Comparison: Oddworld Abe's New 'n' Tasty / Oddysee (1997-2014)

[PlayGamers96]

I just made a little video where I do a comparison between Oddworld New 'n' Tasty and Oddysee C: I hope this is helpful and you like it (and that does not violate any rule.)
I know this is my first post here and it's short, but the video will make you understand what I am passionate about Abe c: !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gs8nEExuDNc

[V_O_T]

Nice video I've seen a few of these done by others, but none the less, nice work.

That video of the alpha Abe build is a crap ton more fluid than the latest gameplay shots. what gives? lol

[Scrabaniac]

Welcome to the forums I'm not sure if we already have a thread that contains similar videos and postings, possibly the 'new screenshots' thread. That is up to Nate to decide if this fits there better though. Glad to see more oddworld fans joining, mostly everyone here is very friendly. Just be sure to read the FAQ at the top of the discussion page once again welcome to OWF. - Scrabaniac (Josh).

[PlayGamers96]

Welcome to the forums I'm not sure if we already have a thread that contains similar videos and postings, possibly the 'new screenshots' thread. That is up to Nate to decide if this fits there better though. Glad to see more oddworld fans joining, mostly everyone here is very friendly. Just be sure to read the FAQ at the top of the discussion page once again welcome to OWF. - Scrabaniac (Josh).

Thank you for the welcome C:

Nice video I've seen a few of these done by others, but none the less, nice work.

That video of the alpha Abe build is a crap ton more fluid than the latest gameplay shots. what gives? lol

Thank you i see now the others gameplay, If I can, I try to do a "2.0" of this video c:

[Holy Sock]

Nice video I've seen a few of these done by others, but none the less, nice work.

That video of the alpha Abe build is a crap ton more fluid than the latest gameplay shots. what gives? lol

Either because character animations were affected when they switched game engines and they haven't finished them or because it made the gameplay irritatingly sluggish trying to match the fluidity of the sprites in the original.

[AvengingGibbons]

I don't get why they're trying to speed up the animations so much. Part of the puzzle is timing. Sometimes, slower animations add excitement to the game like if you're trying to pull a lever whilst a slog is chasing you down, the fact that there's a lag between issuing the command and, say, the meat saw coming down and mincing that slog before it gets to Abe adds tension to the game. Part of the beauty of Oddysee and Exoddus was predicting what is going to happen at each moment, and taking into account how long it will take to pull levers, hoist up platforms, go from running left to running right. If you take all that away, you end up with too much control, Abe no longer feels like a separate person who you are guiding rather than controlling. Some animations do need speeding up, but not as much as they have done. The priority should be to keep the animations as realistic looking as they can, only speeding animations up if they have little significance.

The animation lags are not bugs, they're a game mechanic.

[Holy Sock]

I think the problem might be, Gibbons, that real smooth and fluid animations in this new 3D world are too slow for gameplay and feel much slower than the original. It's relatively easy to create really fluid yet relatively quick and responsive movements with sprite animations but in the 3D space maybe it affected the flow of gameplay too much.

I could be wrong but that seems the most likely explanation if the animations aren't going to change.

[AvengingGibbons]

I think the devs have probably played with the animation speeds alone. Think of it like fast forwarding a video, the quicker animations are unnatural when simply sped up, but if the animation sequence itself is altered to speed up the animation, you can create a quicker animation whilst still maintaining an accurate simulation of physics, hence natural movement. Maybe the devs are looking for the ideal animation speeds, before tweaking the animation in more detail in order to naturalize the motion.

[Holy Sock]

Maybe. I mean all you can really say is that they're not making these decisions willy nilly. The difference is that whilst they can have hours and hours of conversations and playtesting we're just shown the final product without much context behind the changes - so it may take us longer to get on board with them.

[Manco]

Remember that what looks like smooth and fluid gameplay may feel much more sluggish when you’re actually in control. Slower animations are fine when you’re just passively watching a pre-scripted playthrough, but when you’re in control you want things to be snappy.

What surprised me was how much the art direction has shifted since the alpha – the alpha was almost screen-for-screen the same as the original RuptureFarms.

[Michael]

Animator here I agree with Gibbons, There's a big difference between a quick action, and a slow action sped up. Speeding anything up will make it seem unnatural and it won't have a believable sense of weight/momentum.

Think of mo-cap; you can have very fast actions, but they all still look fluid and realistic because, well, they are real The reaction to any fast movement will be far greater than a slow one, and this is not captured if the movement is just sped up.

I agree the animations in this video seem a lot smoother, and probably better in general. Are they too slow for gameplay? A little, perhaps. However, it's very possible to create quick actions that are just as believable and smooth. The problem is that for the physics to feel correct, the speed should really have been set from the beginning.

The only reason I can think of for just speeding the existing animations up, assuming the sense of physics was correct at the original speed, is saving time on having to effectively tweak (or even re-animate) all character movements. Doesn't look as good or realistic, but will save a lot of time and money. Depends what's more important