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[8BiTw0LF]

In this 2022 Visual Effects Summit session, Housemarque & Playstation Studios’ Risto Jankkila and Sharman Jagadeesan discuss how Housemarque used their programmable particle system to create key vfx features in Returnal. Covering aspects such as volumetric fog driven by real-time fluid simulations and usage of particle hierarchies for character effects such as tentacles.

 

[tommib]

Thanks, man. Can never get enough of my game of the generation until Housemarque’s next game.

Hilarious to hear that dev talking about the sphere that’s running all those fluid simulations and how frustrated he gets by not seeing players shoot at it. I always did! So rewarding to see all that goo move smoothly, pushing the hardware.

Returnal’s tech still unmatched for me this generation.

 

[Bartski]

Nice one, in the queue!

I wonder what's their process in choosing which stuff to post on youtube. There are so many amazing talks I'm hearing of on Twitter, year after a year locked in the GDC premium vault.

I'm not a dev, I'd love to have an account there but it's 600 bucks a year...

 

[Black_Stride]

Nice one, in the queue!

I wonder what's their process in choosing which stuff to post on youtube. There are so many amazing talks I'm hearing of on Twitter, year after a year locked in the GDC premium vault.

I'm not a dev, I'd love to have an account there but it's 600 bucks a year...

I believe devs themselves actually ask before time that they want their videos out of the vault at some point.
Its always good for the person giving the talk to have a video they can reference for their portfolio without requiring people to be members of GDC.

You should also check on vimeo sometimes devs "accidentally" post their own talks there before they are out of the vault.
Just lookup whatever talk you are looking for and/or the person giving the talk, they will likely have a link to it on their portfolio or artstation.

 

[tommib]

Didn’t know where to share, but I finally got my vinyl copy:

 

[CamHostage]

Game is so rad, I really appreciate Housemarque and like that people are coming back around to its wow-factors after kind of writing it off as "not next-gen enough" in some impressions.

One thing I do wish they could do or improve in the future is have more persistent chunks in its destruction system. When objects get cut down to rubble, the fragments bounce around and then disappear. Would love it if they could keep a greater percentage of rubble persistent longer (even if its collision turned off and the pieces cannot be shot or kicked once they land) in future versions of their tech. Accrued destruction really adds to the feel of the mayhem.

 

[Skifi28]

I thought this was about VFX Veteran for a second there. Don't scare me like that again.

 

[Ezekiel_]

I don't get why, as a developer or business owner, you would put this info out there.

Unless you're making your engine and techniques open-source, just keep those secrets to yourselves.

Let other developers try to figure out how to do things.

 

[Black_Stride]

I don't get why, as a developer or business owner, you would put this info out there.

Unless you're making your engine and techniques open-source, just keep those secrets to yourselves.

Let other developers try to figure out how to do things.

Remember developers move between companies and are constantly looking for new talent.
If im an expert at particle systems im much more likely to approach Housemarque knowing that they use particle systems for so much.

GDC is a place for collaboration and showing off basically.

 

[nowhat]

I don't get why, as a developer or business owner, you would put this info out there.

Unless you're making your engine and techniques open-source, just keep those secrets to yourselves.

Let other developers try to figure out how to do things.

The first (and thus far only as far as I can tell) GDC talk on motion matching was by an Ubisoft employee. And apart from For Honor, Ubi has done very little with it. However, Naughty Dog absolutely nailed the tech with TLoU part 2 (and later, part 1).

It's not the suits giving the talks, it's people who love making games and want to share their passion. And it's not like they're giving out actual code, just general principles on how to solve a particular problem. I think it's all for the better, both for corporations and consumers alike.