Walking Animation And Movement

[Psy 350]

This is something I was thinking about the other day when playing Red Dead Redemption for the first time in a long while. Red Dead has some of the most realistic walking animations I've seen in any game. Looks real, BUT the animations are pretty slow and the controls seem sluggish. In order to change direction when walking you usually need to walk around in a circle. When walking up tight staircases and trying to get through doors it can be a bit of a pain and you end up just scraping along the wall. The same thing happens in GTA 4, especially in buildings, or for example when running around on top of a container or something. You're always running the risk of running off the side when trying to turn around.

Personally I would rather see less realistic animations with less realistic movement. For example if I'm running right and I need to change and turn left, I'd rather run to the left almost instantly, without needing to see a slow down animation followed by him turning around and picking up speed.

Bit of a minor issue, but compared to games like inFamous, or even GTA 3, I find the movement controls and animations in the next gen Rockstar games to be fairly sluggish for lack of a better word. They look great, but I'd rather they were smooth and quick than slow and realistic looking.

Anyone else have any thoughts?

[Massacre 7646]

God damn it, now I have to post this again...

When I turn, I don't lean in the direction I'm turning. Neither should Niko. Fix it.

That is all.

[Iconoclast 6]

Very true, this is one of those things where realism gets in the way of fluid playability.

I'm not saying to get back to the III-era movements, but the least they could do is make the character do a quick stop when turning and running the other way. (Let the guys at R* do a 'Cooper test', they'll get the idea afterwards)

[DuPz0r 5361]

This is a trade-off Rockstar have encountered since GTA IV. They've decided to use motion capture animations instead of hand-drawn animations for more realism, which generally has more detail at a high frame rates compares to hand animated character performance. This is why it feels sluggish, because each motion capture animation has to overlap, and the animators no longer have to animate them, instead they have to clean up motion animations, which is probably more pain staking than just hand-animating a walk cycle off the bat.

I think they're getting better at it, because motion capture is still a fairly new tech in real-time. Almost every big budget game uses it now. And you can still notice sluggishness across the board. Take Uncharted for instance, they have some of the smoothest in-game animations, but there is still some sluggish behaviour there sometimes.

But i do agree, I'd prefer hand animated smooth animations instead of poorly mashed together recorded movement. I'm sure they have learnt a lot since GTA IV though.

[DuffMan 266]

They need snappier controls for sure. It's a very pretty implementation of realism in a video game, but it slows the gameplay right down. Whether you survive a gunfight or not shouldn't depend on how lucky you are with what animations are played as you run between cover. The process of taking cover needs to be snappier as well.

Gears of War does the movement/cover thing very well. Probably a bit too unrealistic for GTA but something along those lines would be great.

[Rayge 689]

God damn it, now I have to post this again...

When I turn, I don't lean in the direction I'm turning. Neither should Niko. Fix it.

That is all.

Exactly, I found it amusing walking in circles practically leaning inwards in IV. I think it should be MORE realistic, a real human can turn almost instantly, and don't lean when they turn.

[DiO 4730]

Looks like its fine in Max Payne 3

skip to 1:10

[Smafugula 31]

I hate in RDR when you get up close to kill someone it puts you in that "cool" kill perk thing, which is prone to glitches and really pisses me off when im trying to kill someone old fashion.

[rm80rams 62]

This is something I was thinking about the other day when playing Red Dead Redemption for the first time in a long while.

First time in a while. I still play the game ALOT

[Rayge 689]

This is something I was thinking about the other day when playing Red Dead Redemption for the first time in a long while.

First time in a while. I still play the game ALOT

Really? I don't particularly like the multiplayer and I got 100% completion with ease so for me there is no point, except throwin' tomahawks and throwing a lasso around a dog pretending it's my pet.

[D1J2D3 2]

This is something I was thinking about the other day when playing Red Dead Redemption for the first time in a long while.

First time in a while. I still play the game ALOT

Really? I don't particularly like the multiplayer and I got 100% completion with ease so for me there is no point, except throwin' tomahawks and throwing a lasso around a dog pretending it's my pet.

Ya I thought it would be a big deal in RDR to get the Bureau Uniform, and it was actually really easy. Thank God there were no pigeons, I hate those things in GTA IV their pretty useless.

[Guest Marney1]

Looks like its fine in Max Payne 3

skip to 1:10

That's something I've been wondering lately; will GTA V's movement and animation be on par with Max Payne 3? The AI looks great too @0:40 where Max is hiding as the enemy are searching for him.

[rm80rams 62]

This is something I was thinking about the other day when playing Red Dead Redemption for the first time in a long while.

First time in a while. I still play the game ALOT

Really? I don't particularly like the multiplayer and I got 100% completion with ease so for me there is no point, except throwin' tomahawks and throwing a lasso around a dog pretending it's my pet.

i actually didnt get the game right away and i went through the story a couple times. i also personally really like the multiplayer

[PedestrianRiotz 93]

I think it doesn't need to be changed, I'm happy with the way it is, although I'd like them to sort out a few glitches with it but I like the realistic walk animation etc.

[Rayge 689]

Yeah as I said, if it was more realistic the characters wouldn't lean when they walk etc... And it would also obviously be more realistic than if they downgrade the realism of the walking to make it easier.

[Indy 350]

The issue is whether we should strafe or turn (with the left analog).

[Rayge 689]

I think it should be like if you turn left, you turn realistically like a normal person without leaning, and the camera follows you. Is what they do in GTA IV and RDR classified as strafing?

[Qdeathstar 1763]

Niko seemed really top heavy to me... Yet he had no breasts... So the need to fix that, one way or another

Yours sincerely, A fine gentleman with an iPhone.