COD Now Officially Stands for Copy of Duty: Ghosts Rips Cutscene from MW2 Nearly 1:1 - aka worse gam - Polidicks

I don't see the big deal, it's 20 seconds of the same animation, so what. This just seems like the same COD circlejerk that always happens here.

[QUOTE=Coyoteze;42781162]It [I]isn't[/I] a minor scene. A "[I]minor scene[/I]" would be if a character was standing in the distance doing a waving motion followed by a jump off a cliff or something. This is HUGE. It's not just a viewmodel reuse, it's not just a few seconds of one characters arm-movement, it's an entire fucking scene being reused. And who cares? Isn't this thread a testament to who cares? The people commenting in the video in the OP? The news journalists reporting it? I think that pretty much screams that EVERYONE cares. And it's something a game developer (especially a BIG one) should realize! And I mentioned the models because you made it a big deal that the models had to be made when in reality while that IS the biggest part of the work, it's got no impact on the animations - so it's a null argument.[/QUOTE] You said there's a massive difference from redrawing a scene over another animation to just applying skeletal animations to a rig and putting it in the scene. How is that any different from taking an older animation and modeling a new scene around it? Sure with today's technology it's easier but it's the same [I]principle[/I]. In each case you have a basic animation of a scene that is being copied, yet the bulk of the work (in Disney's case, drawing, in COD's case, sculpting, modeling, texturing, UV mapping, and rigging) still needs to be done over the original animation. In each case you have an animation that serves as a back-bone for the scene, and everything else that makes up the bulk of the work being made around it. Companies have been doing this for years and will continue to do this whether you think it's lazy or not. The only reason anyone's pitching a shit is because it's Call of Duty and making fun of Call of Duty is the "in" thing right now. Just look at Resident Evil 5. Playing through that game felt like they had just taken RE4 and plastered new models and textures on it. The similarities were blatantly obvious yet no one said a word about it.

[QUOTE=mugofdoom;42781290]You said there's a massive difference from redrawing a scene over another animation to just applying skeletal animations to a rig and putting it in the scene. How is that any different from taking an older animation and modeling a new scene around it? Sure with today's technology it's easier but it's the same [I]principle[/I]. In each case you have a basic animation of a scene that is being copied, yet the bulk of the work (in Disney's case, drawing, in COD's case, sculpting, modeling, texturing, UV mapping, and rigging) still needs to be done over the original animation. The only reason anyone's pitching a shit is because it's Call of Duty and making fun of Call of Duty is the "in" thing right now. Just look at Resident Evil 5. Playing through that game felt like they had just taken RE4 and plastered new models and textures on it. The similarities were blatantly obvious yet no one said a word about it.[/QUOTE] The principle isn't the same when the effort and time it takes is different. Is that such a hard concept to grasp? And you can't compare redrawing every frame of an animation to a mocap scene. Yes, there's the modelling, UV-mapping, texture etc etc - but generally (like I said) once the model is done, it's done. It's able to be used in any way the animators want it to be used, in a quick and easy way. The models were already done, and remaking the scene to not look like such a carbon copy would be no effort at all (like Dai said, especially early in production stages). And no, I actually like the COD games. They're good time-killers. I'm not ripping on it as an entirety, but I am ripping on this scene, and this travesty in general. Re-using animations in any case where it's easy to avoid is unforgivable, no matter the area it's happening in.

[QUOTE=Coyoteze;42781373]The principle isn't the same when the effort and time it takes is different. Is that such a hard concept to grasp? And you can't compare redrawing every frame of an animation to a mocap scene. Yes, there's the modelling, UV-mapping, texture etc etc - but generally (like I said) once the model is done, it's done. It's able to be used in any way the animators want it to be used, in a quick and easy way. The models were already done, and remaking the scene to not look like such a carbon copy would be no effort at all (like Dai said, especially early in production stages). And no, I actually like the COD games. They're good time-killers. I'm not ripping on it as an entirety, but I am ripping on this scene, and this travesty in general. Re-using animations in any case where it's easy to avoid is unforgivable, no matter the area it's happening in.[/QUOTE] Whatever, dude, this is just going in circles. Agree to disagree?

[QUOTE=mugofdoom;42781290] How is that any different from taking an older animation and modeling a new scene around it? Sure with today's technology it's easier but it's the same [I]principle[/I]. In each case you have a basic animation of a scene that is being copied, yet the bulk of the work (in Disney's case, drawing, in COD's case, sculpting, modeling, texturing, UV mapping, and rigging) still needs to be done over the original animation. In each case you have an animation that serves as a back-bone for the scene, and everything else that makes up the bulk of the work being made around it.[/QUOTE]When a scene is done in a video game, it is comprised of multiple finished resources that can from that point on be individually stored for future use. The textures, uv maps, rigs, and models were created once and can be re-used infinitely with little fuss. When Disney turned a dancing ___ into a dancing ____, people sat down and manually altered every frame in the animation (or went back to the original footage they rotoscoped from and made another set from it). Their "resource" was a base humanoid body that they will have to add everything to, from scratch, repeatedly and 12-24 times per second of animation. When a game developer changes ____ and ____ dragging _____ into _____ and _____ dragging ____, They just had to remove the resources of the original _____ and slot in the new _____ resources. Their resources are the base humanoid bodies, how those bodies move, and all of the model/texture/uv data already created for those characters from all previous scenes. They do not have to remake the textures, UV, or models 24 times per second. Unless this is among the very first scenes put together for the project, all of those resources were completed ages ago and adding them to this scene is essentially drag n' drop.

[QUOTE=nnoah95;42781251]I don't see the big deal, it's 20 seconds of the same animation, so what. This just seems like the same COD circlejerk that always happens here.[/QUOTE] The big deal is that Call of Duty is probably the best known videogame globally (excluding stuff like Mario and Tetris that has been ingrained into pop culture), they have ridiculous budgets, many teams of people, and brand recognition up the ass, yet they continue to cut corners like this everywhere to maximize the money they will get so they can create Call of Duty MW4 in November of next year, probably within the same week Ghosts came out. I don't even believe theres a real hate circlejerk anymore. It's more of a...disbelief that they can still get away with this.

you really have to wonder why they would even bother cutting corners on what's essentially a day's work for a small group of people they wouldn't save anything in any noticeable amount so why bother?

[QUOTE=Pennywise;42781606]When a scene is done in a video game, it is comprised of multiple finished resources that can from that point on be individually stored for future use. The textures, uv maps, rigs, and models were created once and can be re-used infinitely with little fuss. When Disney turned a dancing ___ into a dancing ____, people sat down and manually altered every frame in the animation (or went back to the original footage they rotoscoped from and made another set from it). Their "resource" was a base humanoid body that they will have to add everything to, from scratch, repeatedly and 12-24 times per second of animation. When a game developer changes ____ and ____ dragging _____ into _____ and _____ dragging ____, They just had to remove the resources of the original _____ and slot in the new _____ resources. Their resources are the base humanoid bodies, how those bodies move, and all of the model/texture/uv data already created for those characters from all previous scenes. They do not have to remake the textures, UV, or models 24 times per second. Unless this is among the very first scenes put together for the project, all of those resources were completed ages ago and adding them to this scene is essentially drag n' drop.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE=mugofdoom;42781026]I said it was the same principle, not the exact same thing. It all comes down to big companies not wanting to spend the money on doing the exact same shit twice. Cutting corners is a big thing in the entertainment industry and apparently you know that.[/QUOTE] It is in that way that they are comparable, not in the difficulty required to complete each task.

[QUOTE=mugofdoom;42781934]It is in that way that they are comparable, not in the difficulty required to complete each task.[/QUOTE]In the same way that a photo of a person's face and a photorealistic painting of the same person's face can be compared, yeah. They look the same, they have approaches and methods that may line up in some instances, but they are very different and have very different standards due to that. Disney was in a financial crisis and cut corners on things that could take months, while Ghosts is... well, [i]Ghosts[/i] and cut corners on something that would take a few hours. Alluding that it's perfectly fine for a 3d animator to cobble together scenes from 100% pre-existing material because a 2d animator utilizes rotoscoping is quite a reach.

Minor sequence animations that don't have much to do with the story, sure why not. But when it's the ending of the game, that's quite lazy, and don't give me that "company needs to save money" bullshit because this game had a huge budget.

As an animator, this is a bit lazy but at the same time, quite expected and rather frugal for them to do. And at, what, five or so seconds of what seems to be mocap derived footage, it certainly seems like people are just adding to the negative reviews, but for fairly small things like this. I don't understand why people are going so apeshit about this, though - they saw an opportunity to reuse the animation and they took it. Let's be honest, since the first CoD which of the following has been a common element in an animation? * Rappelling down a building * trying to catch up to your comrades, only to fall through the roof of a favela building/some sort of hut ment and make your own path to your crew? * Being in any sort of helicopter vehicle when it gets hit and you get to have first hand "fun" of watching it go down? * super stealth mode where you'll be doing as John Price, king of the sneaks, tells you? I would rather blame the writing in these cases than I would the animation because goddamn they re-use more "cinematic moments" in CoD than in any other game I've ever seen.

[QUOTE=Pennywise;42782048]Alluding that it's perfectly fine for a 3d animator to cobble together scenes from 100% pre-existing material because a 2d animator utilizes rotoscoping is quite a reach.[/QUOTE] The only thing that was "pre-existing" in that scene was 18 seconds of mo-cap data. Around and around we go, where does it stop? Nobody knows!

[QUOTE=mugofdoom;42782360]The only thing that was "pre-existing" in that scene was 18 seconds of mo-cap data.[/QUOTE] God [QUOTE=Coyoteze;42781373]Yes, there's the modelling, UV-mapping, texture etc etc - but generally (like I said) once the model is done, it's done. It's able to be used in any way the animators want it to be used, in a quick and easy way. The models were already done[/QUOTE] Damn it [QUOTE=Pennywise;42781606]Their resources are the base humanoid bodies, how those bodies move, and all of the model/texture/uv data already created for those characters from all previous scenes. They do not have to remake the textures, UV, or models 24 times per second. Unless this is among the very first scenes put together for the project, all of those resources were completed ages ago and adding them to this scene is essentially drag n' drop.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=Pennywise;42782451]God Damn it[/QUOTE] None of those are pre-existing though. Just because they don't have to be remade every frame doesn't make them pre-existing. Christ, I wasn't even arguing that it's okay because of rotoscoping. It's just an example of a company cutting corners to save time and money and a way of exemplifying the fact that this is very common in the entertainment industry and you guys are flipping out over nothing. It's a horrible fucking comparison anyway and I wasn't even the one who brought it up originally. A better example would be Resident Evil 5, the one I've been using in all my posts.

When a sequence from the very start of one artistic piece is shot-for-shot a recreation of the last sequence of an earlier piece in the same series I'm inclined to call it an intentional reference. The film industry does it all the time, just look at the number of scenes reused or copied almost line-for-line in the Sergio Leone Dollars trilogy.

[QUOTE=RenegadeCop;42780084]Disney actually had a financial problem though. Call of Duty team doesn't. If they did, the commercials wouldn't be real-live action explosions and Megan Fox. Also that movie was probably $5 to go see back then, in comparison to the $60 this game is.[/QUOTE] All of the money went to Megan Fox.

Why exactly is the "it's an intentional reference" thing so impossible?

[QUOTE=Mister B;42782582]Why exactly is the "it's an intentional reference" thing so impossible?[/QUOTE] Honestly I could see it being an intentional reference now that I think about it. The scene that it's copied from is a rather important scene in Modern Warfare 2, so it's possible.

[QUOTE=Mister B;42782582]Why exactly is the "it's an intentional reference" thing so impossible?[/QUOTE] Because if you're making a reference, you shouldn't be reusing the exact same animations. Set up a similar situation, sure, but straight-up reusing the animations right down to the camera movements? It's just lazy, and it's not really justified given the insane budget Call of Duty gets.

If the scene was referencing a much older CoD, sure it could be a nice homage, but I feel it's less justifiable when it's from the fourth installment prior to that in an annual series.

I don't get why everyone's like "OMG COD REUSING ASSETS SO HORRIBLE" I mean, it's not like Valve's been using the same assets since HL2 all the way to Episode 2 or anything, nor have almost every ending in the series [sp]involving a train.[/sp] [editline]6th November 2013[/editline] [QUOTE=Stinky;42783022]If the scene was referencing a much older CoD, sure it could be a nice homage, but I feel it's less justifiable when it's from the fourth installment prior to that in an annual series.[/QUOTE] It isn't the same series. It's "Ghosts," not Modern Warfare. Just strictly obvious laziness.

[QUOTE=mugofdoom;42782600]Honestly I could see it being an intentional reference now that I think about it. The scene that it's copied from is a rather important scene in Modern Warfare 2, so it's possible.[/QUOTE] or just you know fucking lazy work lol how the hell could that have been a reference at all yeah I bet all the other reused animations are "intentional references" as well is this serious [QUOTE=gk99;42783069]I don't get why everyone's like "OMG COD REUSING ASSETS SO HORRIBLE" I mean, it's not like Valve's been using the same assets since HL2 all the way to Episode 2 or anything, nor have almost every ending in the series [sp]involving a train.[/sp] [editline]6th November 2013[/editline] It isn't the same series. It's "Ghosts," not Modern Warfare. Just strictly obvious laziness.[/QUOTE] you do realize the episodes aren't full games right? they're basically DLC, or mini games, they were also not sold as an "entirely new" game for 60 dollars. that's a really shitty comparison really. hell, it's even in the name, "[B]EPISODE[/B]". So Dishonored's Duads DLC, Episodes from liberty city, and other things are now the same as CoD releasing an ENTIRELY "NEW" game with a ton of rehashing. ironically though mw2 felt like DLC of MW1 to me and I don't even see how that train comment makes any sense at all. I mean fuck, asset reuse isn't bad, but this is simply taking it way too far.

[QUOTE=Killuah;42780160]Thanks for spoiling the MW2 ending![/QUOTE] Nothing of value was lost though

[QUOTE=JeanLuc761;42782972]Because if you're making a reference, you shouldn't be reusing the exact same animations. Set up a similar situation, sure, but straight-up reusing the animations right down to the camera movements? It's just lazy, and it's not really justified given the insane budget Call of Duty gets.[/QUOTE] Well, if you'll notice, not everything's synced up.

[QUOTE=gk99;42783163]Well, if you'll notice, not everything's synced up.[/QUOTE] it's not 'perfect' but it's pretty much the same thing just repainted that's all Call of duty has been this whole time, a repaint of the last game.

[QUOTE=mugofdoom;42782503]None of those are pre-existing though. Just because they don't have to be remade every frame doesn't make them pre-existing.[/QUOTE] Wh- what Yes it does What the fuck are you talking about, do you actually know anything about skeletal-based 3D animation or are you just talking out of your ass at this point

[QUOTE=Coyoteze;42783324]Wh- what Yes it does What the fuck are you talking about, do you actually know anything about skeletal-based 3D animation or are you just talking out of your ass at this point[/QUOTE] he must be fucking with us lol

[QUOTE=Coyoteze;42783324]Wh- what Yes it does What the fuck are you talking about, do you actually know anything about skeletal-based 3D animation or are you just talking out of your ass at this point[/QUOTE] In theory if you have the following things: * a cleaned out mo-cap, retained from the raw workfiles (Maya Files, for example) made during the production of MW2 * a solid character referencing system(in built in most industry standard 3D software), that hinges on a rigging standard within the studio that has remained unchanged since MW2. It is actually very possible to swap out the characters from one scene to another and then spend one or two hours just fine tuning the small stuff (slight differences in proportions causing the contact points - hands and fingers - not meeting or intersecting) Not disputing your point, Coyoteze, but the workflow with software these days makes it "almost" pre-existing in terms of the minimal work required and program powered automation.

I don't see why this is a huge deal, a lot of developpers reuse assets from their previous games. It's certainly not as good as completely new animations but it's commonly used method. Also the cutscene is fairly generic and it's just about two guys giving you a lift. Although it's a bit cheap when you compare both but I wouldn't notice it otherwise. It just seems like people need to bash on Ghosts.

[QUOTE=junker154;42783445]I don't see why this is a huge deal, a lot of developpers reuse assets from their previous games. It's certainly not as good as completely new animations but it's commonly used method. Also the cutscene is fairly generic and it's just about two guys giving you a lift. Although it's a bit cheap when you compare both but I wouldn't notice it otherwise. It just seems like people need to bash on Ghosts.[/QUOTE] People wouldn't be so aggravated by this if this were a different franchise, and for good reason. When each Call of Duty makes upwards of a billion dollars every single year, cutting corners like this is almost insulting. It's not like they don't have the money or the resources, so this is really just lazy, and lazy gets harder and harder to swallow when they're still asking $60.