Videogames of their own Volition: from conecpt to completion
As you step through the darkly tinted, steel-framed raucous door that bears the label "Volition" in a thick white broken text, you are greeted by a friendly secretary in a waiting room decorated as if a hip and stylish dentist owned it with the phrase, "Welcome to Volition."
The waiting chairs are comfortable and covered in leopard upholstery. The side table contains large overflowing piles of the latest PC and Videogame magazines, and a large glass cabinet hangs on the wall containing 30 boxes, all different sizes, shapes and colors, christened with the title, "Decent."
This is no ordinary trip to a mundane office overrun with cubical uniformity, you have just been absolved into the world of Volition, Champaign based Videogame developer for THQ Inc.
It is here where famed game series like the Summoner and Red Faction were born and bred. Recently THQ acquired the license to Marvels The Punisher series and has adorned Volition with the task of creating the game.
Once you're taken out of the front room, you enter a new world where dimly lit mazelike passages interconnect and double back on themselves, each festooned with story boards, sketches, as well as level and character composites.
Each room is set up in a different fashion, but all share the same eerie emanating blue glow of computer screens in the dark. With each room you pass, you see flashes of walls covered in videogame, movie and anime posters, toys piled on shelves, art books and physical references stacked desks embellished with keyboards, controllers, electronic pens, multiple monitors and TV's.
As you regain your bearings from the shock of excitement, the multibillion-dollar videogame industry, all of a sudden, no longer looks nor feels as big and out of reach.
After being walked through the process of the current development of Marvels most menacing vigilate, The Punisher, your aspirations and understanding grows to a level you've never seen. You discover that they development of a videogame is a much less static process then one might first expect.
It all starts with the concept, and what comes with the license of any Marvel character, is a long rich history of conflict and character development. "The Punisher is one of Marvel's grittiest heroes delivering a unique brand of vigilante justice that is a perfect fit for the video game universe," said Germaine Gioia, Vice President of Licensing, THQ.
"We look forward to working with Marvel in bringing a perfect blend of classic comic book and filmed franchise versions of The Punisher to console gamers across the globe." Gioia said.
"The Marvel Universe and all of its characters continue to provide engaging content in the interactive arena and THQ is doing a great job translating this popular vigilante to the major consoles. This is a game that will satisfy long-time Punisher fans of the Marvel Comics' series as well as any new fans turned on to the character after his feature film adaptation this April," said Tim Rothwell, president of Marvel's worldwide consumer products group.
The development process on The Punisher first began with concepts and storyboards. "Basically, we started character designs for (THQ's) new punisher game as soon as we got the character list," said Steve Halt, Volition concept artist. "When designing a character, I first attempt to get an idea of how I want the character to look. I generally get real picture references off the internet for textures on clothing."
After the concept work is done, the picture is then sent to a 3D modeler, who formats a skeleton for the character in a program called 3D Studio max -- it can both model and animate three dimensional objects.
"Basically when I start, I just map a 3D skeleton for characters using the frontal and profiled composites from the concept artists. Once I determine the skeleton outline, I go into detailing what I want the characters face and clothing to look like," said Scott Rays, Volition 3D Artist.
From there production moves into the animation phase, where characters are given a certain physical weight, and all their movements are mapped out through the looping of specific motion captured actions.
Videogame level design occurs in a similar fashion. Basic models -- built with 3D blocks -- are constructed in the computer - where not only the structure is developed, but the play mechanics are set as well. "We set the gameplay, we're the ones that make the game 'fun,'" said Volition level designer.
After the levels and play mechanics are detailed on this base model, the levels are sent to Level Artists who places all the details into the levels.
"A lot of the time, especially recently, we place most of the objects in the levels, and we basically make it all look pretty" said Level Artist, Frank Marquart.
While levels are constructed and made pretty, markers are placed throughout levels so that, "if the player does something, or gets to a certain point, we set this certain event to happen. Once they complete a certain objective, other ones will turn off because it's similar or redundant, this allows for a greater variety of gameplay multiple times through," said Matt Boynton, Volition level designer.
While the look, feel and play of character and levels are a large core part of the game, the enemy artificial intelligence is just as important.
"AI generally adds the difficulty to the game... The trick with have separate difficulties is that you want to make your characters look and act intelligent on all levels of play, but you still need to separate levels between easy, medium and hard" said Volition Programmer.
Though all the behind the scenes work is important, it takes a lot more then programming code to get a game from concept to completion and on the store shelves.
Strategic marketing, public relations, business relations, beta testing, packaging, art, design and more all come in as factor to the production of any videogame.
So next time your in your local video game shop, remember all the work it took to get it there.