BAF Game

This year I only attended a few talks at BAF Game, ones that would be of most relevance towards my dissertation. The one that I really enjoyed the most was a talk from Warren Spector who designed Epic Mickey. It was great to see game animation that embodied some of the 12 principles of animation and had that appeal that you wouldn't necessarily get from other games. Mickey Mouse is such an iconic character and because of this the animation and style had to be recognisable to his original form. Luckily Mickey is a very adaptable character, over the years he has had many different design iterations, for a game though he had to come across as a 'hero'. The team had to make Mickey look like a hero but also have his original appeal.

The animators did a great job with all of the animations. They used old Mickey cartoons as reference in order to get his movements correct, they did these so well that when composited in the original scene, people couldn't tell that it was 3D. I was immediately drawn to the animation when Warren showed us at BAF, I went and bought the 2nd one for myself and the animation really impressed me. Because of it being a game, the animations have to seamlessly intertwine with one another. When a player wants to change actions, the movements have to change at any point and without being noticeable. Game like Epic Mickey make game animation more appealing for myself, right now I'm looking at feature film animation or commercials. Unless it's cinematics I find game animation somewhat repetitive , yet with Epic Mickey it feels more refreshing and exciting. It's combining the exaggeration of animated characters into game format.