2d or not 2d

[Noone]

Hi, Bill!

A bunch of questions from our reader Artemiy.

Will the game be 2D, 2.5D or 3D? If the game will be 3D then why first screenshots were with 2D graphics? AFAIR you told that the game will be cartoony...
What engine have you chosen for the game?

Thanks.

[WilliamTiller]

The game will have 2d backgrounds and 3d animation and characters. The reason for the 2d screen shots is because originally we were going to do the game in 2d and we made a four room 2d demo which the screen shots are from. They will be removed pretty soon and replaced with 2d/3d screen shots as soon as we have the game engine and animation ready.

The switch was made because of difficult making 2d was for us, because we hadn�t done it in years. My team was all 3d artist so switching back was tough. We were convince the game could look good in 3d with 2d backgrounds and it would be easier in many ways to develop. And many people are used to 3d in games now, so we wanted to appeal to as many people as possible. So it was just easier for us, and we thought it would broaden the appeal of the game for players and publishers. Plus 3d can be very powerful and flexible.

The engine we are using is a secret at the moment, but once it is where we ant it to be and has all the bells and whistles and pipeline issues solved we will release details about the engine. Right now we aren�t quite ready to do that. Sorry.

[Noone]

Will the 3d nature of models be quite seen on the screen or you'll implement some filters to make models look like a drawn 2D (as in "Runaway")?

[WilliamTiller]

We are leaning away from a cell shade look, but haven�t completely shut the door on it. Our initial tests look good without it so if I were betting on one or the other I�d bet on us not using any cell shading.

If we had black outlines around our environments like we did on Monkey Island 3, I would do it without hesitation so hat the characters fir in with the style of the environment. But we aren�t doing nay black outlines in AVS so visually I don�t think we need a black outline to help the characters read. Lighting will have a lot to do with how the characters look in the game, so we plan to use the dynamic lights in the scene to make sure all the characters and 3d elements blend in with the environment and still be clear and �readable.�

-Bill

[Orange Brat]

This probably won't get answered, but I'll post this just in case. Is the game still going to use the "layered" backgrounds using a virtual multiplane camera as suggested in an older thread on the official AVS forum?

@Alex ASP: Runway didn't use filters, all of the characters are sprite based and use a huge number of animation frames to enhance the animation quality. They all started out as models in a 3D package, had a toon shader applied, and then were saved out into whatever 2D format they used for animation.

[WilliamTiller]

Yes we will have a multi-plane camera for the backgrounds to give them a more dynamic and three dimensional feel, even thought they will still be hand painted 2d backgrounds. And the characters will be real time models and animation. The details of this technique I can't go into yet, but will in the coming months.

-Bill