It wasn’t all smooth sailing though as many reviews noted that the facial animations can be more than a little clunky at times. The good news is that developer, Remedy Entertainment, is well aware of the situation and hopes to remedy (see what I did there?) the problem in the upcoming downloadable content packs.
Speaking on the official Remedy Forums, developer, MarcusRMD said:
Personally, I am not too bothered about the quality of the Alan Wake’s facial animations, but it is really great to hear that Remedy plan on delivering improvements so quickly. I suppose that the somewhat dodgy animations currently in the game are down to the title spending five years in development.
It’s not alone a matter of the method how or where the facial capture is done, it’s about the run-time animation techniques available, skeleton setup and so on. It’s a complex problem trying to dodge the Uncanny Valley.
Animations aside, Alan Wake looks to be one of the games of the year, and if, like me, the wait for it’s arrival is killing you, I strongly recommend checking out the live-action prequel series, Bright Falls, it should help you get your Alan Wake fix until release day rolls around.
Alan Wake will illuminate stores on May 14th in Europe & May 18th in North America, exclusively for Xbox 360.
Source: Remedy Forums
