Heavy Rain dev shows off 'Kara'

"We never thought it would work on a PlayStation 3," Cage told an audience at Game Developers Conference. He then showed off "Kara," running on Quantic Dream's new engine for the PS3.

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Quantic Dream, the team behind Heavy Rain, is working on a brand new game for PS3. While it will take advantage of lessons learned by their last adventure, creative director David Cage said that they wanted to create brand new tech for their next game.

"We never thought it would work on a PlayStation 3," Cage told an audience at Game Developers Conference. However, after experimenting, he announced "then we discovered that it could."

Repeating the footsteps of 2006's "The Casting," Cage revealed a brand new prototype that isn't necessarily related to their upcoming game. "We wanted to see if what we learned on Heavy Rain could be applied to a different genre," Cage said when describing his new game. As the lights turned down, he revealed "Kara," a new prototype. Before the video played, however, he announced that in all-caps: "NOT OUR NEXT PROJECT."

Running in real-time on the PS3, Cage said that the new engine would allow for a low-cost motion capture solution with a "direct-to-engine" pipeline. He said that the team is aiming "if not the quality of Avatar, something really high quality."

The Kara demo is already one year old running on "version 1" of the engine. Since then, Cage claims the team is currently utilizing a "version 3." While he wouldn't talk about the studio's next game, he did say that the final product would look even more realistic than what we saw. "I think you're going to get much better than that in the game," he confidently told the audience.

Andrew Yoon was previously a games journalist creating content at Shacknews.

From The Chatty
  • reply
    March 7, 2012 3:15 PM

    Andrew Yoon posted a new article, Heavy Rain dev shows off 'Kara'.

    "We never thought it would work on a PlayStation 3," Cage told an audience at Game Developers Conference. He then showed off "Kara," running on Quantic Dream's new engine for the PS3.

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      March 7, 2012 3:29 PM

      Naaaaise and creepy. Good facial animation.

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      March 7, 2012 3:37 PM

      I'm probably just a jaded PC gamer used to the GTA 4 mods with photo realistic textures, but that video wasn't impressive in the least.

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        March 7, 2012 3:40 PM

        you are

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        March 7, 2012 3:43 PM

        It was the realisticness of the model or textures that was impressive, but the subtle facial movements to communication emotion. That's what Avatar had to make you forget you're looking at CG characters. It was actually rather impressive. They can probably only do 1 or 2 figures at that level, but for dialog closeups that's probably all that's needed for a game.

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          March 7, 2012 3:47 PM

          It didn't seem any more impressive than the Half Life 2 tech from 2005 and it was way worse than the tech used in La Noire.

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            March 7, 2012 3:49 PM

            Pay more attention to the lip movement when NOT talking.

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            March 7, 2012 4:01 PM

            The key point from this article is the direct-to-engine and low-cost motion capture. La Noire was certainly very nice, but it was neither of those things (which may be contributing factors as to why Team Bondi is no longer around).

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              March 7, 2012 5:20 PM

              I think management was more the problem there.

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            March 7, 2012 4:40 PM

            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsKi5ZvB64U

            I honestly didn't think LA Noire was all that great for the facial expressions. Probably because they were way over exaggerated. In this video the facial expressions looked good and the detail was decent for being rendered in real time.

            What I can't stand is why try to make something powerful on something so limited? PC is limit less and you start off a project with limits in mind? That's no the best way to start making something.

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              March 7, 2012 5:55 PM

              PCs have limits too.

              If you want your game to run on 10% of gamer PCs, you have certain limits.

              If you want your game to run on 5% of gamer PCs, you have lesser limits.

              If you want your game to run on 0.1% of gamer PCs, you have even less limits.

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                March 7, 2012 6:16 PM

                The limits are far less though, even on a gaming PC that was made when the consoles were released. I would say that 99% of computers that people use today are far more powerful then any console.

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                  March 7, 2012 6:21 PM

                  You think only 1% of computers today have crappy integrated Intel graphics?

                  Perhaps you'll be so nice to send me some $ to upgrade my Radeon HD 4670 and GeForce 260 while you're smoking whatever you're smoking.

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            March 7, 2012 4:50 PM

            Are you kidding me? This is leaps and bounds above that.

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            March 7, 2012 5:25 PM

            I think you may need to play LA Noire again - this was far higher quality than that game's facial animation.

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            March 7, 2012 5:26 PM

            some of you so called graphics whores have amazingly poor eyesight and comparative abilities

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        March 7, 2012 5:40 PM

        You're probably just a something, yeah. Continue smoking that weed.

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        March 7, 2012 11:08 PM

        [deleted]

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      March 7, 2012 3:40 PM

      Video not found...

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      March 7, 2012 3:54 PM

      Use this tech for Omikron 2!

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      March 7, 2012 4:06 PM

      Holy shit, that was as good as the casting.

    • Ebu legacy 10 years legacy 20 years
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      March 7, 2012 4:12 PM

      Wow. I'm pretty damn jaded but that impressed me.

      • rms legacy 10 years legacy 20 years mercury super mega
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        March 7, 2012 5:10 PM

        Where do I preorder?

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        March 7, 2012 5:54 PM

        im the most negative man that you will never meet but even i was hooked if im honest.

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      March 7, 2012 5:21 PM

      Whoever did the acting for the robot was very good; the guy was not so good; and the writing helped neither. I love new engine tech, but really wish game companies would spend a little money improving their writing.

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        March 7, 2012 5:43 PM

        Heavy Rain had similar problems. In the case of one of the main characters in that game, it was voiced by someone for whom American english is not their native language, but he was supposed to sound like a guy from New York and it was laughable.

        Hopefully whoever funds their next game throws in a few extra bucks to get Nolan North or someone with some actual talent to read their dialogue (and improv out the shitty French to English translations)

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        March 7, 2012 5:53 PM

        it's just a tech demo

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          March 7, 2012 6:08 PM

          Yeah but the writing in the rest of their work isn't any better.

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        March 7, 2012 5:55 PM

        Quantic Dream's storytelling is considered by many to be some of the best in the industry.


        *heavy sigh*

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      March 7, 2012 5:25 PM

      Nicely done. I like that they made it into a short film more than a tech demo.

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      March 7, 2012 5:48 PM

      Well, that was the coolest thing I've ever seen.

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      March 7, 2012 5:53 PM

      Holy shit, I almost got tears in my eyes.

      I'm always excited to see what these guys will come up with next.

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      March 7, 2012 5:57 PM

      Holy fucking shit.

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      March 7, 2012 6:07 PM

      omg, while the lip syncing is uncannily 'off', it's still fucking amazing, considering it's real time on 7 year old hardware.

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      March 7, 2012 6:12 PM

      that looked really dumb and cheesy imho

      but to be fair who fucking knows what the game is gonna be like.

      JASON!!

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      March 7, 2012 6:16 PM

      I dont care about the graphics, heavy rain devs.... next time just try to make a game without gaping plotholes that decimate an otherwise awesome experience.

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        March 8, 2012 11:03 AM

        1 in 10 gamers agree with the plotholes.

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      March 7, 2012 6:27 PM

      The big thing seems to be the eyes. They seem way more life like and like they have a soul. Everything eelse is completely wtf though and same old shit.

      Overall it's not that impressive considering Quantic Dream showed this to demo PS3 tech prior to launch.

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8-mPgALl74

      New consoles need to come out already.

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      March 7, 2012 6:34 PM

      Beautiful writing. Visuals and animation were gorgeous. I would love to see a return of adventure games with production quality like this.

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        March 7, 2012 10:55 PM

        Fable games were good. This is beautiful writing. Vegas 2 sucked.

        Hmmm...

        I am suspicious of your opinions now, Dr_Cube.

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          March 7, 2012 10:56 PM

          if this is beautiful, id hate to see what he considers ugly writing!!! LOL

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        March 8, 2012 5:34 AM

        Writing was pretty bad, everything else was great.

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          March 8, 2012 5:38 AM

          [deleted]

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            March 8, 2012 7:30 AM

            Short stories need to be tight, much tighter than a novel or a similar longer format. There is no room for sloppiness - you don't have the extra length that comes with a novel/similar long format medium in which to smooth out inconsistencies.

            The basic concept for this vid is pretty cliche, although executed well. It'd be nice to see some true originality from this medium for once.

            Other than that, the writing/acting of the QC dude was pretty bad, although it's a tech demo so I can forgive it (especially in light of the decently inspired performance from Kara).

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            March 8, 2012 8:29 AM

            this is a haiku
            like, maybe anyway
            I didnt check lol

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            March 8, 2012 8:57 AM

            Everyone notices dialogue that doesn't click with them. It's got nothing to do with being distanced or critical. Anyway, why would bad dialogue be less noticeable (or for that matter less open to criticism) just because of the length of the piece?

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          March 8, 2012 9:17 AM

          I felt the writing was... "OK" until she said "I'm scared"... they needed something else in there to fill the space between that and her getting off the platform... he should have said something. Actually... for the most part the writing and acting for her was pretty good.. but both were pretty bad for the guy.

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      March 7, 2012 6:53 PM

      creepy man-sized hands - would not hit

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      March 7, 2012 10:46 PM

      If this was realtime on a PS3 (which is actually really surprising to me), then imagine what a modern PC can achieve. Makes me sad that deveopers aren't taking advantage of the PC's capabilities. Even PC exclusive games don't look that good compared to PS3 exclusives. Seriously WTF?

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      March 7, 2012 11:21 PM

      Alright I'm just going to say it. Would you hit that? Because I mean, I totally would. About 4 times a day.

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      March 7, 2012 11:39 PM

      Replicant !!!

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      March 7, 2012 11:58 PM

      I'll be that guy. Cheesy over the top emotional garbage. If you loved The Notebook and enjoy long walks on the beach, this just might be for you.

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      March 8, 2012 12:10 AM

      While you can definitely see the age of the hardware in terms of sheer graphic fidelity, the facial animation was remarkably impressive. Plus, they managed to pack quite an emotional punch into a tech demo!

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      March 8, 2012 12:25 AM

      Very impressive work.

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      March 8, 2012 12:47 AM

      Very cheesy, but very impressive too. You notice the lack of sub-surface scattering in the skin :( and the model deformation is a bit rubbery. And the shadows are too hard. And the elbows!! So pointy.

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      March 8, 2012 4:23 AM

      Hopefully the gameplay is more than just quicktime events this time. Just sayin'.

      Even though I sort of like old school Adventure games, I found the gameplay in both Indigo Prophecy and Heavy Rain tedious, annoying, and there's actually much less meaningful choice than it seems.

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      March 8, 2012 4:49 AM

      I'd buy that. I WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENS.

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      March 8, 2012 5:32 AM

      Eyes, mouth and facial expressions are really great, but other subtle things like nostril and nose movement or slight adjustment of the ears and skin perfusion still are missing.

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      March 8, 2012 6:58 AM

      Pretty damn good running on old tech. Kind of exciting what the upper limits of the next gen will look like.

    • gmd legacy 10 years legacy 20 years mercury mega
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      March 8, 2012 7:01 AM

      There are some god damn sperglords up in here good grief. Ummmm heh the graphics were ok but her skin lacks multifractured subparticle noise scattering, and the writing was no where near Shakespearean enough.

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        March 8, 2012 7:07 AM

        If it was a PC only project you'd hear jizzing and "Pfft these old consoles can't do that!! Upgrading my graphics card now"

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        March 8, 2012 7:41 AM

        The only thing many are able to compare it with is a human being, which is a compliment in itself. Of course there still are many nuances that keep it in the uncanny valley, but its getting closer to the ridge.

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        March 8, 2012 8:00 AM

        It's an excellent showcase of 6 year old tech.

        Can you imagine where this would be if the industry used a high end PC as the base standard?

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      March 8, 2012 8:06 AM

      Facial animation was bad.

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        March 8, 2012 8:24 AM

        The facial animation was excellent. Especially for the state of the industry.

        Have you played through DX:HR or Skyrim?

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        March 8, 2012 8:57 AM

        Compared to what?

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        March 8, 2012 9:20 AM

        ...WHAT?! Of all the things to say about this video... that is one area I would not expect somebody to complain about. The facial animation was the strongest part I thought.

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          March 8, 2012 1:14 PM

          Some impressive lighting effects on her body was the strongest part to me.

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        March 8, 2012 5:23 PM

        What would you point to for a good facial animation videogame?

        What makes this bad? What games would you rank above it? What are a few that you would say have had a better development into facial recognition/tracking?

        I honestly don't see how you can say it's 'bad'.

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      March 8, 2012 8:06 AM

      I can't wait until we run into issues like this. I always dreamed as a child that when I was an adult I would have a cybernetic companion. :(

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      March 8, 2012 9:12 AM

      I must be getting old, i'm not impressed by this type of shit any more.

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      March 8, 2012 10:18 AM

      Fantastic. I really can't wait for their next project, which apparently, will be before this one.

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      March 8, 2012 2:11 PM

      That would make for a solid intro to a potentially solid movie/story.^^

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      March 8, 2012 4:33 PM

      Emotion Engine v3.0: INITIALIZED

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      March 11, 2012 2:11 PM

      It is a lot easier running a standard animation script than in game animation. Still, I would like to see the latest software build optimized to be running on high end gaming PC with SLI or Crossfire.

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