Star Wars: Force Unleashed - this isn't your daddy's Atari
Sunday, January 27th, 2008Since developing Majority Desk, I have really been appreciative, intrigued, and amazed by the potential of using simulated physics as the engine for allowing objects to interact in games and other software. For Majority Desk, we used the open source Open Dynamics Engine, and it gave us all we needed and more to simulate a fully interactive, 3D environment.
Today, I came across some news about the new, upcoming game from LucasArts, Star Wars: Force Unleashed.
The Star Wars saga will continue in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, a videogame developed by LucasArts, which casts players as Darth Vader's "Secret Apprentice" and promises to unveil new revelations about the Star Wars galaxy.
Yes, like any self respecting geek, I am a Star Wars fan, and the evil thought of being Darth Vader's secret apprentice, is more than a little exciting. However, this isn't what interested me the most.
As its name implies, The Force Unleashed completely re-imagines the scope and scale of the Force by taking full advantage of newly developed technologies that will be seen and experienced for the first time: Digital Molecular Matter (DMM), by Pixelux Entertainment, and euphoria by NaturalMotion Ltd. Paired with the powerful Havok Physics? system, these new technologies create gameplay only possible on the new generation of consoles. DMM incorporates the physical properties of anything in the environment so that everything reacts exactly like it should - wood breaks like wood, glass shatters like glass, plants on the planet Felucia bend like plants on the planet Felucia would, and more. Meanwhile, as a revolutionary behavioral-simulation engine, euphoria enables interactive characters to move, act and even think like actual human beings, adapting their behavior on the fly and resulting in a different payoff every single time.
This stuff is so freakin' cool that I had to search around a little more. After looking around, I stumbled across this baby, which will set your geekiness levels through the roof. No matter if you are a gamer or a Star Wars fan, this is six minutes of video that you have to watch. The trailer shows and explains the three technologies they integrated for the game. This will not only change gaming, but it also opens up whole new worlds in areas that involve real life simulations for both entertainment and business purposes. Geek overload warning ahead.
My favorite quotes from the trailer
- Havok Physics 2 SDK - Continuous Physics engine:
"allows us to move a great number of objects on the screen at any given time." - NaturalMotion euphoria - Dynamic Motion Synthesis (DMS): "[the game characters] have a sense of self preservation, a sense of self awareness…"
- DMM by Pixelux - Digital Molecular Matter - Game Asset Synthesis Technology: "is a way of simulating the substance of objects, sort of pretending that their molecules"
Bonus footage #1 - Euphoria Engine Tech Demo
Bonus footage #2 - Digital Molecular Matter Tech Demo
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