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Author: Lauren Brady

The rise of auto chess games: who will win the autobattler war?

The wider gaming scene is always defined by its biggest trend. There tends to be one huge, genre-defining game that others dream of being as successful as. First-person shooters were popularised by Call of Duty, MOBAs by League of Legends, and battle royales by Fortnite.

This year has seen the rise of a whole new genre – the ‘autobattler’. What began with Dota 2 mod ‘Dota Auto Chess’ has now spawned multiple competitors all vying to be the dominant game in this new genre. But where did they come from? Where are they heading? And how might they become king? 

 

The opening gambit

If you’re wondering where the terms ‘autobattler’ and ‘auto chess’ suddenly appeared from, you’re not the only one. It’s a relatively new concept that became popular as a custom game type on Dota 2. It combines the characters of Dota and the layout of chess with a dash of mahjong to create a game that was like no other. First making its appearance in January this year, and created by Chinese developer Drodo Studio, it has lit the fuse to a whole new genre of strategic games.

The only fly in the ointment was that Dota is a Valve IP. After discussions with Drodo Studio, the two companies amicably decided to head their own ways. Valve spun the idea into Dota Underlords, while Drodo Studio began work on a separate, fully-fledged game simply called Auto Chess that they hope will not only conquer China but the entire world. And so the autobattler was born. Riot Games is now the latest to join by creating a spin-off of League of Legends entitled Teamfight Tactics.

 

The current state of play

Dota Underlords, Auto Chess, and Teamfight Tactics are the current three big players on the scene, each vying to take the crown of the king of the autobattlers. Dota Underlords has the advantage of having the character set-up people are most familiar with. Auto Chess is the progenitor; the original idea that people love so much. And Teamfight Tactics can capitalise on the enormous player base of League of Legends. In fact, to increase uptake, the game is accessible within the League of Legends client.

The next phase of autobattler games will be securing the player base across platforms. While it began on PC, the genre is aiming to attract the lucrative mobile crowd. Both Auto Chess and Dota Underlords have mobile versions of their game and, in the case of Dota Underlords, the PC version is based on the mobile iteration (for now). There will no doubt be more autobattler games that come along, but what will decide which one comes out on top?

 

Standing out from the crowd

It makes sense that the one eventually crowned as king of the genre will be the one that can attract the greatest community. Naturally, they all have their own in-built communities, but what will attract newcomers? While word of mouth has achieved a lot so far, there has been little in the way of marketing. While this is understandable, given they are all in the early stages of development, it makes sense that they would benefit from cinematic trailers to bring the crowds in. 

The challenge will be taking the relatively dry, top-down view of the autobattler games and turning that into a stunning trailer. It will need to sell the action that is otherwise left to your imagination. It will need to weave a story that plays out in short-form. And, in the case of Dota Underlords and Teamfight Tactics, it needs to show the pre-existing communities that this is an exciting addition to the lore that justifies the hours already spent in the game. Auto Chess has an uphill battle in that regard, so will need a strong theme to attract people’s attention.

This is especially true in the mobile landscape. The competition in this space isn’t just other autobattlers, but all of mobile gaming. How will you differentiate amongst the match three games and the battle royales?

Most of all, it needs to show people this is a community worth joining. At this early stage, any of these games could fade into irrelevance. A new competitor can appear at any moment to claim the crown as its own. If they want to be the best, they need a trailer that unashamedly says “we are the best”.Given the success they are enjoying in such a short period, we think the autobattler genre is here to stay and hasn’t even begun to peak. The autobattler war is about to heat up: are you ready for it?

At REALTIME, we can craft a trailer that amazes audiences and draws in new players. We’ve worked with many free-to-play games, such as Smite and CrossFire, so we’re well-equipped to handle whatever your request may be. If you would like to know more, get in touch with me at [email protected].

Game trailers done right

Game trailers done right: analysing some of E3 2019’s biggest trailers

Now the dust has settled and the post-show high has dissipated, we can look at this year’s E3 showcase with fresh eyes. It was the usual mix of the good, interesting, and the where-did-that-come-from. This year had an odd air about it though, with everyone waiting for the next generation of consoles. Without them, the show somehow felt incomplete – a situation compounded by the fact Sony decided to skip the show altogether. 

What we ended up with was an unusually high slew of quality trailers for games that may well serve as this generation’s swan songs. With the majority of them for games that won’t see the light of day before next year at the earliest, the trailers served to show their importance as a major marketing beat in bringing a new game to market.

There were some VERY impressive trailers for sure – some for IPs we’re already familiar with and some new ones too. Regardless of how fresh the game idea might be, you only get one chance to impress – a mantra we continually remind ourselves of during any production. So how did this year’s crop of trailers fare?

 

The good

A great trailer not only needs to have stunning visuals; it also needs to tell a great story. And we saw some fantastic examples this year!

The latest expansion for The Elder Scrolls Online, Elsweyr, was marked by an impressive trailer that hugely impressed its fans. Fan reactions were overwhelmingly generous to this resplendent CG trailer which told a complete story in four-and-a-half minutes. It did a great job of showcasing the upcoming Necromancer class, expertly blending cinematic brilliance and actual gameplay elements. People loved it. Some people really loved it.

 

The bad

So you have the visuals and you have the story-telling. Great!. But is it interesting? Remember the mantra – ‘you only have one chance to impress’. 

For some, the much-anticipated Crystal Dynamics Marvel’s Avengers failed to deliver. Despite having a massive IP, the trailer left many of its fans underwhelmed, with the design of the characters coming in for particularly harsh criticism. For many, the game felt confusing and unappealing. Yet behind-closed-doors, impressions were nothing but glowing. Crystal Dynamics has since hinted they are going to address much of the criticism before the game’s eventual release.

 

It goes to show how putting a trailer together is important. You can have all the right elements (a great IP) but get the detail wrong (unappealing character design) and you’re in danger of alienating your audience. A successful trailer will give the audience what they want – extolling the virtues of the brand with great story-telling that will appeal directly to its community. Perhaps a good example of this is the CrossfireX trailer. Although a relatively unknown brand here in the West, it’s one that has taken the East by storm. This visceral trailer did an incredible job at planting its flag in the West and letting everyone know it’s here. Those in the know are excited and those who aren’t are certainly intrigued.

 

The breathtaking

Cyberpunk 2077 deservedly stole this year’s show with its incredible trailer. Despite being announced over seven years ago, the hype took it to new heights, pushing its fans to a new level of frenzy with the revelation that Keanu Reeves would feature amongst its cast. 

This E3 was another showcase of examples of why trailers matter. A game’s pre-release hype can live and die on its trailer. Which examples will we still be talking about at the end of the year? Creating a trailer is as much an art as the game itself is – one that needs as much specialism and creative vision as the game itself.

 

At RealtimeUK, we understand the nuance of creating a trailer. Our work has even reached the E3 main stage. Put your trust in a company that knows how to create compelling content. To talk about your upcoming project, get in touch with me at [email protected].

How to: Exploding zombies and flame throwers!

Graham Collier and Adrian Vickers give us a little rundown of what went into making the Zombie Army 4 trailer including the use of Houdini’s Finite Element Methods.

Graham Collier: My favourite part of the day: exploding zombies in Houdini 😀

On previous trailers I used Houdini’s Finite Element Methods (FEM) to fracture and create soft body simulations of exploding chunks of flesh.

This time I wanted to test the new Vellum tools in Houdini 17.5 especially the Vellum Tetrahedral Fiber Constraints. After a few tests I found that I could get similar results as FEM but with much faster simulation times. This was really useful as we had multiple zombie meshes to simulate and we needed to create fast iterations.

To control the fracturing of the Vellum soft bodies I had to set up groups containing areas of impact and impact velocities. I used these groups to add Pin to Target constraints to constrain the mesh to the incoming animation. Within the DOP simulation I then used Vellum Constraint Properties to remove the Pin constraints on the impact frames. I also used Geometry Wrangle nodes to adjust Break Thresholds and add in the Custom Velocities. This enabled me to direct several impacts on the zombies and gave me enough control with the fracturing. The simulation was very fast which enabled me to create several iterations before I was happy with the result.

Previously I used Houdini POP networks for blood simulations, but this time we wanted to go further with Fluid Implicit Particles(FLIP). These fluid simulations were emitted from the internal fractured surfaces. I used a Sign Distance Field (SDF) with a small offset to check if the internal surface was enclosed or open. If open I then scattered points onto the surface and set velocities based on the Normal’s and movement. This data was then used as a FLIP source. The fluid simulation itself made use of Viscosity, Collision Velocity Blending and Surface Tension which all really helped control the flow of the blood.

Finally these simulations were all exported as Alembic caches and rendered in 3DS-Max with VRay.

Houdini users can download this cut down Vellum setup showing a single impact simulation using Tetrahedral Fiber Constraints.

Adrian Vickers: First I exported the character using alembic from 3ds Max, also exporting the camera and any collision geometry I might need.

To start I created a point at the end of the flamethrower nozzle with a normal vector in the direction of spray and also an up vector, this enabled me to copy a remeshed polygon circle, with a rest attribute, onto this point. Custom velocity and density attributes were then created with various controls, enabling me to adjust spread, inner and outer flow, randomized scale and overall strength, plus move the emitter geometry further in or out from the nozzle.

This went into a fairly straight forward popnet, using gravity, collision geometry and various pop forces, scaling the turbulent forces by the points age. These pop points were then seperated into 2 streams in sops, flamethrower spray and collided points. I was then able to create fuel, temperature, velocity and pscale attributes based on there normalized age, giving me more control of each effect. These points then got fed directly into a dopnet for the fire and smoke sim.

The pyro sim then used various gas micro solvers to shape the flamethrower effect, several gas particle to field, gas disturbance based on velocity, gas shred and gas vortex confinement among them.

This was then exported from Houdini as vdb’s and rendered in 3ds Max with Vray using a volume grid, but my initial tests were rendered in Mantra.

Goodwood Festival of Speed 2019

The 26th edition of the ever-growing Goodwood Festival of Speed closed on Sunday after another four days of West Sussex’s answer to ‘What happens when you cross a global motor show with a quintessentially British garden party?’

Apologies to those who were only present on the Sunday, my visit completely avoided the rain and I’m pleased to be boasting the bronzed extremities to prove it!

This year saw centre stage occupied by Aston Martin, to mark 70 years at the festival. A simple but beautiful central sculpture was supported each day with a short musical and automotive showcase, taking in fireworks, Land of Hope and Glory and, of course a certain James Bond.

For me though, the manufacturers’ stands are the main draw and first mention has to go to the fine men and women of Potash Lane, Hethel. Lotus Cars of course and they were signalling their serious ambition with a thumping, green-and-yellow-tastic stand, showing the full range of current production cars and the obligatory historic F1 car. Not just any F1 car this time around though; this year’s display included the very special Lotus Type 25 – the fabled 25/R6 – the actual car in which Jim Clark set the best ever time of 1:20.4 for a lap of the Goodwood circuit, all the way back in in 1965. Still unbeaten! A very pleasant surprise for a very lucky few was a behind-closed-doors preview of the Type 130 EV Hypercar, the Evija. Give me a call and I’ll take you through the correct pronunciation…

From there is was off to Jaguar Land Rover, a stand resonating to the screech of expensive rubber as visitors are given the opportunity to observe the local flora and fauna at close quarters through the side windows of a fleet of oversteering F-Types. For me though, the highlight of the stand was just set apart from it, as it happens, with Land Rover teasing a camouflaged brand new 110” wheelbase Defender, just in advance of its planned launch in the autumn. An equally-disguised 90 also ran up the hill. Still a British icon, even if manufacture is planned for Slovakia? The debate rages on!

Over to the other side of the bridge to catch up with the latest news from everyone’s favourite orange-coloured supercar brand, McLaren. I think they really get it right, bringing the best of their offering to the fans at the show as well as the VIP owners. This was epitomised by the placing of the genuinely beautiful Speedtail front and centre in the public area of the stand, making for perhaps a once-in-a-lifetime personal viewing for so many. Why is it that so many other new cars are just not particularly beautiful these days?

Famous Italian brand De Tomaso took the opportunity to debut its brand new P72, an homage to the 1965 P70 prototype racer brought bang up to date. Absolutely one of the stars of the show and that was before we were all able to experience it firing up and going up the hill!

There was just enough time to catch the Lamborghini stand, very cleverly positioned right in the very middle of all the action. The company is currently riding on the crest of a wave with the new Huracan EVO, the evergreen Aventador and now the Urus, which has effectively doubled the company’s sales, all on display. Any self-respecting Lambo owner has to these days also give garage space over to the official Lamborghini massage chair, ‘road’ tested by yours truly and available in colours to match your latest four-wheeled Italian thoroughbread!

See you all next year!

 

Paul

[email protected]

 

 

Say hello to Joe!

We love to give you an insight into who we are at REALTIME and we are our people, so say hello to our new Lighting Artist Joe!

 

Tell me a little bit about yourself?

My name is Joe Worthington, I’m 31 and from Manchester. I studied Computer Visualisation and Animation at Bournemouth University which landed me an exciting post-graduate job at my local Tesco! I then moved to London and got my foot in the door of the VFX industry as render support. Through this I was fortunate enough to be moved into lighting where I worked on several exciting (and some less exciting) blockbusters. After seven and a bit years working in the south I felt the pull of home and moved back up north, eventually leading me to RealtimeUK!

 

What’s your role at REALTIME?

My primary role here will be CG lighting and look-dev but I’ll also be handling compositing duties.

 

What first sparked your interest in 3D Art?

I’d love to say I had a revelatory experience during a classic film at a young age and this has been my dream ever since, but it was nothing that poetic. I come from a fine art background but I also enjoyed coding, this in conjunction with a love of film led me down the path to 3D art. While it may have been a decision decided with logic I couldn’t be happier with the choice I made. I love working in this industry and am passionate about the work I create.

 

So, what does an average day consist of for you?

A lighters first job in the morning is to check the farm and see how their overnight renders fared, investigate errored frames, resubmit where needed and generally assess render times. I’ll then quickly comp up anything which is ready so it can be reviewed in dailies. Tasks throughout the day will generally be a balancing act of shot lighting, asset lookdev and compositing. Late afternoon is the time to make sure renders are prepared to run overnight, ensuring I’m pulling together all the latest and greatest assets passed on by other artists.

Oh and lots of cups of tea, especially in the morning, I need a strong brew to wake me up.

 

What’s the best thing about working here?

So far the best thing at RealtimeUK has been the people, they’re an exceptionally talented bunch. I’m always looking to improve and learn so I’m excited to work as part of a team which will push me to be a better artist.

 

Are there any upcoming things in the industry that you think people need to keep an eye out for?

AI learning is a growing area for the industry, while its only had specific applications thus far like facial capture, I hear it’s also being looked into as a means of denoising ray-traced renders. It will be very interesting to see where else in the pipeline it can be incorporated. In terms of lighting and rendering, game engines are producing images of increasingly impressive fidelity and with NVIDIA making a push for ray traced graphics on the GPU I’m curious to see how, if at all, this will affect the industry.

 

Tell me a fun fact about yourself?

I once survived having a pub fall on me. Made the news.