than just shmups, they want to be immersed in the game itself and feel that it’s more than just a video game. I agree with the Halo2 cutscene and Silent Hill ones definitely; the former was a tad unrealistic though, you gotta admit. Who jumps off an space station with a nuclear bomb assuming that he’s going to land perfectly on a friendly warship. Anyways, great article.