2024/09/06 21:28
This low-key Shanghai team is hidden behind "Black Myth" and Tencent NetEase
2024/09/06 21:28
Text: Yan Jinyan
In the two weeks since "Black Myth: Wukong" exploded, a large number of behind-the-scenes details have been exposed.
Among them, the topic of motion capture has attracted the attention of many players. The reason is also very simple, everyone is very curious, how the bosses who stumped stumped screws in the game, and the Mandate of Heaven who had good stick skills, were made, and motion capture is the most intuitive and easy-to-understand on-site restoration.
Game Science demonstrates motion capture in Voices
After seeing the comparison between motion capture and the finished game, many players are amazed by the motion capture technology of "Black Myth: Wukong", and think that its production accuracy seems to have made a great leap compared with most domestic works in the past. Many players also discussed the development of domestic motion capture technology under the topic.
And behind these discussions, Grape Jun also found the motion capture production company of "Black Myth: Wukong" - Shanghai Descending Network. In addition to "Black Myth: Wukong", they have participated in the production of many popular games, and have also cooperated with companies such as Tencent, NetEase, Shengqu, Paperstack, and Lilith.
Participated in the production of "Black Myth: Wukong".
After further understanding, Grape Jun found that Li Yangyi, the founder of Shanghai Descending, is actually a veteran of the game industry, who has worked in EA, Tencent and other companies, and has participated in the production of many 3A games.
Last week, I met with Li Yangyi and chatted with him about his involvement in the production of Black Myth: Wukong.
He mentioned that the success of game science is not accidental. In the process of cooperation, the team members of Youke are often at the mocap scene, guiding the actors to perform, and often replying to work information in the middle of the night, which is enough to show the team's efforts.
At the same time, he also said that Yuke is a group of people who deserve respect and are very humorous. Yang Qi had taken the initiative to propose to him before, hoping to put the Shanghai Birth in the staff list at the end of the film, but if the game was messed up in the end and met on the road, he would pretend not to know him.
Here's a summary of the conversation:
01
Grape King: When did you get into the games industry?
Li Yangyi: 2005. But I didn't come from a professional class, but I became a monk halfway.
Grape Jun: Halfway home? What else did you do before you started in the industry?
Li Yangyi: In the past, I was young and shallow, not good at studying, and had no skills. As an adult, I sold clothes to make a living, and I also thought about whether to open a rental business or work in a factory, but in the end, because I like games, I decided to fight hard to see if I can squeeze into the game industry.
At that time, it was reported in the news that there was a great demand for art talents in the game industry, so I signed up for a class and systematically studied game art. However, at that time, I learned a lot of things, and I felt that I still needed to practice to consolidate my skills, so I joined a small game company first.
After a year in a small company, I found that my ability was not much exercised compared to my friends who joined the industry at the same time, so I began to submit my resume to a large company. Later, I was fortunate enough to join Jiuyou, and entered a project to be a monster hunter like, during which time I gradually mastered some skills. Later, I moved to EA, where I worked my way up from basic animator to animation manager, managing teams and working with partners.
Mr. Grape: What projects have you been involved in during your time at EA?
Li Yangyi: At that time, EA China's positioning was a bit similar to insourcing. From 2010 to 2015, I participated in the animation production of each generation of "Battlefield" and "Madden NFL", as well as "Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Wars" and other products. In the process, I mainly learned the production process of triple-A games, and gained a certain understanding of the animation pipeline, including the mastery of motion capture, which was also the foundation laid at that time.
In 2015, when a major domestic company was rushing for talent, I joined Tencent to take charge of animation production for a project.
Grape Jun: It sounds like the whole career is relatively smooth, why do you want to start a business?
Li Yangyi: Two aspects. Number one, I don't like the same rhythm, and once things are stable and nothing develops or changes, I get a little worried, which is why I left EA. At that time, although EA's work pressure was not very high, and life could be regarded as stable, life was diligent, and I wanted to do something more.
Second, although entrepreneurship is fraught with risks, I believe that in the long run, it will allow me to achieve my dreams.
Grape Jun: What is the ideal?
Li Yangyi: I hope that in a well-known game, we can appear and leave a little footprint in the game industry.
Grape Jun: Did the process of starting a business go smoothly?
Li Yangyi: I have been preparing for entrepreneurship for a long time. During my tenure at EA, I worked as a trainer on weekends to discover talent and pave the way for starting a business and building a team. At the same time, I will take on some outsourcing in the evening, and through a number of jobs, I have saved the first pot of gold for entrepreneurship.
However, in the context of the time, leaving Tencent may not be the most rational choice. My friend and I started our business in 2016, and most of the start-up members of the team gave up offers from large manufacturers, but the company's profitability at that time was not particularly optimistic, and it could only be regarded as barely surviving. Compared with the previous salaries of large factories, there is still a certain gap.
Grape-kun: Were you already doing motion capture at the time?
Li Yangyi: In the early days of the world, it was still a traditional hand-made company, and compared with other companies of the same type in the industry, our competitiveness was slightly weaker. After all, the company is located in Shanghai, the operating cost is high, for customers, we do not have an advantage in cost performance.
Later, we observed that in addition to hand K animation, there is also a demand for mocap in the market, and there are very few specialized companies in this field. Basically, many companies that provide motion capture services only have equipment, and their post-production capabilities are relatively weak, so there will be a lack of process in this regard, and generally they will hand over the data after motion capture to the customer, and the customer will then find a suitable post-production company.
After discovering this, we went to talk about cooperation with the supplier who did motion capture, they took over the business, and we came to do the post-production, during which we participated in a number of projects, and slowly gained popularity, and the number of our team expanded to more than 20 people.
At the end of 2019, it coincided with Shengqu's intention to build a motion capture pipeline, and after exchanges, we received the first round of investment. In 2020, we purchased a batch of motion capture equipment, built our own motion capture studio, and took the first step in the whole process of 3D animation.
02
Grape: When did you establish a collaboration with Black Myth: Wukong?
Yangyi Lee: Long before Black Myth: Wukong, we had indirect contact with game science. At that time, they were still working on "Art of War: Red Tide", and wanted to find an outsourcer to undertake some hand-made K animation, but at that time, we were short of manpower, so we didn't cooperate.
In 2020, after the trailer for Black Myth: Wukong was released, I wanted to be involved in the development of this product no matter what. So, the team management and I took the works to Hangzhou to visit Youke, and Mr. Yang Qi personally received us. At that time, they had not yet entered the mass production stage, and in order to prove their ability to incarnate into the world, we also invited them to Shanghai for a field trip.
Later, Mr. Feng (CEO of Game Science Feng Ji) and Mr. Yang Qi came to Shanghai with the core members, we tested the data in the mocap field during the day, and talked about football and the European Cup together at night. Soon, we were able to work together.
In the 820 trailer in 2021,
Many of the characters' actions are made by the incarnation
Grape: How long did the whole mocap production last? How do you divide the work?
Yangyi Li: It's hard to calculate time accurately. From 2020 until June and July of this year, we have continued to produce and tune the package. Because the characters of "Black Myth: Wukong" are very accurate and the design is also very complex, it is not possible to produce all of them at once, so the animation is also produced with the characters.
In the early stages of the project, we were responsible for the mocap shooting and data patching. In the middle of the game, Yuke set up his own mocap studio in the office, hoping to iterate and experiment with ideas more quickly, such as animators who come up with ideas and test them out right away. So from then on, they started shooting their own and then sending us the captured mocap data for processing.
Youke used more than 10,000 parts
DIY has produced hundreds of thousands of professional results
Grape: Is the specific production process still smooth?
Li Yangyi: You Ke is very professional in motion capture production. In the early stage, they will try to find mocap actors who fit the role in casting. At the same time, they know very clearly what they want, as small as a turn of the character's head and eyes, all of which are confirmed in the early stage, which greatly improves the efficiency of post-production, we only need to do the processing of matching details, and do not need to add too many hands to break the original capture details.
During the filming process, Game Science's animators were also on set to guide the actors, tweaking the actors' emotions and movements. I remember that there was a scene where Wukong's fear was to be expressed, and the character had to climb backwards, which was personally guided by Mr. Yang Qi. At the scene, you can often see the teachers holding sticks and thinking about how to perform with the actors.
Moreover, Youke's pipeline process is also very mature. Although in terms of motion capture production, Mr. Yang Qi is the chief reviewer, but at the same time, they will also have many other animators involved, each of whom is in charge of different roles, docking and production, and the efficiency will be much higher, which is also in line with the production process of 3A games in the current mainstream market.
Grape: After the mocap data is collected, what specific repairs will you make?
Li Yangyi: The main thing is to polish the details and make the data meet the product-level standards. For example, sometimes when an actor is performing, in order to move smoothly, he will not really hold a very heavy Ruyi gold hoop stick or a nine-toothed nail rake to play, but the game needs to highlight the weight of the weapon, which needs to be dealt with.
For example, a real-life actor may not be able to do the fast-paced attacks in the game, which also needs to be implemented later on. There are also some accurate item matching, finger changes and other details.
Grape: What is your most satisfying outcome in the game?
Li Yangyi: My personal favorite is the fourth chapter, which is the chapter on Bajie and Spider Spirit, some of which I made with my colleagues. Actually, I've been out of work for quite a long time, and most of the time I'm in charge of company management and some business matters. But at that time, the company had a lot of projects in the same period, and several supervisors really couldn't pull out, so there was no way, so the person in charge of the production department and the business manager arrested me to be a strong man in the past.
At that time, the game had not yet reached the dubbing part, and there were only some simple lines in the screen recording, so I didn't know the specific plot development. But after the game was officially launched, I was pleasantly surprised when I saw the plot content. Bajie and the spider spirit are uneasy, as if they have seen the shadow of the Supreme Treasure and the Zixia Fairy in "Journey to the West".
Grape Jun: In the process of cooperation with Youke, is there anything that impresses you?
Li Yangyi: It's too much. Once, we worked overtime until three or four o'clock in the morning, and after we finished submitting the requirements, Mr. Yang Qi actually replied to the message in seconds. To be honest, this kind of time is very warm for us outsourcers, and you can also feel that the work intensity of Youke is very high, and they also struggle until midnight for the project, maybe this is why they were able to make "Black Myth: Wukong" in four years.
Another thing is also from daily communication. Our company has a habit of making regular return visits to cooperative projects, asking about satisfaction, and timely adjusting the cooperation with Party A.
I remember that it seemed to be 2022, we had a meeting with Youke, and their evaluation of our return visit was three words "very good". This kind of direct recognition can't fix me, it's embarrassing. Later, Mr. Yang Qi took the initiative to display the list of partners after the game was cleared.
So from my personal point of view, it's no accident that the success of game science and the rave reviews from the industry know how to respect their peers and deserve to be respected.
Grape: It's really heartwarming for our partners.
Li Yangyi: Yes, Mr. Yang Qi is also a very humorous person, and later he said to me, "If we mess up the game and meet on the road, we should not know each other, haha." ”
For me, while I could feel their anxiety and expectations during the collaboration, I believe that Game Science is a bunch of guys who can get back up after falling, and even if Black Myth: Wukong doesn't win big, they should fight again.
This reminds me of the first year of my business, catching up with the upcoming Chinese New Year, paying salaries to employees, basically working for nothing all year long, and I didn't have the money to prepare some decent New Year's goods for my family during the Chinese New Year. In the middle of the night, my partner Lao Wang and I kept going around in circles under the company's building, very anxious, and Lao Wang asked me: What if the company can't hold on?
I said, "Do it all over again." That old man put his hands in his pockets and told me the most encouraging words, "As long as you are here, I am willing to accompany you on the skewers." ”
The office of the early stage of Shanghai Born's entrepreneurship
For those of us who start businesses, perhaps the most valuable thing is persistence, and it is even more precious to have like-minded people to persist together. Looking back, all the days of downward rooting are a process of accumulation.
At that time, after the return visit to Game Science, we felt their respect, and we returned to the company for an emergency meeting, emphasizing the most that no matter the schedule, personnel, or quality, etc., there is only one policy for game science cooperation: unconditional cooperation. This is also the only tone that Shanghai has cooperated with for many years.
Grape Jun: What kind of impact do you think the explosion of "Black Myth: Wukong" will have on the game industry?
Li Yangyi: It's definitely positive. The game industry has shrunk seriously in the past two years, and it may be that in the current environment, many manufacturers or investors are not so determined, and it is difficult for some small and medium-sized enterprises to persevere. The emergence of "Black Myth: Wukong" may bring us some inspiration and encouragement, growing up in adversity, and opportunities are often accompanied by crises.
03
Grape Jun: What stage has the development of motion capture technology gone through in China? When did it become popular?
Li Yangyi: Since 2017, there have been more and more, almost geometric multiples. On the one hand, this is in line with the law of game development, because the technical level of the industry is iterating, and the aesthetics of players are also improving, and higher quality products are needed.
On the other hand, a large number of chicken games have emerged in the market, which has also driven the growth of demand for motion capture. At that time, we took on a lot of mechanical motion capture requirements for chicken games (i.e., basic actions such as running and jumping, not cutscenes).
Grape King: Why do some simple mechanical actions also use motion capture?
Li Yangyi: Often, the simpler the animation, the smaller the amplitude, the more difficult it is to do. For example, when a person stands normally, there will be many small details: the body undulation when breathing, the slight movement of the hands, the movement of the footsteps...... Even if you follow the reference to imitate, sometimes the result of the hand k will still be biased, but motion capture can restore the real details well.
Grape Jun: In addition, how much can motion capture improve the project?
Yangyi Li: Mocap is more suitable for improving the accuracy of realistic games and improving the efficiency of your team.
When I was at EA before, most of my work was already doing motion capture, and there were very few hand-only K projects, because they were all games with high precision. This is a development trend, for example, in the past, we used to use a textile wheel to pedal out of the weaving, but later with the automatic machine, it can not only increase your output, but also improve the accuracy. In the past, a dozen seconds of realistic animation might take two or three weeks with your hands, but motion capture can reduce the time by 3 to 5 times.
In today's large-scale games, if it is purely made by hand, "Red Dead Redemption 2" and "GTA 6" may not be completed in 10 years. Of course, if it's a stylized product, not a realistic type, such as "Super Mario" and "The Legend of Zelda", then hand K is still a good choice.
Grape Jun: So now more and more large domestic manufacturers are starting to use motion capture?
Li Yangyi: Yes, Tencent, NetEase, miHoYo and other large manufacturers have already built their own motion capture studios.
Grape Jun: So is there any gap between domestic and overseas manufacturers in the use of motion capture technology?
Li Yangyi: If you talk about art ability alone, I think Chinese game art can already be in line with the world; In the process pipeline, there may still be some deficiencies in China in the past, but in recent years, we can also see that many companies have begun to recruit talents with 3A development experience to help the team sort out the pipeline.
Grape Jun: Do domestic manufacturers now have the strength to challenge large-scale stand-alone games?
Li Yangyi: There is no doubt that the level of game development in China is actually relatively mature, and there is no shortage of good stories and IPs.
There are also many other good products in China, but the direction is different, the track chosen is different, and the return rate of making a stand-alone game is not as high as that of online games and mobile games. But in recent years, the market has slowly begun to change. Platforms like Steam are also becoming more and more popular among young people, and I guess there may be a group of teams or investors who are willing to do stand-alone games after "Black Myth: Wukong", compared to the terminal game and mobile game market, there is still a lot of room for the domestic stand-alone market.
Grape Jun: What are the projects you are working on now? What kind of development dilemma might the company face at the moment?
Li Yangyi: There are many cooperative research projects, such as "Sword and Fairy World" and so on.
In order to maintain good business growth, we will often be in a state of red temperature, the main reason is that the company has limited personnel, it is really difficult to recruit talents, and for the time being, we can only slowly increase production by training new people. The entire cultivation cycle is quite long and painful, so much so that several production department directors have varying degrees of receding hairlines.
Every time a new group of people is recruited, the company will enter a period of business and output bottlenecks. At the same time, it is also necessary to ensure that there are no delays in the scheduling of high-quality large-scale projects such as "Black Myth: Wukong", and the production staff is sticking to it. This year, we have also started to actively contact colleges and training institutions to see if we can cooperate with some professional courses to cultivate talents.
Grape: What role do you hope to play in the game industry in the future?
Yangyi Li: Outsourcing services are currently the cornerstone of our company. Of course, every gamer has a heart for making a good product, and we are no exception. If we have the opportunity to "integrate" into a good project and do research and development together, this is also something we have always looked forward to, and maybe we look forward to seeing each other again in the near future.
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