Activision has sought to replicate the look and feel of skateboard videos through the Tony Hawk franchise. New technology brings it closer than ever before.
WATCH PROVING GROUND VIDEOS
by YVG Staff
Skateboarding didn't become a worldwide activity because thousands of kids spontaneously assembled wheels and decks. No, it was those few cameramen who threw their lenses and themselves in the way of tricks and ollies to grab footage that, more than in almost any other sporting film, communicates exactly what it's like to grind a rail and skate an empty pool.
Video games have long sought to replicate the thrill of skating, often with relatively mathematical results. Tony Hawk's Proving Ground, the latest in a long line of skateboard games from Activision, includes a number of technologies that bring both skating and skate films to users in new ways.
Articulated Animations
Project Eight, the first Tony Hawk game released for next-generation systems in 2006, introduced a system called "Nail the Trick," which used many variable, user-controlled series of close-up animations to represent a wider variety of skate moves than ever before. Proving Ground adds two new subsystems: Nail the Grab and Nail the Manual.
In practice, users won't know how much the new options differ from what was offered last year; the look and feel are consistent. Under the hood, however, previously unavailable animation systems are at work to replicate reality with a new clarity and detail.
To custom-create a grab trick, for example (in which the skater grabs the board with one hand whilst in-air, then sticks the landing) pre-set animations have been ditched in favor of a non-linear string of animated movements that changes on the fly to mirror player actions.
Each one of dozens of these micro-animations is indexed according to a system that reads the placement of the analog stick, so that by moving the sticks players can seamlessly point to their next on-screen movement. Each animation is blended over the last, so that a complex grab trick might use sixty blended movements which appear on-screen to be one unbroken action.
Cut, Splice and Send
Being able to pull off great and realistic tricks is only half the concept, however. Proving Ground allows players to capture their movements, edit them and present the result much like a classic skate video, finally fulfilling one of the long-desired features for virtual skaters.
Capturing action replays is nothing new within the context of video games; for years players have been able to revisit some of their grandest moments, and in some cases even use crude editing systems.
Proving Ground pushes the tech a step forward by leveraging a sort of Final Cut Lite, where players can capture clips of themselves in-game by cameras both built-in to the storyline and placed by the user. Footage can be cut and stretched or slowed (from 20 percent to 200 percent of original speed).
Screen effects selectively add touches like depth of field (one of the most prominent of current visual additions to gaming) and blown-out highlights. Video overlays are also included, with 48 options including Film Grain and Crinkled Paper and (adhering to the reality of the sport) the choice of applying sponsor logos to the clip. All can be edited on their own timeline parallel to the original video track, exactly as in consumer editing programs.
An interesting addition to the editing system, and something that is currently unique, is based on systems imported from another massively popular franchise: Guitar Hero. In addition to handling the Tony Hawk series, developer Neversoft recently took over Guitar Hero, and the Proving Ground team imported beat-matching code from that series.
Having edited a clip, there's an option to place any of the game's soundtrack songs over the footage. By matching the beat of the song to edits, transitions and actions, players can actually improve the rating awarded the clip when uploading it to Live.
There are limitations built into the system. Recorded clips max out at thirty seconds; currently you won't be able to play for two hours and record the entire session. (Doing so requires the old-fashioned method of video capture, and no one wants that.) And while up to two minutes of video can be loaded into the editor -- actually a near eternity when talking about tricks that take place in less than five seconds -- one minute will be the upper limit for clips uploaded to the Live service.
Also, this system isn't quite as robust from a capture perspective of that built into Halo 3, which records as much in-game positional data as players desire then offers the ability to freely move through the captured clip, navigating within the action like a disembodied observer and positioning the camera for maximum effect.
Queried about removing those restrictions, the Neversoft team indicated that things could change in future game releases, but that a patch for this particular game would be unlikely.
Tony Hawk's Proving Ground releases on October 15th for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.
Posted: 8 Oct 2007
