I love FMV’s in games, plain and simple. I think they’re so rarely deployed that at this stage it’s almost always to great effect. Sam Barlow is the obvious one that comes to mind (Her Story, Telling Lies, Immortality) but there are also some famous examples from the past such as the often campy/ham-fisted but always fully-committed and enjoyable performances in Red Alert and Command & Conquer. I also really enjoyed Dr. Darling in Control.
All of this is to say that that FMV’s as a component or the centerpiece of games frequently comes across, at least to me, as being film’s “found footage” equivalent in video games. FF films got a bad rep for “shaky cams” or being a way to mask cheap productions, but some of the best films I’ve ever seen were shot in that style (for those of you who haven’t seen [Rec.] do yourselves a favor). Every now and then the style gets a brief moment in the sun and everyone moves on. Perhaps it’s just seen as too gimmicky but I don’t want to get too thick in the weeds here.
I’ve now seen several great examples of FMV’s and I feel like there’s just this barrier it can’t cross. I’m not sure if it’s technical - asking developers to also be versed in filmmaking, even though many of the same principles in games translate such as lighting and camera angles is maybe too big of an ask - or if it’s just not something that interests many devs yet. Either way, I’d love to see more of it and I’m curious how people think it can be deployed in new and interesting ways. Immortality is a great example because of how it integrated not just the footage but the very tools used to edit films. The UI is a gamified moviola which was necessary for editing and reviewing back in the day. Having editing experience myself actually made the game play better, but it was still very accessible to my friend who had never edited a clip in their life.
I know this is sort of half rant/half question, but I just really wanted to talk about FMV’s so here we are!
Have you seen The 7th Guest VR yet? They used a new technology for volumetric video to do their FMVs, which means you can actually walk around the actors and see them from the side or even go behind them. It’s actually necessary in VR because you don’t want to lock the player’s head in place, and you also need to be able to turn your head, even just slight movements of your head need to be respected.
https://youtu.be/YQajZctjyVg?si=M7WUsoa4ZP2MSHr9
https://youtu.be/FjbngDVdL6s?si=I4YPIgDVom_4-DrI
This means the player can walk around in FMVs, similar to the cutscenes in Half-Life 2. It also means you can mess with camera angles in post, which sounds pretty cool. I think we’ll be seeing some more volumetric videos in games, especially VR games, in the next few years.
Here’s my full playthrough
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cn48pUErkH8&list=PLZIQTa_kwZhBOleFGsSwgQflytfCkTsqz&index=1
Also if you wanna see old school FMVs then check out the original The 7th Guest, The 11th Hour, or the 2019 indie sequel The 13th Doll
We have a community for these games btw [email protected]
And you might also be interested in [email protected]
Wow, that is incredibly cool implementation. Thank you so much for sharing this. I’m going to try to get my friend to grab it so we can play it on his Vive. From a filmmaking perspective it also open a lot of doors because you don’t use the entire frame if you’re just pulling the subject out, which means you can capture the image in different and interesting ways to better utilize the resolution before bringing it into the game. Lots to unpack and consider there!
Appreciate the suggestions, going to check out those communities as well!