Have you heard of....Heavy Rain?

[danlisa]

I don't suppose you have as details are very sparse but small teasers are starting to appear.

Details about the story and gameplay of Heavy Rain itself remain scarce. It is known that the game is not a sequel to Fahrenheit, but a completely new game, with new story and new characters. Director David Cage noted that Heavy Rain "will be a very dark film noir thriller with mature themes", without any supernatural elements.

The game will feature a story that is interactively "bendable", similarly to Fahrenheit. It's been told by the creators, that "the character control mechanism is an essential part in playing Heavy Rain", and is different from the system used in Fahrenheit.

The player will be able to control different characters in the game. In a recent interview given by Quantic Dream co-CEO and executive producer Guillaume de Fondaumière to gamedaily.com, characters will be true virtual actors capable of showing highly realistic emotions.

From a technical and technological standpoint, notable features of The Casting include full body and facial motion capture, real-time tears and wrinkles on the face, advanced skin shades, and some advanced rendering features, such as depth of field, spherical harmonics, auto exposure and high dynamic range rendering.

The technology enables animations of pupil dilation, tongue, eyes, fingers, and dynamic hair with physics. The game engine also supports real-time post-processing, with which E3 attendees could interact at the event. Hair physics is achieved by the use of PhysX by Ageia. Facial motion capture was recorded using Vicon Peak MX40 cameras and system, and was enhanced with a muscle system.

The following are not Pre-Rendered CG, they are live in game images.











An early tech demo of the facial capture used in game:


I'm watching this title closely.