Death Smiles 2 [Cave 2009]

THE · Post by **THE** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 6:35 am

I too think it's justice, every developer that moves from 2D to crappy 3D should be punished hard. A kick in the balls is not enough here

Cave if you are reading this, please take a look at Kof XII, that's how it is done today!

Taylor · Post by **Taylor** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 6:59 am

Touched up renders was what they were doing before?

THE · Post by **THE** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 7:06 am

Taylor wrote:Touched up renders was what they were doing before?

Yeah, at least it's better than crappy real time 3D. Graphically Cave's high times were in the mid nineties, Donpachi, DoDonpachi, Dangun Feveron with strong Toaplan influence, after that they gone the cheap ass route with prerenders and photoshopped backdrops.

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 7:17 am

THE wrote:the cheap ass route with prerenders and photoshopped backdrops.

Which coincidentally look better.

THE · Post by **THE** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:44 am

GaijinPunch wrote:
THE wrote:the cheap ass route with prerenders and photoshopped backdrops.
Which coincidentally look better.

Well the preference between dot art and prerendered cgi is up to each own.

But I guess we all can agree that DS2 looks like crap. They should just have used the old Type-X or Atomiswave or something along these lines. Those machines can handle thousands of megabits of prerendered cgis and somewhat acceptable 3D graphics.

And prerendered cgis being more expensive in development than realtime 3D is just a myth. Creating good looking low-poly objects is far more complicated than sculpting objects with no limits than your artist skills. It's not that STGs need prerendered quality like a CGI Final Fantasy movie anyway.

SuperPang · Post by **SuperPang** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 11:48 am

I'm of the opinion Cave should've sacrificed a bit of profit and jumped on board an established platsorm like Naomi or Type X with the tools already in place.

THE · Post by **THE** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 12:52 pm

What I really wonder is, is this game really made by the same people?
As every person that sits longer than 10minutes at the cab should have "cleared" it, there should be a movie with staff roll somewhere...

Not directly related:

Ikeda made a statement in an interview, regarding his nick IKD, that people will probably stop calling him like that soon. Was this an indicator that he leaves the scene?

Taylor · Post by **Taylor** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:09 pm

THE wrote:
Taylor wrote:Touched up renders was what they were doing before?
Yeah, at least it's better than crappy real time 3D. Graphically Cave's high times were in the mid nineties, Donpachi, DoDonpachi, Dangun Feveron with strong Toaplan influence, after that they gone the cheap ass route with prerenders and photoshopped backdrops.

I think the reason Cave went for cheap ass renders and cannot rely on costly third party boards is because they have small teams, development cycles and budgets.

Anyway, my point was really just a cheeky nudge that the praised KoF12 uses touched up renders.

Kiken · Post by **Kiken** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:12 pm

Taylor wrote:I think the reason Cave went for cheap ass renders and cannot rely on costly third party boards is because they have small teams, development cycles and budgets.

Anyway, my point was really just a cheeky nudge that the praised KoF12 uses touched up renders.

KoF12 uses rotoscoping, not "touched up renders".

Taylor · Post by **Taylor** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 2:22 pm

I recall Daisuke Ishiwatari said they were renders in an interview, and they certainly look like drawn over models from the way they are lit. Rotoscoping seems pretty counter-productive given the outfits, moves and bodily proportions.

Edit:

Gamasutra wrote:I also heard that the King of Fighters XII team at SNK made 3D models for the animation, and then they're tracing them. Are you using the same tactic or are you actually doing hand animation?

JM: Yeah, we're doing almost the same thing.

honorless · Post by **honorless** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 3:56 pm

Taylor wrote:I recall Daisuke Ishiwatari said they were renders in an interview, and they certainly look like drawn over models from the way they are lit. Rotoscoping seems pretty counter-productive given the outfits, moves and bodily proportions.

While strictly speaking, the term "rotoscoping" may only apply when the original footage is from real-life, KoF XII is certainly not "touched up renders".

Using a blank model and painstakingly drawing clothing/facial expressions/whatever over it =/= rendering a 3D model in 2D and touching up the iffy parts.

One of these two takes a hell of a lot more work (and looks a hell of a lot nicer) and it is really sad when people can't tell the difference.

Taylor · Post by **Taylor** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 4:38 pm

I have not said above that KoF12 didn't take effort or looks bad, I said they used 3D models as a base and painted over them whilst describing my exact mannerism for doing so as cheeky within the same sentence. The point being that Cave do not need to look at KoF12 to see how things are done “today” when the procedure is something they were doing it “yesterday,” so to speak. The Deathsmiles port, in particular, had a massive focus on them making detailed, hi-res sprites from the original renders. Yeah, I know this tedious at best, I didn't expect there to be a debate.

Though, since you've brought it up, I will say now that I, personally, dislike the look of KoF12. Mainly due to the lack of motion and caricature on the individual frames. If there was a way on a message board for me to laugh manically and step backwards into shadow while thunderclaps rang in the background, that would go here.

THE · Post by **THE** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 5:14 pm

Taylor wrote:The point being that Cave do not need to look at KoF12 to see how things are done “today” when the procedure is something they were doing it “yesterday,” so to speak.

Ah, okay. My original comment was more pointed to the HD and staying 2D in the year 2009 thing of KoF12.

Regarding KoF12, while I like the overall look, nothing beats traditional dot arts.

Just look at this, if it isn't art what is?

Here are some information about how KoF12 gfx is done:
http://kofaniv.snkplaymore.co.jp/info/1 ... /index.php

honorless · Post by **honorless** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 5:42 pm

Taylor wrote:The point being that Cave do not need to look at KoF12 to see how things are done “today” when the procedure is something they were doing it “yesterday,” so to speak. The Deathsmiles port, in particular, had a massive focus on them making detailed, hi-res sprites from the original renders.

I still don't think you understand what I'm talking about, given that last sentence...or maybe you just haven't seen the Deathsmiles port?

DS360 (and a lot of Cave's earlier output, as THE stated) IS touched-up renders. It's why their sprites look like Donkey Kong Country as opposed to Street Fighter Alpha. If they were smart, they wouldn't have had to make anything—those models could very well have been used at a smaller resolution for the arcade version.

...Ugh. I can see my posts are just the illustrator and general 2D fetishist in me getting wanky, so I won't belabor the point anymore after this.

BIL · Post by **BIL** » Tue Jun 02, 2009 5:44 pm

THE wrote:Just look at this, if it isn't art what is?

Off-topic, but I laughed so goddamn hard when I played KOF 2002 and noticed that dude was named "Ron."

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 12:33 am

And prerendered cgis being more expensive in development than realtime 3D is just a myth.

My guess is that pre-renders are harder to change at a later date, and would probably require help from the design team which are probably on their next game. W/ a 3D model, the programmer is likely given an object and he can do with it whatever he wants. I guess something similar can be done w/ a prerender, but maybe not as good. I don't see this as a make it or break it feature of development though... especially when it has most obviously crushed your bottom line like an ant.

Ikeda made a statement in an interview, regarding his nick IKD, that people will probably stop calling him like that soon. Was this an indicator that he leaves the scene?

Which interview?

Elixir · Post by **Elixir** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 2:22 am

I actually like the backgrounds in DS2. Seen the ones in DS? Try it sometime, they're just blurred images taken from google. Most notably on the train stage.

Makes it worse that they didn't upgrade the walls or background for the 360 version, so it's really noticeable. It might have been an issue with hitbox and bullet placement though.

THE · Post by **THE** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 6:53 am

GaijinPunch wrote:
And prerendered cgis being more expensive in development than realtime 3D is just a myth.
My guess is that pre-renders are harder to change at a later date, and would probably require help from the design team which are probably on their next game. W/ a 3D model, the programmer is likely given an object and he can do with it whatever he wants. I guess something similar can be done w/ a prerender, but maybe not as good. I don't see this as a make it or break it feature of development though... especially when it has most obviously crushed your bottom line like an ant.

Well Ok, but I don't see this having much of an impact on shmups. Afterall they are quite primitive and there is not much interaction between 3D objects. I haven't looked to intense at the DS2 videos. Are those bullet pattern heavy depending of the body part movements of enemies? Finally someone should think that a professional company like Cave is doing the main development with placeholders/simplified GFX anyway. So after the tweaking, they can but in final GFX.

One of the main reasons to switch could be that the team wanted to do more animation. In one interview they stated having a lot of problems cramming all this animations in the old SH3 board. It would be rather stupid though...

GaijinPunch wrote:
Ikeda made a statement in an interview, regarding his nick IKD, that people will probably stop calling him like that soon. Was this an indicator that he leaves the scene?
Which interview?

I think it was in the DS 360 port interview on cave-stg. But haven't found it yet again. I think it was translated by EOJ?

THE · Post by **THE** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 7:12 am

Elixir wrote:I actually like the backgrounds in DS2. Seen the ones in DS? Try it sometime, they're just blurred images taken from google. Most notably on the train stage.

Makes it worse that they didn't upgrade the walls or background for the 360 version, so it's really noticeable. It might have been an issue with hitbox and bullet placement though.

Well a lot of recent Cave games use crappy "google images".
Espgaluda Stage 5 (I nearly vomited here, having in a beautiful fantasy game an ugly photo of a modern town at night...)
DOJ Stage 3 (blurry sky, looks like shit compared to the rest of the game)
Ibara has afair something like that too.

Upgrading those heavy post processed background in DS for a crappy x360 port wouldn't be reasonable from a business perspective. As it won't even affect sales anyway.

What did they sold 38000 copies of DS X360? 38000 x 50 EUR = 1900000 EUR turnover. After all deductions there won't be much left, especially considered that they need to feed a shit load of employees, regarding their public company data they have around 160 employees.

従業員数 160名(平成20年11月30日現在)

adversity1 · Post by **adversity1** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:23 am

LOL, CAVE has a lot more projects than the DS port man.

ncp · Post by **ncp** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:30 am

THE wrote:DOJ Stage 3 (blurry sky, looks like shit compared to the rest of the game)

Those are mountains, bro.

Also it's supposed to feel like DDP's stage 3, and I think they did a fine job, I love the feeling of both games' stage 3. Neither of them beat out the awesomeness of Garegga's stage 5, though...

edit: Espgaluda st 5 is a little weird, I'll agree on that. But Ibara? Ibara is damn beautiful, imo.

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:35 am

Well Ok, but I don't see this having much of an impact on shmups. Afterall they are quite primitive and there is not much interaction between 3D objects.

But these guys tinker until the bitter end. I could see it being an issue in just about any genre really.

I think it was in the DS 360 port interview on cave-stg. But haven't found it yet again. I think it was translated by EOJ?

Hmm... I read half of that. Wasn't too interesting from the dev side. It's main goal seemed to be for promotion. Maybe I'll read the other half one day. I have the mag sitting here I think.

THE · Post by **THE** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:36 am

adversity1 wrote:LOL, CAVE has a lot more projects than the DS port man.

Yes, of course. I just wanted to clarify that those ports are not that important to them, as some people may think. The old Cave never cared about the home markets nor about western markets, those were quite irrelevant to them. I'm pretty sure they do a lot of outsourced game development and maybe even non game related works. At least their company name suggest this.

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:39 am

What did they sold 38000 copies? 38000 x 50 EUR = 1900000 EUR turnover. After all deductions there won't be much left, especially considered that they need to feed a shit load of employees, regarding their public company data they have around 160 employees.

What the fuck are you talking about?

THE · Post by **THE** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:43 am

GaijinPunch wrote:
What did they sold 38000 copies? 38000 x 50 EUR = 1900000 EUR turnover. After all deductions there won't be much left, especially considered that they need to feed a shit load of employees, regarding their public company data they have around 160 employees.
What the fuck are you talking about?

Sales figures of DS x360 of what do you mean?

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:50 am

THE wrote: Sales figures of DS x360 of what do you mean?

They sold 38,000 copies of a game they ported, not even developed from the ground up, and published themselves on the most unpopular gaming console in Japan and you're acting as if it's a failure. Remind me to never hire you.

THE · Post by **THE** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 10:59 am

GaijinPunch wrote:
THE wrote: Sales figures of DS x360 of what do you mean?
They sold 38,000 copies of a game they ported, not even developed from the ground up, and published themselves on the most unpopular gaming console in Japan and you're acting as if it's a failure. Remind me to never hire you.

Well it was not my intention to imply it was a failure. Those 38000 are awesome for a shmup, regardless of the platform and of course it was easy money. This port was a success and they already stated to continue with those ports.

GaijinPunch · Post by **GaijinPunch** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 11:13 am

You said there wouldn't be much left over and that they had 160 mouths to feed (most of which don't even work in the games departments, mind you). I don't know how else one would take that.

THE · Post by **THE** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 12:14 pm

GaijinPunch wrote:You said there wouldn't be much left over and that they had 160 mouths to feed (most of which don't even work in the games departments, mind you). I don't know how else one would take that.

Ah, Ok I understand. Yes after re-reading it, it comes over to negative.
Just wanted to indicate that those ports shouldn't be that important to them, just looking on the turnover they generate. This was written under the premise that they do a lot more turnover with their arcade games.

Anyway this is all too off-topic. Back to DS2...

Macaw · Post by **Macaw** » Wed Jun 03, 2009 5:20 pm

While I think this game looks like shit so far, that John Cleese boss is too awesome!