It's Time To Take Gaming Seriously

It's Time To Take Gaming Seriously
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With branded titles like Sega's Sonic the Hedgehog, the television production industry is just a hop, skip and a jump away for game animators. © Sega Entertainment.

"Animators need to come out of the box a little more savvy today than in the past, and 3D computer ability and experience can be important, but the skill of the traditional 2D animator is still the most important to have," explains Greg Thomas, Vice President of Product Development for Sega DreamCast. "If skilled 2D animators are willing to familiarize themselves and learn the computer aspects of the business, we are willing to completely train them because a great traditional animator is going to be an excellent computer animator."

Today's video game creator is going to carry numerous skill sets to the drawing board each day. There is the core understanding of 2D animation art that continues to be the underlying skill, yet an animator may need the left brain technical ability to work with motion-capture and computer generated three-dimensional sculpturing, as well as the creative right brain ability to develop characters from blue pencil sketches to finished, walking, talking personalities.

Motion-capture plays a big part in sports games like NBA 2K. © Sega Entertainment.

Sega's Current Cast
Released this past September, the Sega DreamCast surpassed one million units sold in little more than ten weeks. This new video game system boasts a peak graphics performance of three million polygons per second and 128 bit 3D processing power that allows games to edge closer to cinematic quality. The processor runs at sixty frames per second versus the twenty frames of past systems.

The system's increased storage capabilities allows developers more room in which to create compelling, story driven games with enhanced details. "This allows the animator to create so much more," says Thomas. "For example not only do the players in a sports title, such as NBA 2K, now have defined fingers, but they can actually raise them to signal to the other players the play they are calling."

To support this new console game, forty games are slated to be on the shelves by Christmas 1999. These games combine core animation skills with technology to create a new level of game play.

One area of game development requiring new animation skills is sports games. These fast paced action games differ from others in that they are trying to provide a life-like experience that accurately reflects how known athletes play the game.

Sega's NFL 2K features more than 1,500 motion-captured moves that put real life players into thirty-one accurately modeled and detailed 3D stadiums where the faces, backgrounds and crowds are still drawn using traditional 2D skills. The advanced DreamCast technology allows the animator to use twenty-one, versus the previous nine, body sensors to capture the physical movements of an athlete.