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If there's one thing this generation did right its character models

Completely static wrinkles and folds, in 90% of the cases. Which IMHO looks worse in motion than just a flat texture would.

Mike's street clothes in Alpha Protocol actually blend between bump/normal maps so that the creases in the back of his shirts move realistically when he runs. It's like the only concession to eye-candy in the entire game that I noticed.
 

chiablo

Member
The only one that has come close is L.A. Noire, but only with the facial animations, the actual models look pretty shitty.

la-noire-john-noble.jpg
 

MisterHero

Super Member
out of all the chars to use as examples, please don't use Sagat.

That is one character who, both by design and animation, is by FAR best represented in SF4. No other version of Sagat comes even close.
I'll disagree about 4 having the best Sagat, but I'll concede him being one of the best looking in SF4, because most of SF4's characters leave a lot to be desired aesthetically (for me, at least).

To Capcom's credit, SF4's modeling was much better than choosing to reproduce Shinkiro's art in 3D
 

orioto

Good Art™
To Capcom's credit, SF4's modeling was much better than choosing to reproduce Shinkiro's art in 3D

Why ?
Did we at least see what it could have been ? But even if not specially Shinkiro, lots of japanese artists would have made a better job at designing charatcers in SFIV. A shame cause indeed, wonderful tech and animation!
 

MisterHero

Super Member
Why ?
Did we at least see what it could have been ? But even if not specially Shinkiro, lots of japanese artists would have made a better job at designing charatcers in SFIV. A shame cause indeed, wonderful tech and animation!
The animation, like the silly hit reactions, might've interfered with his style. His is more about clean portraiture, but I agree there are livelier styles that could've been modeled after.

TvC's cel-shaded look is a bit closer to Shinkiro's input, but it doesn't have the detailed animations that worked in SF4
 

Durante

Member
That makes zero sense.
It's pretty simple: flat textured clothes getting deformed by skinned bone animations don't look nearly as unnatural as normal mapped ones getting deformed without proper response by the (normal mapped) depth detail.
 

Log4Girlz

Member
Its more art design than anything else. Yeah modeling is still important, but you have a stupid number of polys to work with. I miss the days where every fucking poly and its placement counted.
 

StuBurns

Banned
That Drake is pretty amazing.

For me character wise I still think the Japanese are killing it. MGS4 and FFXIII are both incredible in their character model work. The faces not so much, they have those strange fake people look, but their clothing and stuff, perfect creases all over the place and things. Compression seems to really kill it, but if you ever see the direct feed Versus XIII trailer that came with the FFXIII demo, that Noctis character model is really incredible, you can practically tell the feel and weight of that jacket just based on it's mapping and texture, it's crazy.
 

Drencrom

Member
If only the image quality in the actual game lived up to the amazing assets. Next-Gen needs to come tomorrow.

Well the screens I posted are ingame, but yeah the game's visuals would definitely benefit in higher res, cleaner IQ and better texture filtering.
 
Most games still have crappy/frightening facial animation. There are some highlights, like Uncharted 2 or 3, but for the most part modern facial animations will haunt you unless the studio is big enough to dump money into character animation, lip synching etc. To list a recent example, they're absolutely atrocious in Kingdoms of Amul-whatever. I would like to see more efficient mechanisms to get quality facial animations next gen.
 

StuBurns

Banned
I found a pic from Versus that displays my point. The IQ isn't perfect, but still.
final-fantasy-versus-xiii-playstation-3-ps3-014.jpg


If you look at the things dangling from the girl's chest, you can see the chain holding them is made of tiny little rings. It's an almost obsessive level of detail.

Ironically I think based on the address, Kagari got this screen.
 

scy

Member
Say what you will about JRPGs and all that, but I'm glad that at least they're doing some good hair.

Arguable on whether or not the hairstyles are anything good is another matter.
 
Just don't let me see these again
2051550-mag_valor_soldier.jpg

mpchar.png

unit13_2.jpg


COD has some great models
71945.jpg

though I never understand creating stupid looking enemies, nobody wants to play as them.


Resident Evil Revelations has my favorite of the series also.
df82726d4f4b654d733c146121ec50a8.jpg

3da1ff637dfd48345c48d93b5c459fe3.jpg

resident-evil-revelations-raid-mode-2.jpg
 

StuBurns

Banned
Alice: Madness Returns hair > all others
Alice is a good example of a game lacking consistency in regards to the character model, she looks incredible, the rest of the game looks pretty rough (outside of the art direction I mean).

The beauties in MGS4 always looked like they'd been wrestling in a vat of K-Y, really strange.
 

gogogow

Member
I found a pic from Versus that displays my point. The IQ isn't perfect, but still.
http://kagari.zerox20.net/FNC/final-fantasy-versus-xiii-playstation-3-ps3-014.jpg[/IMG

If you look at the things dangling from the girl's chest, you can see the chain holding them is made of tiny little rings. It's an almost obsessive level of detail.

Ironically I think based on the address, Kagari got this screen.[/QUOTE]
That's just typical SE KH:BBS bullshot "target render".

Non-target render:

[IMG]http://h11.abload.de/img/4d47c1fa_versustraile8pk6s.png
 

StuBurns

Banned
That's just typical SE KH:BBS bullshot "target render".

Non-target render:

http://h11.abload.de/img/4d47c1fa_versustraile8pk6s.png[IMG][/QUOTE]
Neither of them are running on PS3. Those scenes look more or less the same. There's aliasing all over his shirt in the former. Not that it matters, it's not a graphics competition, it's just about the models isn't it?
 

Djin1979

Member
I think the models of the first VITA games have a good level of details.

unit13.jpg


drakegr.jpg


Those crappy screenshots don't do justice to the actual models on the OLED but it gives an idea.
 
One MAJOR problem with the Drake image.

The Jacket/Tie/Shirt textures are absolutely horrid. You have this great looking head sitting on a flat, low-res textured last gen body. Bleh.

So disagree. I would love to see something like this last gen
19247yemen_well_3.jpg

airport-elena-drake-2.png

Some of the wrinkles actually move, you don't see that in many games this gen.
 

gogogow

Member
Neither of them are running on PS3. Those scenes look more or less the same. There's aliasing all over his shirt in the former.

Maybe the scene isn't all that different, but the models are night and day, blocky body, blocky hair versus extremely smooth hair and shoulders.
 

Raging Spaniard

If they are Dutch, upright and breathing they are more racist than your favorite player
They use some nice tech on those shirts, basically its an animated normal map mixed with a little bit of the model being animated.

But yeah, lots of these examples are cutscenes, those are not the same models you see during actual gameplay.
 

Nemo

Will Eat Your Children
FFXII nailed it for me, that was the end game

edit, almost forgot about MGS2. Jesus Christ that was amazing
 
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