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Furi Community Week – Interview with Chris, CG Animator

Hello everyone,

The community week is still going on! Today, we are happy to share an interview of Chris Hoareau, Lead Animator & Artist at The Game Bakers. To learn more about his work on Furi, read below!

Hi Chris, can you present yourself and your job on Furi?

Hello! I am Chris and I am a French CG animator and artist, living near Paris. I’m 33. I always drew and wanted to work in entertainment. Fun fact, according to my school teachers, I did my first flipbook at only 4 years old. In animation, I like moves that use the whole body (like fighting, you know). I also like to add unnecessary details, and I’m always the guy who’s late (I am sorry about this, truly). In life, I like speed, having fun, learning things – I actually want to learn everything – and, I’m also the guy who’s late.

For Furi I was in charge of the gameplay animations: that includes the long walk on the path, the fights, and some cutscenes. I also rigged* all the characters. I also storyboarded The Flame’s cutscenes. 2023, it will be my 10-year anniversary at The Game Bakers, so cheers!

Furi is about creating intense satisfaction to players, as Emeric Thoa, Creative Director, explains in a blog post. How is animation part of creating satisfaction? What were the keys to making Furi’s animation?

There are at least two categories of animations in the game that create satisfaction for players, without talking about cutscenes which make the story go forward.

First, the ones we call “Melee Attacks” (when the boss is stunned, and the player attacks to trigger a short cutscene) are very pleasant to watch. The player can appreciate the nasty blows the bosses have to swallow.

Then, Furi’s gameplay lets players do really quick moves to avoid, parry or attack bosses. Our animations just push up those actions to a next level, that makes them even more satisfactory. 

But I want to say it’s really the work of the whole team, animations alone wouldn’t be enough!

Furi is also a game about facing challenge. What was the biggest challenge regarding animation on Furi?

The biggest challenge was to make fighting animations that were fast but also readable to the human eye. It was my intention, but it was pretty hard to do, especially as I was a junior back then. I had not that much experience in animation. Some of the fighting animation length was something like 2 frames (Furi was animated at 30 frames per second, so that is pretty short in time). I hope players managed to see all the nice details we added!

Can you share some references you used to animate some of Furi’s bosses?

For sure!

First, Takashi Okazaki (character designer of Furi) drew some cool and original posings for Rider. I’m thinking about Rider’s running stance: holding his sword in two hands right in front of him while running at something like 50mph, haha.

I love and grew up with Japanese culture, mostly anime (precisely “shonen neketsu” like Dragon Ball, Saint Seiya, Hokuto No Ken, etc…) so I am imbued with these brutal accelerations, inhuman movements and iconic posings.

I also practiced martial arts for a few years, so I recorded myself with my smartphone smashing pillows in the living room of my previous apartment to reproduce and adjust my moves in the game. (Don’t ask, I will not share those videos).

Emeric, who has a big movie culture, shared some movie scenes that help me a lot, for instance from the Miyamoto Musashi movies. He shared ideas coming from fighting games like Soul Calibur or Metal Gear. He already had an excellent vision of the game before its conception.

Finally, I can tell that there was also a big part of “feeling”. I mean, the characters’ designs have strong personalities. Just looking at Takashi Okazaki’s artworks was often enough to know how to animate and give life to each boss.

What did you enjoy the most while working on the game?

To be honest, as an animator, Furi was the first game I worked on for PC and consoles. Just wow ! Secondly, this is a fighting game! I’m keen on fighting games. As I said before, I practiced martial arts and I really love them. It was just like a dream come true to animate all those incredible fighters! Thirdly, there was a big creation part. I was and felt really free to create some fighting moves. Every time I worked on a new boss, it was like entering a new world, with new feelings. It was enriching to try to imagine the mindset of each boss.

How did you proceed to animate Onnamusha, the new rider? What did you have to do to make her move as the rider?

I can’t reveal all the magic tricks, right?

Actually, Onnamusha uses almost all the same animations as Rider. The reason was that Onnamusha had to play correctly the existing cutscenes as the new Rider. To do this, I had to set up the 3D model (made by the awesome CG artist Anthony Beyer) so she had more or less the same body proportions to share the same rigged skeleton as Rider. In addition, Onnamusha had to keep her female shape, and that was the tricky thing: to have a female body share the skeleton of Rider. The more the two characters had the same proportions, the more the game and cutscenes animations fit.

Was there anything unexpected that happened during the development?

Developing a game IS a source of unexpected things! There is always something new to learn and something new to fix.

One thing that wasn’t really planned and gave me some trouble was that I had to animate (by hand) Rider’s hair and cape. For the first iterations of Furi, these parts relied on the physics of the game, and it was very beautiful. Then came the optimization pass (it was obviously very important to have a good frame rate to be able to play properly) and we had to make compromises.

Fortunately, I had already done that before on The Burst hat bands. It was already planned to animate the ribbons “by hand”, so I knew how to do it. At that time, we already knew that it would require too much resource to have her bands animated by the game physics, so, it was not an option. Everything was planned in the rig* and the animations of The Burst, and baked into her animations files.

So, I had to adapt Rider’s rig by adding bones to his hair and to his cape. To have something like a natural rendering, I simulated the physics of the hair and the cape and I created the animations one by one. I added wind effects and played with gravity when it was necessary. For example, when Rider runs, his hair and his cape had to go backwards. It meant I had to re-animate, re-export, and reintegrate the animations of Rider with the hair and the cape animations in the files. It was a lot of work!

Do you have any last word for Furi’s players?

For players: if you haven’t finished the game, please do!
For animators: don’t hesitate to do weird new things that can lead to great ones!
For me (how snooty): don’t forget to enjoy life!

* Like for a puppet, rigging is the creating the elements necessary to animate a character. First, we create a skeleton which will more or less influence the body parts that we want to move. Then, to animate it more easliy, we create “controllers” of the skeleton, which allow the bones to be moved as desired. A rig = skeleton + controllers on the CG model of the character.

Furi Community Week – Interview with The Toxic Avenger!

Hi Furist!

We know how much you love Furi’s soundtrack, as we receive a ton of feedback about it. And it’s keeps going strong, and we regularly hear from players who discovered the game through its music! This community week is the perfect time to share some up-to-date data on the success of the OST.

Thanks to the spectacular work of Danger, Carpenter Brut, The Toxic Avengers,  Waveshaper, SCATTLE, kn1ght & Lorn, streaming equals to over 600 years of listening 😱.

To celebrate the community week, we had a chat with The Toxic Avenger about his work on the OST.

Hello, you worked on Furi’s original soundtrack and composed two tracks and in particular Make This Right, that became emblematic of the game, and was in the launch trailer. Can you introduce yourself to those who don’t know you?
Sure! My name is Simon, I’ve been making electronic music for almost 25 years now, I’ve released 5 albums and participated in several movies and video games soundtracks.

What is your connection to video games?
I am 40 years old, I started playing with Galaga on NES, which means I’ve been playing for almost 35 years. At times a lot, at times a little, but there is always something to play near me. For the last ten years I’ve been able to see the behind the scenes of gaming and work together with video game creators.

For Furi, it was the first time you composed for a video game. How was the collaboration, and how did you approach this new adventure?
It was indeed the first time I composed original tracks!
My music had already been used in games like Need For Speed or Watch Dogs.
The collaboration went very well in the sense that I understood quickly what The Game Bakers wanted, and they also understood me very well, it’s always very nice to understand each other!
I took the work to heart because I know the influence that video games can have, and I was immediately charmed by the little I could see of the game before working on it.

In Furi, the music adapts to what is happening in the fight, especially the phases of the bosses. How did you manage this?
For me, it was a first! Composing differently. When a character moves from A to B, let’s say, B being a more tense moment in the game than A, the music has to adapt, become denser, and intensify.
For that, I had to compose in parts of tracks, with layers of layers and elements that can be assembled and removed if the player decides all of a sudden to go back closer to point A. I had to cut the track as in making different scenes, a bit like movie editing… but I don’t know if I’m very clear 😀

What was your biggest inspiration to compose Make This Right & My Only Chance?
I was lucky that The Game Bakers approached me and asked me to do what I am used to doing! So it was very easy for me, but obviously, the big inspiration was what I saw of the game. Graphically it influenced me a lot, it looked sumptuous!

What do you enjoy most about composing for video games?
To wake up the teenager in me (he’s never really asleep anyway). I also love to make music to the image.

Thank you! Do you have any news to share for our players?
Yes! I just released my new album, a double album in fact! It’s called “Yes future” and I’m pretty proud of it!

Furi – Community Week – Fan Art Contest

Between November 5th and 11th, we are celebrating Furi’s amazing community with a lot of events and content. You can see all the details here.

We are running a fanart contest on the theme “Peace: what if Rider became friend with one (or several) guardians?”. The fanart can take the shape of your choice (drawing, illustration, sculpture, collage, installation…) but has to be created especially for the contest. You have to be the original author of it. The contest runs from today until November 19th at 11:59 PM CEST / 2:59 PM PT.

 

To participate, please send your fanart, your nickname, your social media profile and the name of your art to fanart@thegamebakers.com. Don’t hesitate to share it also on social media with #furifanartcontest or in our community hub on Steam ! Be careful, you have to email us to participate, only posting on social media doesn’t count.The jury consists of Emeric Thoa (Creative Director), Audrey Leprince (Narrative Director), Anthony Beyer (Lead Artist), Marjorie Deneux (Game Artist) & Mylène Lourdel (Marketing Specialist).

Here are the prizes for the winners:

  • 1st: Limited Run Edition Collector (Switch) + Original Soundtrack on Vinyl + Furi Artbook + T-Shirt
  • 2nd: Furi Limited Run Edition (Switch or PS4) + Furi Artbook + Original Soundtrack on CD
  • 3nd: Original Soundtrack on CD + Furi IndieBox (PC)
  • “Coup de coeur”: Original Soundtrack on CD + Furi IndieBox (PC)

Since the release of Furi, you have created a lot of amazing fan art and we can’t wait to see the results of this contest!

Furi – Community Week

Hello Furists!

It’s been a good year for Furi with the launch of Onnamusha, bringing a new fighter to the game, and the update of the game. We’re always impressed by your continuous support over the years, and we thought it was a good time to celebrate you and Furi in a new Community Week!

This Community Week, we will share some behind the scene about Furi and the Onnamusha DLC, our favourite fanarts, interviews with team members who worked on Furi and more! We are also hosting a new fanart contest on the theme “Peace: what if Rider became friend with one (or several) guardians?”, all the details are available here. Show us your best creations and win some Furi’s merch!

We will host two Ask Me Anything sessions. The first one will take place on Discord on Monday 7th at 6 PM GMT+2 / 09 AM PT, focusing on Onnamusha. It will be the perfect time to know more about the new Rider and the creative process behind the DLC. On Wednesday 9th at 10 PM GMT +2 / 1 PM PT, Emeric Thoa and Audrey Leprince will also hold an AMA session on r/Gaming on Reddit.

That’s not all! We are discounting the game this week, so you can encourage your friends to try it.

The game is available 70% off on SteamGOGHumblePlayStation and Nintendo Switch. And cherry on top, Onnamusha is discounted for the first time, with 30% off!

Make sure you follow us on our social networks and join our Discord server in order not to miss anything!

Offre d’emploi en Level Design (poste pourvu)

[POSTE POURVU]
Game Bakers recherche un ou une Level Designer expérimentée pour le développement de notre prochain jeu d’action aventure sur PC et Consoles.

Vous rejoindrez une équipe de 15 personnes, qui ont travaillé ensemble sur nos précédents projets et livrent des jeux de qualité, sans crunch et dans la bonne humeur. Notre équipe travaille à 100% en télétravail, avec des horaires flexibles.

Game Bakers est une petite équipe talentueuse qui fait des jeux qui marquent les joueurs et les joueuses, comme nos précédentes créations Haven ou Furi. Grâce au succès de nos jeux, nous sommes un studio indépendant et auto-financé et nous travaillons sur des créations originales qui sortent tous les 3-4 ans.

Mission

  • Créer des zones du jeu dans le moteur de jeu (Unity) avec les outils interne (pipe 3D)
  • Concevoir du LD qui crée des challenges variés, avec une bonne gestion du rythme et des émotions
  • Concevoir du LD qui marie les contraintes de gameplay et de level art
  • Proposer des solutions et améliorations du pipeline et des outils de LD

Profil

  • Expérience professionnelle en game / level design
  • A déjà participé au développement – de la conception jusqu’au lancement – de plusieurs jeux commercialisés
  • Sait travailler avec Unity
  • Autonomie, pragmatisme, capacité à travailler en équipe, bonne humeur
  • Bon esprit de synthèse et d’une bonne communication, à l’oral et à l’écrit, en français et en anglais

Informations complémentaires
Dates : début entre novembre 2022 et janvier 2023
Lieu : l’équipe est intégralement en télétravail, mais nous avons un studio à Montpellier qui peut vous accueillir.
Rémunération compétitive et bonus, horaires flexibles, mutuelle de qualité, aide à la garde d’enfants, frais de télétravail.
Contrat : CDD ou Freelance

Pour postuler
Un petit mot avec votre CV à hello@thegamebakers.com

Merci de vos candidatures !

Offre d’emploi de gameplay programmer

[Poste pourvu]
Game Bakers recherche un programmeur ou une programmeuse gameplay expérimentée pour le développement de notre prochain jeu d’action aventure sur PC et consoles.

Vous rejoindrez une équipe de 15 personnes, qui ont travaillé ensemble sur nos précédents projets et livrent des jeux de qualité, sans crunch et dans la bonne humeur. Notre équipe travaille à 100% en télétravail, avec des horaires flexibles. 

Game Bakers est une petite équipe talentueuse qui fait des jeux qui marquent les joueurs et les joueuses, comme nos précédentes créations Haven ou Furi. Grâce au succès de nos jeux, nous sommes un studio indépendant et auto-financé et nous travaillons sur des créations originales qui sortent tous les 3-4 ans.

Mission :

  • Développer le gameplay principal du jeu
  • Proposer des solutions, des design, des implémentations qui concrétisent la vision 

Profil :

  • Diplôme en informatique de niveau BAC +4/+5 (école d’ingénieur ou formation similaire)
  • Connaissances approfondies en C# (C++ bienvenu)
  • Compétences solides en mathématiques (algèbre linéaire, trigonométrie, quaternions)
  • Compétences solides en physique et systèmes d’animation (IK, ragdoll, playables, animation procédurale)
  • Sait travailler avec Unity 
  • Capacité à reprendre rapidement le code existant
  • A déjà participé au développement – de la conception jusqu’au lancement – de plusieurs jeux commercialisés 
  • Autonomie, pragmatisme, capacité à travailler en équipe, bonne humeur
  • Francophone
  • De l’intérêt ou des connaissances en biomécanique, mécanique newtonnienne et anatomie humaine sont un plus

Informations additionnelles :

  • CDI
  • Dates : dès que possible – début avant octobre 2022.
  • Lieu : l’équipe est intégralement en télétravail, mais nous avons un studio à Montpellier qui peut vous accueillir.
  • Rémunération compétitive et bonus, horaires flexibles, mutuelle de qualité, aide à la garde d’enfants, frais de télétravail.

Pour postuler : un petit mot avec votre CV à hello@thegamebakers.com

Merci de vos candidatures !

FURI – Patch Notes – June 21th 2022

Hello everyone,

We hope you are well and that you enjoyed fighting the guardians with Onnamusha, as well as the last free update. We would like to thank you for all your support on Furi, it’s amazing to see how much you are involved with the game 6 years after its release.

We just released this small update to fix some bugs, you will find the patch notes below.

————-

Furi – Patch Notes – June 21th 2022

Versions: PS4, Steam, GOG v1.1.224

PS5 v1.1.225

Common:
Bug fixes:
– Fixed a bug that permitted to skip the Edge fight in Practice mode
– Fixed a pattern in Furier difficulty during the Line fight
– Fixed missing feedbacks while tweaking the audio settings

Common except Steam
Bug fixes:
– Fixed several localization issues

PC
Bug fixes:
– Fixed the visual quality setting being reset after restarting the game

GOG
Bug fixes:
– Fixed a bug that may prevent achievements/trophies to unlock

Steam
Bug fixes:
– Fixed the loading screen on SteamDeck

PS4
Bug fixes:
– Fixed bouncing bullets against the shield of the Line

PS5
Improvements:
– Added V-Sync option in the visual settings

Rediscover Furi – Onnamusha Update

Rediscover Furi: Furi Update & Onnamusha DLC

The Onnamusha DLC will let you play as Onnamusha Rider, a powerful fighter that alternates between two stances: fast and agile or slower but lethal until she’s able to unleash the devastating power of the Star. The new gameplay mechanics bring new challenges, for a complete rediscovery of the game.

After Furi we needed a break from intense and fast paced action and we made Haven.
And after Haven we wanted to feel the thrill of combat again… So we worked on a little something during the summer.
We’ve read all the Furi fans messages and this request really stuck with us: “I wish I could forget Furi to discover it for the first time all over again”. We asked ourselves: how could we do that? Is there a way for players to rediscover Furi?

A couple of weeks later we were working on Onnamusha.

Furi Onnamusha


Onnamusha is a new playable character. It is Rider as a woman, but most importantly it’s a new fighter with a completely different playstyle. While the original game is very demanding but pretty simple in terms of abilities (you can dash, parry, slash and shoot), Onnamusha adds a layer of tactics by alternating two combat stances:

Spark: while in Spark stance, Rider is faster than ever, heals on parry and can double dash but deals weak damage.
Storm: in Storm stance, Rider is extremely lethal, but very slow and has a vulnerable jump roll.

It’s a different rhythm when playing with Onnamusha, as you’re always toggling between stances to optimize your damage and maximize your chances of avoiding hits.

But there’s more. When you make damage or parry successfully, you fill a special power gauge. It’s true in both stances, but while in Spark you will fill the gauge much faster. When the gauge is full, you can trigger the Star power and benefit from the best of the two worlds: be even faster and even deadlier.

And finally, another mechanic finishes to make Onnamusha a very fun and rich character to play: the burst mechanic. You get a boost in damage and defense just after you change stance, for a couple of seconds. In Spark stance, you’ll shoot many more bullets during burst. In Storm you’ll fire bigger and faster bullets. In both stances, your slashes will be deadlier. This makes it valuable to toggle stance frequently to take advantage of the power burst.

With these new combat skills, each bossfight can be approached with new strategies. You’ll have to decide when to deal damage with the Storm stance, when to toggle stances to benefit from the burst, when to use your Spark speed to defend, gain back some life or build up your Star power. And eventually, decide when is the perfect moment to use the power of the Star and destroy your opponent.

You can get the Onnamusha DLC (6.99$) and rediscover Furi with Onnamusha in Story mode, Speedrun mode (with dedicated leaderboards) and Practice mode.

In the Furi free update that is made available at the same time as the DLC, we have included all previous content that was released on the game, and in particular the previous “One More Fight” DLC with The Flame bossfight (and secret boss Bernard). We also updated the game in general and added new accessibility improvements with the ability to unlock trophies in Promenade Mode, an option to autocomplete Quick Time Events, and a couple of additional control schemes.

Rediscover Furi: Furi Update and Onnamusha DLC is available on PC, PS4, PS5 and Switch.

Go back stranger. We will bring you back.

Furi Onnamusha DLC with a new Rider coming soon!

Hello everyone,

We’ve read all the Furi fans messages and this request really stuck with us: “I wish I could forget Furi to discover it for the first time all over again”. We asked ourselves: how could we achieve that? Is there a way for players to rediscover Furi?

A couple of weeks later we were working on Onnamusha.

The Onnamusha DLC will let you play as Onnamusha Rider, a powerful fighter that alternates between two stances: fast and agile or slower but lethal until she’s able to unleash the devastating power of the Star. The new gameplay mechanics bring new challenges, for a complete rediscovery of the game.

With Onnamusha Rider, the game can be played again in Story, Speedrun and Practice modes.

The studio will also publish a free update to the base game on all platforms, that includes all paid and free content available for Furi: One More Fight DLC and all the improvements made since the release (Invincible Mode, Furier Speedrun, Alternate controls…).

The DLC ($6.99) and the free update will be available on May 17th on PC (Steam, GOG), PlayStation 4 & 5 and Nintendo Switch

Haven Update: Meet the new Yu and Kay

They love each other, but they can’t be together, so they do what anybody would probably have done in this situation: escape to an unknown planet.

This is the story of Haven, a romantic space adventure about two lovers trying to stay together against all odds. Who are these two lovers, you ask? Well, with this Couple Update, the question just got more interesting.

Haven originally let you play as Yu, the hot-headed mechanic and Kay, the cautious biologist. This free update introduces two new characters: Yu, the hot-headed mechanic; and Kay, the cautious biologist. Which means you’ll now be able to play with Yu & Kay, Yu & Kay, or even Yu & Kay.

Still confused? Ok let’s clarify a bit: while Haven originally let you play as a heterosexual couple, you will now be able to play as a same-gender couple.

It could feel like a small change, but Haven being a game about the freedom to love whomever you want, we’re really happy to provide more ways for players to identify with our precious couple.

Whoever you chose to play, the main story won’t change, nor will the personality of the characters. What will change is their design, models, art, animations, quite a few lines, and of course, their voices, since the 80,000 lines of dialog have been entirely re-voiced by our amazing voice actors, Lexie Ann Kendrick (Kay) and Ryan Highley (Yu).

When we first started to work on this update, soon after the release, I was curious, as a writer, about how the original dialogues would translate for these two new couples. Will some of them sound odd? Unnatural? After all, I wrote Kay as a man, and Yu as a woman, didn’t I?

I was pleasantly surprised to realize that, pronouns and minor details aside, almost nothing had to be edited. Overall, the alchemy between the characters remained unaffected.

As if characters weren’t determined by their gender. As if men and women could have the same interests, the same thoughts, the same feelings.

Funny.

We hope you’re as excited as we were to discover or rediscover your favorite couple. Oink, for once, can’t wait to meet his two new moms. Or dads.

Haven Couple Update is available for free on PC, PlayStation 5 & 4,Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S and Nintendo Switch.

Pierre Corbinais

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1win сегодня: актуальные зеркала для входа. Щедрые бонусы новым игрокам и турниры в 1win казино. Мобильные приложения 1вин доступны для iOS и Android.