Rumour thread (SPOILERS - ALLEGED LEAKS)

[Absolclaw]

Because they only began working on this the moment Black2/White2 were out in America, and had no previous 3D models to work off of, with the animators having just graduated.

 

[Crackseed]

Because they only began working on this the moment Black2/White2 were out in America, and had no previous 3D models to work off of, with the animators having just graduated.

Given the nature of game development and how big your teams need to be, it's entirely feasible they had to pick something to "give up" a bit when they tackled this. As Shatterstag pointed out, even if you have a trained team, generating 700+ models AND the unique animations to go with them could easily eat up a year+ of development. Look at the short CGI animations done by developers like Blizzard or Blur - that stuff can take 6 months for just a short 1 minute long clip and that's a pre-generated video with no deviation or range of animations required like individual in-game models would.

2+ years to get to the point X/Y is now even with only 70 "new" models is entirely plausible - I'm not excusing GF and saying "It's cool - they can totally do less new pokemon per generation" as much as given the amount of work this probably took, it's understandable if one of the major caveats to only 70 new mons was directly affected by the transition to a new 3D engine/models.

 

[shatterstag]

@ Shatterstag - awesome look into modelling. I've dabbled in it a bit but never got too far but even my brief foray into it showed how absurdly time consuming it was. Much props to GF for finally going this route - while I certainly would have loved more then 70, given the amount of work going into this generation's games, I am beyond pleased with the final result.

Haha thanks! 3d art is such a crazy unknown world and it's really easy to look at 3d movies and say 'thats easy! they dont have to draw each frame!' And it's true, 2d animations is hard too (technically I'm an animation major so I've done both 2d and 3d), but they're time consuming in different ways. Most people who don't know much about 3d stuff just sort of assume that it's quicker, because they haven't spent days trying to furiously unwrap a model lol

Looking at XY from a game artist perspective, they've spent a bunch of time and a lot of resources modelling all these pokemon for the future. I mean, with most sprite'd pokemon games they get a new sprite for each generation right? They've saved themselves the energy and modeled everything in one fell swoop for future games (Hoenn remake confirmed???). I'd predict that they'll probably make use of these models for a good few more games, because it'll save them tones of time from here on out and the models are really pretty and probably can't be improved that much more because of the 3ds' limitations.

I guess in a way you could say that, now the hard work has been done, it's going to be a lot easier for them to make new 3d games! So if they only give us 70 new pokemon in the next game then we'll have a LOT to complain about hehe!

 

[Lunala]

Is there a source on the EXP change?

 

[Zeta]

Haha thanks! 3d art is such a crazy unknown world and it's really easy to look at 3d movies and say 'thats easy! they dont have to draw each frame!' And it's true, 2d animations is hard too (technically I'm an animation major so I've done both 2d and 3d), but they're time consuming in different ways. Most people who don't know much about 3d stuff just sort of assume that it's quicker, because they haven't spent days trying to furiously unwrap a model lol

Yeah, I remember reading an interview with Pixar artists who were like "People assume we just make a digital doll and move it around like its a machinima but it's a lot more complex than that."

 

[Reshi643]

Interesting note on EXP: The Gen V Exp. relative formula has been undone. Exp. is now earned like it was in the first four generations. I might end up using Exp. All after all and just toggling it a lot...

Source

Is there a source on the EXP change?

The source is from Smogon.

 

[Crackseed]

To add some extra perspective on just how time consuming it can be, I recently read an article about a new skin that was created for Ezreal, from League of Legends. Now Ezreal obviously was already completed but they built a special legendary skin for him - this skin did not really add much in the way of new animations outside of his dance/portalling and a bunch of new spell effects but apparently to do that and all the polish needed took about 6 months. Now granted it probably wasn't a full team of folks working on the skin but you can expect that this was still 2-3 people animating at the least. Even if we assume GF used triple or more that amount for animators, you're still looking at a metric ton of work just for 3D modelling.

Anyway, hope I'm not sounding preachy but honestly - if 70 was the price to pay for 3D models and the leap to this type of gameplay going forward, then I personally feel it's a worthwhile "cost" - just my 2 cents

 

[The Outrage]

Instagram

Is this not an air battle?

 

[NoirGrimoir]

Totally random, but I'm reading a manga in another tab, and came upon a scan with biscuit-cookie things that look exactly like the ones in Pokemon Amie, lol. Was not expecting that.

 

[Absolclaw]

Again, it's not like this is the second biggest gaming franchise which had at least 3-4 (leaning towards the latter) years in development. They also absolutely designed the Pokemon at the exact same time as they allocated to modelling. I suppose once they designed the Pokemon they then went off and began modelling the buildings and the world map completely separately, while designing it at the same time.

Yes, 3D is difficult. Good animation is difficult. But this isn't an expressive Pixar movie where you need to capture human emotion with various close ups and keep the audiences attention for 1 and a half hours. This is watching a 3D model 'breathe' a little. And then maybe move forwards a bit and have the attack animation play, creating the illusion that the models are doing unique things. And flapping for the winged ones that never perch because they have the stamina of an Olympian. They aren't doing anything near as complex as something in, say, The Incredibles.

Totally random, but I'm reading a manga in another tab, and came upon a scan with biscuit-cookie things that look exactly like the ones in Pokemon Amie, lol. Was not expecting that.

The biscuit things in Amie just looked like generic munchies to me.

Instagram

Is this not an air battle?

No. Because what kind of generic trainer battle of any kind involves battling inside what looks to be the sun.

 

[BigBadBatter]

Have I missed anything?

 

[Absolclaw]

Nothing much, just pictures of totally surfing on a Lapras.

Spoiler

ITS A LIE

 

[BigBadBatter]

Nothing much, just pictures of totally surfing on a Lapras.

Spoiler

ITS A LIE

Heh, nothing much going on here anymore.

 

[NoirGrimoir]

I want to surf on a lapras...

 

[Absolclaw]

Heh, nothing much going on here anymore.

S-sure there is, see.

 

[BlackButterfree]

Actually, models are easier to make then animated sprites. Once the model's done, that's it, you can animate it however you want. Sprites require each being drawn individually, that's a lot more work then whatever models you have to deal with. That's not to say that they haven't put a lot of time and work into these games, but the comparison is more skewered towards sprites rather then models due to how much work they require.

Having said that, 700+ models is still quite a bit to work with regardless.

I'm seeing a lot of people complaining about the small number of new pokemon and comparing sprites to models and I thought I'd shed a little bit of insight on 3d modelling.

I've really got to respectfully disagree with saying that 3d modelling is easier than making sprites, or those who are saying that they could have done way more new pokemon. I'm a second year game artist major - for my final graduation project I'm working on low poly 3d models, and even though I've only been modeling for 2 years now I know the ropes. I can tell you right now - modelling is ridiculously time consuming. Even if most of the X&Y models likely don't scrape above 2000 polys, that's still a hefty amount of work, especially considering thats 700 individual pokemon models alone. And I'm not even talking about the unique animations.

A 3d model goes through various stages before it's complete - first, you model the pokemon, which involves modelling from references and then spending like a million years refining it so that it's clean and animates well. Each pokemon is completely different - the majority are going to be modeled completely from scratch. Then they need to be 'unwrapped' (which is basically like cutting it out so that it lays flat) and textured. Then each model needs to have a 'rig' setup - basically an armature on the inside of the model which gives it movement and tells it how to animate. Then it needs to be skinned, which is binding the model itself to the 'rig' armature. Then there's unique animations for each pokemon.

That's a hell of a lot of work, even for a large team of experienced 3d artists. And that's 700 pokemon models. This isn't even factoring in the generic attack animations, the overworld assets, all the characters, the visual effects....
Compare that to a small sprite sheet, where the pokemon is sprite'd and then it's arms are selected and moved slightly back and forth so it looks like it's moving.

People tend to think that 3d modelling is easy because once the base model is finished it can basically do anything. But the process of modelling can take an abominably long time, and 3d work is way more technical and finicky than just slapping some pixels down.


In my opinion, as a game artist, the fact that they managed to slug through 600 pokemon models AND add on an additional 70 brand new really good ones is incredible. I may have liked to see more new mons, but the work and effort that's gone into the game is mindblowing!

@ Shatterstag - awesome look into modelling. I've dabbled in it a bit but never got too far but even my brief foray into it showed how absurdly time consuming it was. Much props to GF for finally going this route - while I certainly would have loved more then 70, given the amount of work going into this generation's games, I am beyond pleased with the final result.

Haha thanks! 3d art is such a crazy unknown world and it's really easy to look at 3d movies and say 'thats easy! they dont have to draw each frame!' And it's true, 2d animations is hard too (technically I'm an animation major so I've done both 2d and 3d), but they're time consuming in different ways. Most people who don't know much about 3d stuff just sort of assume that it's quicker, because they haven't spent days trying to furiously unwrap a model lol

Looking at XY from a game artist perspective, they've spent a bunch of time and a lot of resources modelling all these pokemon for the future. I mean, with most sprite'd pokemon games they get a new sprite for each generation right? They've saved themselves the energy and modeled everything in one fell swoop for future games (Hoenn remake confirmed???). I'd predict that they'll probably make use of these models for a good few more games, because it'll save them tones of time from here on out and the models are really pretty and probably can't be improved that much more because of the 3ds' limitations.

I guess in a way you could say that, now the hard work has been done, it's going to be a lot easier for them to make new 3d games! So if they only give us 70 new pokemon in the next game then we'll have a LOT to complain about hehe!

Spillin' that hot truth tea all over Bulbagarden! Preach it, bb!

 

[Crackseed]

We're in slow trickle mode now since most of the progressed leakers are trying to find out what post-game exists and people are getting their copies a few days in advance. I suspect this thread will empty pretty fast after today really.

Though I sure would like to know what the big "secret" Nintendo is supposedly holding on to re: X/Y is.

 

[Absolclaw]

Spillin' that hot truth tea all over Bulbagarden! Preach it, bb!

Neither of them have BB for initials ...

We're in slow trickle mode now since most of the progressed leakers are trying to find out what post-game exists and people are getting their copies a few days in advance. I suspect this thread will empty pretty fast after today really.

Though I sure would like to know what the big "secret" Nintendo is supposedly holding on to re: X/Y is.

Indeed, soon we will go and be unleashed into the wild along with the other couple of thousand of spoiled people to secretly laugh behind the back of the people who experience the global launch the way Nintendo intended.

 

[TFerro]

We're in slow trickle mode now since most of the progressed leakers are trying to find out what post-game exists and people are getting their copies a few days in advance. I suspect this thread will empty pretty fast after today really.

Though I sure would like to know what the big "secret" Nintendo is supposedly holding on to re: X/Y is.

Wait. Why are people getting them in advance?

Delivery messed up?

 

[Absolclaw]

Wait. Why are people getting them in advance?

Delivery messed up?

Some stores broke street date in Canadaland and Italyland. The store in Canada was run out of business as a result of Nintendo's wrath. Apparently the news didn't give much of a damn about the Italian store though. I'm kind of tempted to see if Australia has broken it yet