The personal site of Christoffer Radsby

Love for “The Making of”

Thursday, October 22, 2009

I really love “the making of” movies/clips when it comes to the game industry, there isn’t often you get to take a quick but informative peek into the game development industry. Lately I’ve watched the Lionheads: The Making of Fable II, CD Projekt’s The Making of The Witcher (PC) and Naughty Dogs The Making of Uncharted 2.

The Making of Fable II can be found on the limited edition of the Xbox 360 game and some of the developer diaries can be found on Xbox Live Marketplace. The Making of The Witcher can be found on the Enhanced Edition version of the game. Sorry guys those are for the ones whom purchase the more expensive editions of the game

The Making of The Witcher

CD Projekt’s The Making of The Witcher came with the Enhanced Edition of The Witcher for PC, a great game and great developers. The whole thing was in polish with subtitles but still great. I was really impressed with the work environment and the laid-back attitude of theirs. They said that they had Artists come in at different times a day just because the artists work is so dependent on which time during the day they feel creative, some work best at night and some in the mornings. I really like that approach, don’t know if it would work at every company though.

The Making of Uncharted 2

So I’ve played through Uncharted 2 , very impressive game on all aspects. I took some time watching through their behind the scenes videos and I was mighty impressed, it was [ah-suhm]. One of the aspects why I like Uncharted 2 is the fact that they weave the story-elements of the game into the gameplay-experience, I believe it’s because of their game-engine, it’s amazing. The thing about Naughty Dogs Uncharted 2 is that they’ve taken most of the game elements (Story, Game Mechanics, Aesthetics, Technology) and weaved them together so that they work seamlessly with each other in harmony. It must have taken a lot of time and determination but the outcome is obvious, it’s a great game without interruptions.

The approach they have to their active cinematic experience is really something, and they are right on the money when they say that it makes players feel like they don’t want to put the controller down. I played through the game in three sittings and that’s because I had to stop, not because I wanted to. If I had the time I would probably play the whole thing through in one sitting, it’s that good.

I really like how they use the power of the Cell-processor, one of the thing they mention is that they let the SPU take care of the post-processing effects instead of letting the GPU handle it. Which makes the GPU more available to more polys on screen. There is another company that also let’s the PS3’s SPU take care of many things and that company is Guerilla Games (developer of Killzone 2).
You can read about it here.

They let the power of the Cell do the work and that’s probably why we don’t see games looking like Killzone 2 or Uncharted 2 on the Xbox 360, I might be wrong though, I’m no expert but so far we got amazing looking games on the ps3. If we take a look at Uncharted 2 again, we get to see AND play amazing over-the-top events and it really makes us immersed in the game. Read more about it here.

I was also impressed by Naughty Dogs work-environment, they seem to have a very productive way of working where everybody got a say in the development. They believe in a no management kind of workstyle and I like it. They said that if you have a problem with something in the development you go to the guy responsible and asked for it to be fixed, you don’t have to go up the chain then down again to get it fixed. I believe it’s healthy for the co-workers relationships, it keeps the artists/programmers/designers etc, in touch with each other, and as they said. If something is wrong with your work you’ll have 16-20 people asking if you have a plan to make the thing you’re working on awesome.

I’ve come to a point in my life where I feel like I need to work with people not afraid to give constructive criticism on my work, the forums ain’t enough right now. I hope that I’ll be able to work together with some other talented people and create games. Hopefully that will happen soon.

Oh well, If you have Uncharted 2, when you’ve finished the game, take a peek at the bonus movies, they are worth it. I want every company to make some kind of diary about the development, I always find it an interesting read or watch. What do you guys think about “The Making of” videos?

Tags: My thoughts