GuiltyGearXrd's Art Style : The X Factor Between 2D and 3D

While the quality of photo-realistic real-time graphics in games is advancing daily to near feature-film quality, Arc System Works' RED team took a completely different approach with Guilty Gear Xrd in pursuit of an impressive art style that would stand out even in this competitive environment. The team's mission was to rebuild a classic 2D fighting game within a modern full-3D graphical framework, while maintaining all of its old-school 2D charms. In this GDC 2015 talk, technical artist Junya C Motomura will discuss the art and programming R&D, as well as all the artistic decisions, that lead to the award-winning results.

[@testsubject747]

"Nature is imperfect, The Artist is imperfect. Therefore, Perfection looks too artificial." That's deep, man

[@idaret.]

"Correct is not good enough"

[@kuasocto3528]

That last bit should be changed to "perfection looks artificial". Not "too" artificial, because that look can also have it's place in things that, well, SHOULD look artificial.

[@KnappLionj]

Reality is often disappointing...- Thanos

[@chafacorpTV]

Bruh...

[@Shelf0808]

Idaret uhhhh no?

[@Laerei]

They literally shared their notes with everyone and 5 years later they are still the only ones that pull off perfect looking 2D in 3D.

[@Vector_Lotus]

Wrong I'm already doing it so is You Tube and the NPR community

[@tristancarter4324]

@@Vector_Lotus ^ what you mean

[@djmips]

Well it's because the explanation was: There is no magic - we just hand crafted it to look sublime. Go ahead and copy that!

[@alex-qn5xp]

@@Vector_Lotus tf is npr?

[@alex-qn5xp]

@@Vector_Lotus I guessed you meant non photorealistic rendering, on the other hand I thought it was a game or something with a big modding community lol.

[@sixthsurge]

1995: We faked 3D in 2D! 2015: We faked 2D in 3D!

[@Um.angolano]

2019 We Still Faking 3D in 2D

[@aaronhibbert8773]

Joel Paulo Wait How?

[@user-gk6nt5gi5n]

@Cyphero2 uhhh press x to doubt

[@bobvella7228]

@@aaronhibbert8773 that netflix move klaus does it, they the key was lighting i think they even used a shader

[@PercyPanleo]

@@hexcrimson2511 In the Super Mario Maker series, in the NSMBU style, Mario (And the other player characters), Bowser, Bowser Junior, and Boom Boom are the only characters with 3D models. Every other enemy just has a bunch of large sprites and bump maps.

[@ViRiXDreamcore]

"To get a conventional 2D look, everything on screen has to be [an] intentional choice, not just a result of calculation." -- technical artist Junya C Motomura of Arc System Works RED Team

[@NeoKurow]

I'm here 2 years late but I just want to add that this guy predicted the "functions" comment from Capcom 2 years ahead... learn from your mistakes Capcom you can do it

[@Cheesedragon117]

"That may be true, but we personally think clothes and hair flapping around crazily every time you move an inch is way more realistic." -- The artists on Tekken and Street Fighter V

[@nowonmetube]

He explained why Bersek 3D looks so bad.

[@KaitouKaiju]

This game deserves all kinds of awards for animation

[@solidust573]

The best compliment that I can pay is to say that I watched a guy play this game for nearly 30-minutes for the 1st time recently & I had no idea the characters​ were 3D models. I've seen press photos before, but i just assumed that it was completely hand drawn. the gentleman in this video revealed the mesh wireframe beneath & I still don't believe it. I've been playing videogames for over 30 years & I've never seen anything quite like it. legitimately incredible works.

[@no-hr6rj]

Does anyone else REALLY like the speaker? Like how you can tell he's passionate about the subject and is trying his goddamn hardest to create a coherent speech but is still really nervous at the same time? And you can relate so much to the little part where some cord isn't hooked up and he's playing it cool but you can feel his anxiety because you've been there? I just find him very earnest and wholesome. That's all.

[@tristancarter4324]

It's hard to explain what came natural to you

[@genx799]

Probably, that is because he's not a native speaker.

[@robin9031]

@@genx799 seeing as he is fluent and has a western middle name i doubt thats relevant

[@JJJ-yq3nf]

He's trying to explain a pretty niche game dev topic to a crowd of a few people who might be interested, so it's understandable he might've been nervous. But this style of animation/modelling is really in depth, he did a good job explaining it to the average gamer in the crowd. The dude's also a legend, he's the director Dragon Ball FighterZ.

[@djmips]

My impression is that he wasn't nervous, in fact he was very confident. If you thought he was nervous I'm guessing it's picking up some cultural things that don't translate.

[@neonaofumi5572]

The fact that the artist have to handcraft every character's lighting and shading explains why they haven't made any alternate costumes yet. It still needs more time to fit into the game than using regular methods. Kinda shame really, because I was kind of expecting an complex automated system, and it's more of an artistic achievement than technical one, even though that is impressive in it's own right because this is such a cool idea.

[@cubbwatch]

So true, It's also why DLC is really tough regardless of the demand for it :(

[@runbaa9285]

With the dynamic lighting in Strive, I think alternate costumes may be a thing in future GG titles.

[@tristancarter4324]

@@runbaa9285 well proportions is more realistic so the shadow and the scaling thing they mention is not as important so I see it likely plus the costumes are very much tone down (got to check again but I believe May basically was just in a hoodie (not many ways to shade that wrong))

[@tristancarter4324]

@Lalrivunga Hnamte true yet I feel that with the way the models are now they have more room to do more, The characters are more realistically proportion and the animations feel more 3d this time around like yes it looks better but I'm telling you this game art wise was easier to make check out rams trailer intro with her hair doesn't look 2d at all more like 3d with frame stops and the occasional distortion to give feeling that it's drawn Also instead from last game where every character had there own light source I believe now they using something that tells the game don't shadow these polygons cause the react to the environment shading rather than there own shading(excluding faust)

[@tristancarter4324]

@Lalrivunga Hnamte I know it uses interpolation etc. but isn't the point for it too look 2d and MOVE 2d the movements is more fluid than a Mortal Kombat game lol( someone need to teach MK about follow through anyway tho the real tea) The coat ripples hair motions stop the whole 2d feel cause when you play you play the game in motion so that's big giveaway they going a more easier/smother route. Also if Faust has a different shading code than rest he has his own light settings then -I don't think Faust has his own lighting -The shading of the darker regions is more darker What you said contradicts each other?

[@TheShapingSickness]

I never really thought about the extreme close-ups with no pixelation or jaggyness, this has made me appreciate the graphics on GG and upcoming DBFZ even more than I already did. These guys are truly geniouses.

[@creationsmaxo]

While I would love to get a job in a studio that think outside the box as much as Arc System Works' RED team, I would surely get nightmares if I was part of the group who worked as rigging the models for animation. 400-600 bones to controls 40K triangles must have been an hell of a job to do... and test... and fix. When I learned that it was all 3D and saw the hair and clothes moving around without much of an error, I knew they used bones to controls everything... but still... 400-600 bones is like... INSANELY CRAZY (in a good way). I already got my head full with rigs that has 80-90 bones... Can't imagine the hell of having 4-8 times more PER character. Damn.

[@TheAlison1456]

Are most of those bones for the shading!? Holy shit...

[@laos85]

I do work for small indie that think something outside the box

[@reftu1489]

I'm legit curious what would take least amount of time and effort; 2d sprites, 3d conventional modelling(like latest KOF and street fighters), or Xrd? I mean modelling is one thing but shading for every character let alone the costume as well as every movement sounds nightmarish.

[@creationsmaxo]

@@reftu1489 The amount of time depends on the skills level of the artists and their capacity to adapt to new methods/ways. If you concider the amount of time alone, 3D conventional modelling is the fastest, but the 2d sprites is the one requiring the least amount of effort (but a lot of time). Xrd's is the middle ground between both, but bring the style far closer to the traditional 2D style than conventional 3D. The main issue with Xrd's method is that there's no "shortcuts" or tools that assist in the modeling unlike the 2 others. You can work on paper and/or outside with many artists in 2D as it's frame-based. 3D is restricting in terms of man-power because everything can only be checked in the engine (a.k.a. on a PC, which means all the works gets funneled together a lot more.) Even conventional 3D like Street fighters can be build a lot faster by using the 3D scanning method. (Build a clay model of the character, Details and changes can be done live by multiple clay artists. 3D scan and you're already 80% done with the 3D model. Rigs and animations can be even started early even if the 3D model isn't finished.) Xrd's method can use 3D scan, but that's barely 40% of the work as you got to produce the vertex color data (and custom textures). UVs are also non-traditional meaning it's another thing that can't be quickly done by automatic tools.

[@reftu1489]

​@@creationsmaxo Honestly I didn't expect replies. Thank you.

[@jonnysac77]

Hope they do a GDC like this after Strive comes out

[@AdlerMow]

I would love to see this applied to revive 80's toon series like He-man and Thundercats. Use a simplified approach with less attention to detail, to be more cost effective but still achieve a decent look. AWESOME!

[@alexgeorge3068]

Oh my fucking God. Yes.

[@guyguino5770]

I love these creative looking art styles more than photorealistic stuff we see in CoD and Uncharted.

[@xSilentZeroXx]

Everything has its place, but I do agree nonetheless. In 10 years, this game will still look fantastic. The new Call of Duty? There will come a time when that game looks like crap. (although it already DOES look like crap; still images look fine, but Activision does not go the extra mile when it comes to motion capture. Way back in Ghosts, there's a dude in the campaign who you wrestle with to seize a gun from their hands. Their face doesn't move at all. It just stares at you, blankly. Soullessly.) This will never look like crap. At least, not until the day when anime takes its next big evolution. But like I said, it has its place. Hideo Kojima uses photorealistic (for their time, anyway; RIP MGS1 and MGS2) graphics for Metal Gear Solid in order to try and tell a more "human" story. They look like people, so you can connect with them a bit easier. And the animation quality is always on point, so there's minimal immersion-breaking hiccups. Sadly, most games use "amazing photorealism!" to just try and impress people with the visuals. They don't do it to tell a story. They just want to attract idiots with skin-deep beauty. Which is especially ironic, considering that many of those companies outsource for their game engines. So they didn't even MAKE the graphics, they're just USING the graphics. It's silly. (one last point about Kojima, the MGS games actually do vaguely stylize their graphics just to help them stand the test of time a bit better. And considering that MGS3 still manages to look okay, I'd say it's a winning method.)

[@containeduniverse]

Yes.

[@xSilentZeroXx]

***** It's an easy punching bag because it's an absolute disgrace of a gaming franchise to anybody that's actually thought about it for five seconds. The games are tailor-made to entice as many suckers as they can possibly manage (and no, that isn't a joke, the games are made to look cool and make you feel cool without actually having to acquire any real skill. You can't appeal to the lowest common denominator if you make players actually have to put EFFORT into doing good, right?). At least it isn't Destiny, though. Now THERE'S a joke of a game. I could honestly do an entire documentary on just how scuzzy that game really is. (And both franchises are owned by Activision. Go figure.)

[@guyguino5770]

Well I wasn't dissing Call of Duty. I just personally like seeing unique art syles more in gaming. Of course if you like hyper realism then that's fine as well. I recognize the hard work people put into making Call of Duty looking good.

[@eliack95]

I feel like photorealistic graphics in games should only be reserved for those meant to feel life-like and immersive, to tell a better and perhaps more genuine feeling story. Otherwise, I couldn't give a crap about photo-realism in my games. If CoD multiplayer looked like Splatoon, I'd still play it.

[@khhnator]

easily one of the best GDC presentations ever the way they managed to do the inner lines is both insane and genius

[@TehWever]

This is genius - even as photo realistic arnold render artist I am amazed how good artistic effect you can get with simple nodes and mesh attributes

[@johngddr5288]

exactly! Its crazyy!!!!

[@thanatosinstinctrising9287]

I'm very curious about what exactly a "photo realistic Arnold render artist" means... I mean... Are we talking Arnold Schwarzenegger in Terminator Genisys or something?

[@thanatosinstinctrising9287]

@@pie75 Cyberdyne is going to be so disappointed.

[@erinblue4043]

@@thanatosinstinctrising9287 i think he Is talking about 3D Max rendering engine

[@Hlidskialf]

We need more games using this method.

[@3dgamerman]

+Hlidskialfk sucks that sfv didn't do this.

[@Hlidskialf]

AirplaneRandy I don't think the main game needs this but SF Alpha 4 with this graphics would be nice.

[@TechCarnivore1]

Dude, I see you everywhere.

[@Hlidskialf]

Urocyon wat

[@kenonerboy]

to be fair, this was a but load of work

[@darkangelzephyron]

They've finally did it!!! Now make a DBZ game like this ASAP!

[@alexinaboxx]

darkangelzephyron A game in a 3d space without a fixed camera or playing field would be very tricky to do and these techniques would have to be altered. I do think with some further R&D it could be done : )

[@JohnBoyX]

Flamel Well they finally did it

[@JohnGlow2]

Its funny cause they are now haha

[@NTBXP1]

Congratulation. You predicted the DragonBall Fighters Z.

[@Drstrange3000]

Flamel Damn... You're a psychic 😳

[@Matti_Mattsen]

I´m a sucker for sprite graphics, especially when it comes to Fighting Games. The approach ASW took is absolutely perfect. More games should adapt this.

[@meatz666]

As a computer scientist and gamer, its amazing how ArcSystem managed to get the horsepower from texture to revamp polygon count for an Anime 3D. Just awesome.

[@MANIAKRA]

This is absolutely brilliant. Talk about pioneers. Completely reworking the traditional workflow to achieve their stylistic vision. So much respect to these artists.

[@johngddr5288]

The way they mapped the UVs for the line details blew my mind. I can't believe I never thought of that technique... It makes so much sense.

[@gavacho131313]

So glad to see this presentation posted on KZbin! Guilty Gear Xrd is hands-down the most amazing looking fighting game I've ever played, and definitely one of the most visually stunning games every made period. I love that Arc Sys was able to stay so true to fighting game 2D roots using a modern 3D engine. Aesthetically and technically wonderful. Even the UI and menus are really well designed! Of course the soundtrack is great too. All of that wouldn't mean much if the gameplay was bad, but fortunately the gameplay shines as brightly as the rest of the presentation. This game is so well made, and delivers on so many levels! Kind of a shame is hasn't received more recognition & sales, but hopefully Arc Sys will be able to sell more copies in a future expanded update.

[@PhilShary]

Amazing, thanks for posting it. 2D is not only pixel art, you know.

[@wohdinhel]

GGXrd's aesthetic always reminds me of a more polished and clean version of what El Shaddai did. The techniques that were developed for this game will go for miles in helping other studios achieve similar things - provided they're willing to put in the work.

[@CHAOKOCartoons]

This is the type of animation I seek to study, absolutely fantastic! I've always thought this style was impossible, but this has sparked my hope and driven my fuel to try and master it!

[@johnywuijts917]

how much have you mastered it so far?

[@esmooth919]

I wanna know, too

[@voodoopepercorns]

that inner line technique is genius, thanks for the insights!

[@xox8717]

arguably one of the best GDC talks ever, we need more of these @GDC.

[@MimebladeGMail]

Bonus: Junya Motomura's got an awesome Death Metal Growl (he did vocals for Worthless as the sun Above Clouds and Black Onslaught).

[@oneish7454]

Blade Galewind And MUST DIE in Central Fiction, too bad he didn't want to talk about it. Wonder why.

[@tropixx_xlr1549]

Also the system voice of the Persona 4 Arena games, its really cool to listen to, at that!

[@Stiltonator]

One of the best gdc talks ive watched so far... He broke down a lot of the concepts understanding their goal, the current problem(s) faced with rendering that and their solutions... to a point where you could basically take away their findings and implement the solution... Obviously you need some understanding of 3d rendering / normals to make use of the information but it's great stuff...

[@mycollegeshirt]

all these questions they asked are gold

[@kbbusia]

+mycollegeshirt "dizzy when" "i expected that question" 10/10

[@charlesajones77]

I wanted to study 3D graphics when I was in grad school, but at the time nobody was doing anything like this. Ray tracing was the fad back then, but I was much more interested in real time modelling. I should have been born 15 years later.

[@HikikomoriDev]

+charles jones ...Except that back then the 3D market was not that competitive and one could go and make an awesome living out of it. Now it's easier to access the information and many people do it now which not that great for people looking to get inside the industry and do great things and get paid well.

[@finoraptorscorner]

This is what SF should've done, many people argue that with 3d models they can't achieve the same fluid movement of sprites... but these guys made it possible, you can look how they stretch their models to made them look more fluid animations at 31:21. Amazing work!!!!, but pretty damn tedious!. CONGRATS! this is the best anime-esque game I've seen is just top notch

[@MrMarinus18]

3D models are far more smooth than sprites. That's why they feel so different. They made the models intentionally have more stilted animation to feel hand-crafted.

[@TetsuDeinonychus]

@@MrMarinus18 But, they also added more squash and stretch and smear-frames which adds a different type of fluidity that's usually missing from 3D graphics, even with the higher frame-rates.

[@DramaLex04]

I like how GDC questions can range from "did you expand that along the generated normals?" to "Dizzy when?"

[@hannana.4319]

The guy who asked "Dizzy when" actually made me chuckle lol

[@AsuraDandy]

The way they did the texture maps and utitlize them blew me away, the ingenious way they made the outline and inner line was amazing and how they were using limited animation to make it look more anime like was awesome. I'm definitely going to research into this and play around with it. I'm glad I found this video.

[@ronnie3052]

This is AMAZING!!! This is an inspiration for the whole industry. Thank you for sharing technical details to help others move their art style forward.

[@andersdenkend]

That is indeed the most convincing fake 2D I have ever seen.

[@LuminescentShine]

They are already adding and improving on the next games shadows and details

[@DiegoBM]

Speechless, amazing techniques, and even more incredible result! Kudos! You just demystified anime-games-done-right for the rest of us!

[@galagast3d]

Really awesome presentation! Glad some questions in had in mind was also asked at the end.

[@HartleySan]

Very impressive, and well done. I agree with Motomura-san in that this technology has been available for years, but it was a matter of being creative, taking a chance and working hard to make it work. Well done!

[@glentaker]

they need to use this technique on SF, KOF, Last Blade, Samurai showdown, and all 2d fighting games to revive the Fighting Genre!

[@SketchBookShortFilms]

YO! LAST BLADE LOVE!

[@noughiphiet]

You forgot the Grandaddy of all Anime Fighters ... Darkstalkers

[@moonducks507]

Fast forward to 2017, they are doing a Dragon Ball game, it's going to look AMAZING!

[@rehannoor4961]

FAST FORWARD to 2019, Granblue Fantasy Versus demo happening and it's look pretty amazing.

[@undercover1001]

@@rehannoor4961 Fast forward to August 2019, Guilty Gear 2020 teaser trailer released.

[@rehannoor4961]

@@undercover1001 awaiting November 2019 for GG 2020 playable demo at ArcSysRevo

[@tatzeta]

@@rehannoor4961 Awaiting June 11th for it to fucking drop

[@olbohn99]

mindblowing and inspirational to see how they conveyed their unique style into a new medium without losing what made it special in the first place. I think Disney could learn a few things from them.

[@alialtaf3412]

3D that looks like 2D Animation/Anime... this is my dream come true.. This is Great breakthrough in 3D and 2D animation.. Best thing about 3D is you don't have to draw each and every frame from scratch which makes it easier... Maybe Anime makers will use this engine soon for better quality animes... :O Also in Video Games 3D has ability scale as much as we can without loosing any pixels.. best example is just check 480p on 720p or 720p on 4k monitor game will look terribly pixelated while 3D games looks good at whatever resolution... This is no doubt Great breakthrough and evolution of 3D technology..

[@davidburke4101]

The problem is that because of how much work has to go into each frame, it's effectively still as hard to do as 2D so this particular technique won't be used in anime, as they use 3D to cut budget, not look good.

[@MrMarinus18]

They could since the limitations don't affect them as much. For games ths is kind of limited to fighting games since it's highly inefficient. Meaning that since everything on screen has to be rendered in real time you can only have so many objects on screen. But anime doesn't have to worry about that.

[@SharifSourour]

So happy I found this! Was wondering if they would ever release a behind-the-scenes since they really got new and much more convincing results in the cel-shading market.

[@Skorbutt]

thats the kind of talent and ideas SNK needs (cries thinking about KOF XIV trailers)

[@spade4acer]

+Skorbutt Yeah SNK doesn't have the money to do this kind of shit lol, probably the only reason they're making KOF 14 is because they desperately need money

[@Skorbutt]

You are right. Honestly,, I don't know much about developers budgets, but back in early 2000s SNK should have had more budget than Arc System Works, don't you think ? I don't know why SNK failed so hard while Arc System works are making a pretty good job at keeping their franchise alive.

[@andimatrus]

+Skorbutt They did kof XIII with a similar tecnique but now they can't do it again is pricy for them....

[@Antiformed]

+Skorbutt dude shut up. they're making a fighter with 50 goddamn characters, of course they're not totally polished, and the trailers are very clearly marked as Works in Progress you need to realize that what most companies present to you as betas are pretty much already finished. you're playing a slightly buggier version of the final product. KOF XIV is what actual beta footage looks like.

[@XtraTrstrL]

+Antiform They just released the 10th trailer, the visuals aren't jumping that much anymore. It isn't gonna be anywhere near as nice looking as GG Xrd's style, that's painfully obvious at this point.

[@joabfariasgmail]

This game looks so good that I watched 30 minutes of this video just to be certain that it really is 3d.

[@RazorEdge2006]

Amazing technical achievement. This game deserved to win more awards for its incredibly unique graphics.

[@isaacchonillo4868]

I have been trying to understand this technique for a long time, your work is admirable.

[@jdale2fresh]

This is really great and i can defiantly see these methods being used in the future for cartoons and anime.

[@Undead2k]

An amazing talk, thank you for sharing!

[@Djeison_]

This is borderline sorcery! Awesome! And now I know I probably won't be alive to see an JRPG with this style. It demands so much work for every character that it isn't worth the time, effort and money to make it happen. Two to four months for every character just too much and now it makes sense why the season pass for dragon ball fighterZ is so expensive.

[@Thefuryspeed100]

THANK YOU SO MUCH for making all this available to us

[@Quello_di_una_volta]

Softimage, we miss you so much...

[@88Somi]

I hope more games will use this technique , looks cool !

[@rdeleonp]

Had Guilty Gear on PS1. Had Guilty Gear X on Dreamcast. Had Guilty Gear X2 #Reload and Guilty Gear Isuka, both on PC, repurchased them on GOG. Was on the fence regarding this game because I wanted the same 2D goodness of the originals. This presentation convinced me to buy this game on Steam today. Bought it. It's better than expected. If unsure, don't be. Get it.

[@Shamshiro]

You like Guilty Gear and Cuphead. Truly a man of good taste.

[@diffraction163]

27:40 this is some really interesting stuff

[@cubbwatch]

These are the lengths you would only really go to for an anime fighting game, although considering the rapid uprising of anime style animations, "anime games" and this format might become increasingly popular, maybe even an entire era of gaming visuals. Arcsys should be full of pride to be pioneering this style, they've effectively implemented the style in Guilty Gear and Dragon Ball FighterZ, and also their two newest instalments Granblue and Kill la Kill, all of which are currently doing well/ are projected to do very well. The reception from the FGC has been amazing as well. It's really beautiful to see.

[@Ironwill_Games]

I hope they keep pushing this style a lot more and in a lot more games cause is not new, it's not difficult and it has an amazing result! Great going Arc System! ;)

[@scarlindo]

This is brilliant. Thanks for showing us.

[@alexinaboxx]

Guys also keep in mind that in an un-fixed environment the kinds of exaggerated poses for character animation will be nearly impossible to do during gameplay until real-time character tesselation becomes widely usable; comparing these techniques with that of 009 Re:Cyborg one can see a common method of warping the models for the camera angle.

[@tenshiros]

Amazing!!! I would love to see a step by step of how to set up something like this in RT.

[@habsi70]

Such a great talk, very inspiring!

[@DramaLex04]

Thanks to whoever the guy was asking about speculars - noticed them during the presentation and was curious about that too

[@emrekulac3207]

actual legends and its crazy how they managed to improve so much on this in strive

[@colorizedenhanced-silentmo3068]

Hey there, GDC. it's beautifully enigmatic video. thanks. :)

[@ruaangrobler3035]

I know this vid is old, but DAMN! Love it and awesome presentation. And I miss Soft now - I loved that app, worked in it for years :(

[@dnangel4277]

Amazing way of presenting Guilty Gear!

[@D0NU75]

this is a goldmine of information, it's genius, astonishing the use of tools we all have at hand nowadays, i'm just fucking impressed

[@zfv3336]

-> each character model has average poly count of 40k triangles for a vertex look feel -> conclusion: 3D anime killed trigonometry

[@oneish7454]

Wait, Junya Motomura... holy shit, he also sang Black Onslaught and MUST DIE in BlazBlue!

[@explosionsindasky]

THIS GUY?! AAAAAAAHHHHH

[@danperin]

Amazing work...Wow

[@GameArts1]

Awesome talk and am really impressed.

Awesome talk. Lots of demos. Direct to the point. Could have spent more time with the presentation, a lot of the questions are related to topics missing during the presentation.

[@sarblader]

This should be used in every 2D fighting game, both now and in the future. For ever.

[@csmemarketing]

13:09 NO WAY!!! This real-time toon-shading looks better than actual 2d. Amazing.

[@TheRadicalOneNG]

38:14 I know it takes a lot of work, but *damn.*

[@Terithian]

Ha, after he mentioned he did some singing, I decided to look it up. He did the death metal-style vocals for "Worthless as the Sun Above Clouds" from Guilty Gear 2 and "Black Onslaught" from Blazblue. He also translated the lyrics for all the vocal songs in Xrd Sign and Rev 1 from Ishiwatari's original Japanese to the English the vocalist actually sang.

[@TheGameLecturer]

I would LOVE to play an JRPG with this technique!

[@FluffyMeowington]

I'm just a mere consumer, but this was very interesting- thanks for bringing this to us.

[@airhead1320]

...Imagine a fighting game with Guilty Gear Xrd's graphics and Street Fighter 3: Thirds Strike's animation.

[@nickbutler6877]

YES.

[@dee6561]

So much important info! I am not sure how much I will use, though.

[@randomstroke7026]

Awesome ! Thx a lot for sharing)

[@tentara8677]

Wonderful..I Really need to try those at some point.

[@morbid1.]

animation part is super interesting.. I would like to see more about that.

[@erickednaldodelima]

27:42 This is the most beautiful EV I've ever seen! So symmetrical!

[@rwxstudio7173]

I still remember when XIII (Thirteen) came out and the cell-shaded comic book style graphics were praised as being super clean and easy to see.

[@taylorbee4010]

This is why I like ark says because other companies will use an existing engine to cut costs... (New school Capcom) Arxus will just say F that create an entirely new visual style that no one's ever done before and then throw it in a game. That's the kind of innovation we need in the industry. Chads. All of them.

[@nowonmetube]

Thank God this guy exists 🙏🏼

[@KOEXStudio]

Nice video on NPR rendering! I am making a animated series using NPR in Maya. Could understand the challenges they are facing.

[@diegoarivera35]

love the concept

[@rityblackmore]

This game is simply awesome, a combination of several factors that have made it so fantastic, fighting system, gameplay, and the aspect that most draws attention to the graphics and care in leaving it with this anime look, I would like to see many other games if doing vale of these technologies, just as the visual of the Stree fighter 4 had characteristics so cool and played everything fuck when they released the SF 5... Nice presentation, it´s cool to see how the developers achieve that level of detail and aesthetics on a game!

[@muffinduck01]

Watching this after the next iteration of this style (Dragon Ball FighterZ) is out, and they pushed these techniques even further. Simply blows my mind how good these games look.

[@Beyond-Studios]

Is there some way to keep the normals looking right when you deform the mesh? I get strange hard shadows when I try to close the eyes on my mesh or open the mouth too far.

[@user-eb8lr5lm3d]

"the frontier is there waiting to be discovered" I like to think in the weeks and days leading up to this moment he repeated those words hundreds or even thousands of times, imagining some younger version of himself listening in the audience, unseen behind the spot light's glare--his hour upon the stage. Strutting, fretting.

[@fidel_soto]

This was amazing.

[@whatever_orejo9281]

Dragon Ball Fighter Z is using this method and looks amazing too

[@azuresaiyan9005]

I actually think they improved a ton as well with it.

[@DeathBringer769]

Any good dev with refine and improve their techniques over time. I think it's the same overall general "method" still though, just with improvements ;)

[@skyler114]

Has anybody found a good deconstruction of their workflow, something like this ideally =)

[@richardmf6575]

skyler114 the guilty gear team made dbfz so wouldn't this be what you're looking for?

[@departmentofeducationurdan75]

First look I thought it was a 2D hand drawn game, hope some will use the same techniques in developing tv shows or movies... x-men/justies league series would be cool...

[@mytino]

Wow, such a great execution with the art style. I wonder if it would be possible to do the same for something like an openworld game (where the camera movement is harder to anticipate), and make it feel just like an anime.

[@ShambrookBen]

+Asbjørn Lystrup pretty much no, as soon as the camera starts moving even in this game the illusion falls apart. One of the big things that helps sell it is the limited frame rate, but you would be driven nuts if your camera control was given a limited frame rate to control. You could do a game with a fixed camera (God of war, Devil May Cry 1, Old Resident Evil/Silent Hill games) like this though.

[@raveoreynolds6049]

+Asbjørn Lystrup While it's been ages since I've played/viewed the game, Tales of Vesperia had basically a more rudimentary version of this in the game, and it had an overworld and whatnot. I actually at certain times while playing the game, said to myself (holy crap, this looks like a still from an anime)! I feel like the trick to making it work well is in how you adjust the normals though. For instance in GGXRD, while the camera can be adjusted, to be perfectly frank, the characters are really only meant to be viewed from one angle.(or better put, they look best from one angle). For an open world game, you'd probably want to simply focus on making effects that are common in anime from almost any angle, such as shadowing underneath the chin, or plainly shaded hair, and then leave the rest of the shading up to the worlds conditions.

[@ShambrookBen]

Vesperia had a locked camera except in the over world, and the overworld looked pretty mediocre compared to the other areas.

[@raveoreynolds6049]

Ben Shambrook It was no more fixed than 90% of most anime scenes, which is what the o.p. was asking about. Because FULL camera movement like that of say Journey or Mario Galaxy wouldn't even make sense. If you're imitating anime, anime doesn't have constantly swooping camera motion every scene, it's static for the majority of the time.

[@maximeteppe7627]

+Asbjørn Lystrup he also mentionned high poly models, doubled for the outline, and a huge number of bones. All this is costly in terms of ressouces, so an openworld game wouldn't look as good, or at least couldn't afford this level of polish.

[@SevenDeMagnus]

Hi. Great look. I hope it becomes widespread to TV anime and anime OVAs.