1.0 to 2.0 - Cut Scenes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aU5N24_5VIk I probably watch these atleast once a week. Is it just me or do the cutscenes in 2.0 lack something that 1.0 seems to get right? The whole gridania opening is just amazing.. I especialy like how the wood wailer show up out of no where after the moogles go by. Just something about the look and camera angles, graphics, and scenario of the cutscenes are all just amazing. Does anyon agree? Don't get me wrong, i love 2.0 just as much if not better than 1.0. But the cutscene quality just seems to be so much better to me but I always hear or read the devs say different. But looking at it I just dont see how they can say this..

Edit: Also it seems like it gives your characer more, well, character. lol. I dont recal ever hearing the voice of my character in 2.0 cutscenes. i only hear it durring combat..

The 1.0 cutscenes were properly directed while the 2.0 ones feel rather static. I think yoshi P directly commented on this and said if they kept up the quality similar to the 1.0 ones they wouldn't have them done in time for the 2.x patches.

Limsa and ul'dah intros in 1.0 felt epics that goobue fight ,talk about chucked in at the deep end, was fun though

Low budget game yo. But at least it plays correctly.

1.0 was entirely about presentation and aesthetics.
Often times I dream about 1.0 graphics with 2.0's lighting engine. Oh if only...

I would very much enjoy if I could view the old cutscenes in my room. That back and forth between Thancred and Niellefresne in the 1.0 Ul'dah storyline was amazing.

As someone who's had to do this on many different occasions.




Cutscenes take a very very very long time to procure. The amount of time you put in them, is the amount of time you sacrifice elsewhere, or in the quantity of them.

If I had a game with let's say four levels, and I wanted a cutscene for the start of each one, along with a begining and an end, there's only so much time I can put into crafting each one.

If you haven't had to do anything on this scale before, or even something as simple as planning, directing, shooting or editing audio/video, then you might struggle a little to understand how much effort actually goes into the little details and how long that actually takes. (Even more-so with games)

It is NOT as simple as putting in a few camera positions/effects and animations, it takes A LOT of work, and A LOT of time.




FFXIV ARRs development early on was founded on the principle of "How do we balance quality vs. time", and they balanced it so that the quality across most content is the same, but with the occasional cutscene that matters more with additional effort and work. This saves time and leave room to develop and expand elsewhere instead of 1.23's mistake where we had a few cut-scenes that were nice, but felt disjointed and repetitive elsewhere.

The video sample below that I recorded from 1.23, a cut-scene that took a fair bit of effort to make, but in the expense of making cut-scenes like this, they fell short in many other cut-scenes and in terms of overall time management and development for the game.

https://vimeo.com/51107372

http://puu.sh/bMc0Y/3d19a4943b.jpg

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Originally Posted by Yukiba

Oh, I'm by no means saying its a simple process.. I'm just saying I wish 2.0 cutscenes were like 1.0. The camera angles and movement, and just how they are directed with a tone you can feel.. Just a better experience all around.

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No worries, I know what you meant. And I completley agree.

I was just explaining the reasoning behind them cutting back on the quality.

The problem being, the developers were thinking "This is Final Fantasy, therefore we need Final Fantasy tier cut-scenes", but in the process they forgot of the sheer amount of content, variations and overall time restrictions that an MMO development entails. Ontop of inexperienced and badly trained staff that weren't prepared or ready for a new generation of games development or processes they focused so heavily on making sure everything looked pretty that it ironically felt spare and few between.


Also worth mentioning change your audio language to Japaneese in 2.0, trust me on this.
There are more details, more careful animations and facial experssions to have been crafted for the JP audio than the ENG audio, its only slightly subtle changes, but the cutscenes are MUCH nicer as a result.
(Considering the ENG VA's are so low budget it shouldn't be too much of a sacrifice)

Oh, I'm by no means saying its a simple process.. I'm just saying I wish 2.0 cutscenes were like 1.0. The camera angles and movement, and just how they are directed with a tone you can feel.. Just a better experience all around.

Everytime the garleans attacked it felt real like I should feel dread and terror. in 2.0 not at all. There is no fear at all for me. specialy that ending.. man

Well, this might be a good place to drop this again. A group of us from all over the world had got together to bring a bit of life to the 1.0 story b adding Voice Acting to it. It is not professional by any means (except for the excellent video editing done by Vagrant Riskbreaker) but we had fun with it. It has been a long time since we worked on the rest of the chapters so if you enjoy this, Please leave some comments on the youtube videos as encouragement to continue. I was lucky enough to voice Sthallman/Rostenstal (the big Roegadyn guy) and a few other bit characters. Hope you enjoy reminiscing with us!

A Realm Retold

The one that starts at 2:00:55 of that video in the op. Just beautiful. The characters had weight to them. You were able to hear all the footsteps. The effects were great as well. If only if only we could have scenes like these at least once in the main scenario quests of each major patch.

Like other people said, they take a lot of time and effort to do. It's a shame we had to throw them away for ARR. (Why did we have to ruin all the gathering/crafting questslines though?)

Hopefully we can get some good ones in the expansion or something. Something where they can take time to make a good scene.

it's probably due to the ungodly amount of motion capture used in 1.0, and even then they touched it up considerably for what they needed (lalafell animations all had to be corrected by hand i believe.) ARR makes less use of full motion capture, and relies on a larger amount of poses and sample animations instead, which means less time spent animating the scene.

Not to say they don't have moments of full motion capture still, but that tends to be restricted to main storyline events and some very dramatic sidequests. I wouldn't mind some overly cinematic scenes again though.

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Originally Posted by TessaJalloh

ARR makes less use of full motion capture, and relies on a larger amount of poses and sample animations instead, which means less time spent animating the scene.

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This is one of the bigger things that bothers me about 2.0 cutscenes. I didn't actually play 1.0 for more than a couple weeks, so I'm not saying 1.0 was better about this, because I have no idea. But the characters in the current cutscenes make these jarring transitions from one animation to another, with lots of simply standing in place, and there's not much camera/perspective trickery to lessen the impact. Characters run into place, then snap to a stop, then talk with some looping gesture, then snap to some new pose, and so on.

The transitions are really blatant, and the fillers are generally static. There are some spots with good use of camera panning/zooming/etc., and some places where characters are talking and moving at the same time. I know you kind of can't get away from this completely with an MMO, but so much of it is just... more like a storyboard than a finished scene.

Did the 1.0 cutscenes use the 1.0 start-and-stop-running momentum thing? Because even that would've made a big difference.

Agreed that it's sad to lose the high quality cutscene's. Though I understand it's a sacrifice needed to improve other parts of the game.

I miss being able to watch the old cutscenes. Apparently the cutscenes are stored server-side on the Legacy servers cause of all the things I lost in moving to Midgardsormr, being able to watch the old cutscenes in the inn book was the most noticeable.

1.0 had live actors that actually spent time developing cut scenes with motion capture. Thus it added a much better feel then 2.0.

The 1.0 engine was born to make beautiful cutscenes and, sadly, not much else.

PS3 limitations

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Originally Posted by Gextiv

PS3 limitations

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More like everything limitations. 1.0 had worse PC requirements than some high-end shooters then. My G53SX could barely handle it at Medium settings and it was new at the time.

I wonder if their going step it up when in comes to cut scenes in the upcoming patches and expansions.

I don't have the quote with me, but apperantly they (SE devs) are spending alot of resources on something that Yoshi disagrees with and thinks its unimportant for the game. My guess is they plan on adding more cutscenes and voice acting. Both of which are expensive and time consuming

Yoshida said that the main reason why the Hildibrand CS are not voiced is because the devs do also last minute changes on these CS to make them better.
And I can say, the Hildibrand quests have really the best CS in this game

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbEan62z8RA

And really, what man could possibly convey Hildibrand's manliness effective enough to make you feel like it's just as he should sound? None, I tell you!

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Originally Posted by Gramul

Like other people said, they take a lot of time and effort to do. It's a shame we had to throw them away for ARR. (Why did we have to ruin all the gathering/crafting questslines though?)

Hopefully we can get some good ones in the expansion or something. Something where they can take time to make a good scene.

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Agreed...i would love to see better CSs...at least in the main scenario questlines, on another note...i wonder if they will make a new CGI trailer for the expansion like they did with ARR, i will admit i would love to see another one, but then again if it cuts into work on in-game CSs or any in-game development time then i can do without it.

Once support is dropped for the PS3, the in-game cut scenes will likely improve.

Until then...

Godspeed.

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Originally Posted by Yukiba

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aU5N24_5VIk I probably watch these atleast once a week. Is it just me or do the cutscenes in 2.0 lack something that 1.0 seems to get right? The whole gridania opening is just amazing.. I especialy like how the wood wailer show up out of no where after the moogles go by. Just something about the look and camera angles, graphics, and scenario of the cutscenes are all just amazing. Does anyon agree? Don't get me wrong, i love 2.0 just as much if not better than 1.0. But the cutscene quality just seems to be so much better to me but I always hear or read the devs say different. But looking at it I just dont see how they can say this..

Edit: Also it seems like it gives your characer more, well, character. lol. I dont recal ever hearing the voice of my character in 2.0 cutscenes. i only hear it durring combat..

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Ah, wow! That was amazing. Thanks for showing us.

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Originally Posted by Gextiv

Once support is dropped for the PS3, the in-game cut scenes will likely improve.

Until then...

Godspeed.

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That's not the reason why. The PS3 does not limit creativity in terms of animations, effects, sounds, dialogue or the amount of time the development team spend on planning/crafting a proper cut-scene.

That's simply a time restriction on the developments teams part.

Another reason for this, is that the cut-scene is loaded in separately from the rest of the game, other un-necessary processes are removed during a cut-scene and then reloaded again after, therefore processing proper and memory simply isn't really as much of an issue (hence why cut-scenes are so smooth compared to the rest of the game on a PS3)

See my original post for more detail.

I don't think 2.0 had any cutscenes that were memorable sadly.

1.0 had the amazing leviathan intro and do you guys remember that one where the sky gets covered in dark clouds (in real time!!!). Those were so cool.

I don't know why they aren't even using mood specific music for most scenes like 1.0 and XI did.
So much of the main storyline just seems... For the lack of a better word; cheap.

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Originally Posted by Seif

I don't think 2.0 had any cutscenes that were memorable sadly.

1.0 had the amazing leviathan intro and do you guys remember that one where the sky gets covered in dark clouds (in real time!!!). Those were so cool.

I don't know why they aren't even using mood specific music for most scenes like 1.0 and XI did.
So much of the main storyline just seems... For the lack of a better word; cheap.

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I wouldn't go that far to say that there wasn't any memorable CSs, like others have mentioned the Hildebrand CSs were pretty hilarious, not to mention the small CSs of your before and after Duel with Hoary Boulder and Coultenet, i would name others but i don't want to spoil anything for newer players who might happen to be reading this thread.

The camera was so much more dynamic and movie-like in 1.0, I miss that so much. Also the adventurer was animated a lot better in 1.0, with actual expressions (and sometimes vocal exclaimations) and fluid movements that weren't just static emotes. In 2.0, all we do is /nod, /talk, /handover, /take stuff. We lost a lot of stuff from out-of-CS animations too, such as skidding and skreeching to the ground when suddenly stopping and turning.

Whoever they fired from XIV's original team that took care of camera movements and character animation should come back, he did awesome.

It's not that they were fired or he left; the reasoning for removing start-up and stop animations when walking/running is that it creates a delay, though slight, for things such as ability inputs and the like. Yoshida said it would adversely affect combat because you're basically getting caught in an animation lock. (Think DRG-lock during jumps)

However, it didn't affect 1.0 even remotely according to friends I've talked to that did end-game content, such as Ifrit and Garuda. I just think that, with the way fights in this game require more movement than actual strategy, putting these animations back in would be a detriment.

I don't know if it could be made to where you can just move again during each animation to cancel out of them, but it would be great if they could do that.

The intros to 1.0 were amazing!! 2.0's intros felt lacking (very much so in comparison). And I was actually describing these to some in-game friends the other day who hadn't had the opportunity to play 1.0 and they loved the sound of it all.

Watching the way characters walk and come to a stop, or turn around and leave a room really really bothers me. It just looks so unnatural and phony. Add in the horrible clipping, which is my biggest pet peeve, and a lot of it just looks cheap. I mean, 2014, a hugely successful and money making MMO, and we have to endure these horribly animated clipping cutscenes? I expected way better from SE on this.

I LOVED the animation and cutscene details in 1.0 Really wish they would focus more time / money towards that again, rather then pushing out 3 star gear only good for vanity, that clips badly too and looks unnatural in certain poses.

Did I mention I hate the clipping??

I hope someday we get cutscenes as good as the ones from 1.0, 1.0 was a much better game cinematically.

Most definitely.. I just feel they don't give much thought to any cut scenes.. Some are alright like hildibrand and his dad chasing him and the fight scene between thancred and the sahagin. But all that falls flat in comparison with the cut scenes of 1.0 especially the openings and ending of 1.0. It would also be nice if they would use our voices that we picked more often in cut scenes. they don't have to speak but at least some kind of noises for like surprise or fear or whatever.

Would also be nice to see our characters fight other things in the cut scenes like thancred and the sahagin. I know thats a stretch due to different sizes of characters and such... but I think that would just be amazing and worth while. FF has always been about the music/tone (tone wise 1.0 is like the dark night as opposed to 2.0 animated batman lol), story, and cut scenes and even though I understand this is an MMO, they should still make a better effort in these areas.

It doesn't even have to be right away, if they could even comment and say something to the effect of "We plan on making cs more interactive with better quality" or something at all addressing this, I would be very glad. I have paid for this since it came out and I play daily. Would just be nice if they pushed a little harder in these areas.. Anyways, I do like 2.0 and they have done a terrific job turning things around. Just hope they get the cut scene quality back.

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Originally Posted by Borgan

I LOVED the animation and cutscene details in 1.0 Really wish they would focus more time / money towards that again, rather then pushing out 3 star gear only good for vanity, that clips badly too and looks unnatural in certain poses.

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There were also less CS compared to ARR

Looking at 1.0's cutscenes, they definitely were better - but I feel like SE has definitely gotten better at cutscenes in 2.2 & 2.3.
There were more memorable cutscenes in 2.3 alone than in all of 2.0!

There's still a lot of room for improvement but I hope that they continue to improve and give us some really amazing things in 3.0