I recently played through Battlefield 3 on PC (yes I know I'm a bit behind the times, but I got it free from the SimCity debacle, but lets not dwell on THAT clusterfudge...)
Playing through the single player campaign, I noticed a fair amount of bugs, especially in the animations (must be my Animation QA tester background...)
The 2nd mission "Operation Swordbreaker" has a fair amount of animation glitches in it's first 12 minutes. A compilation of the worst is below:
There are many similar issues throughout the game. If your characters are going to be playing canned animations while carrying these weapons and equipment, then surely fix the animations where they clip, it just breaks the immersion in the world, and it isn't like the equipment being carried is dynamic, surely the same equipment is always carried and these issues are always seen occuring?
This is the 2nd mission in the game, surely one of the most viewed areas of the game, and its not that well polished? This was even used as the gameplay footage used to show off the game so surely it should have been spot on and perfect?
I was especially surprised to find some gimbal glitches in a pre-rendered cutscene, especially one near the end of the game...
*SPOILERS* (seriously, this game is over a year old, but just in case)
The player camera clips through what appears to be the players arm, casuing a visible artifact on the screen
Again these are things that we worked extremely hard to avoid and fix at Eurocom, so how they can slip through EA and DICE is a surprise, especially again, as this is the final climactic moment of the campaign.
The next couple of issues are not 100% reproducible, and the first appears to occur most after a checkpoint reload, or load game after completing the game
The driver of the player's car in the previous script as well as an onlooking NPC can be seen to be T-posing (or the Jesus pose, similar to that that afflicted players in the NBA Elite demo from 2010)
And now in Jpg form...
Again, totally avoidable and something that we would have been crucified (pun intended) for at Eurocom.
This then brings me to the very final cinematic, but it can also affect the final QTE. The player HUD, direction and weapon / ammo count can sometimes appear overlaid on the final video
This was again something we used to fight with, and should really be handled by the video player to prevent any overlays, if not at least an event during the final QTE to hide / remove the HUD.
There are other animation issues, as well as scripting issues throughout Battlefield 3 and with my background of testing and then producing and setting up animations it annoys me that other developers have the same issues that we busted our balls to fix at Eurocom and are happy to ship with. Some may say "it was probably spotted by QA and waived by management", this may be true, but that highlights the lack of polish and pride that can be found in game studios, at least at upper levels anyway, and how little respect and attention is paid to the animations that make up the game and create the chracters and world that are so essential to most modern games.
Playing through the single player campaign, I noticed a fair amount of bugs, especially in the animations (must be my Animation QA tester background...)
The 2nd mission "Operation Swordbreaker" has a fair amount of animation glitches in it's first 12 minutes. A compilation of the worst is below:
This is the 2nd mission in the game, surely one of the most viewed areas of the game, and its not that well polished? This was even used as the gameplay footage used to show off the game so surely it should have been spot on and perfect?
I was especially surprised to find some gimbal glitches in a pre-rendered cutscene, especially one near the end of the game...
This isn't really excusable. Yes it is captured from the game engine, but being pre-rendered and near the climax of the campaign, you would think that more care would have been lavished on it. Now, this may just be on PC but I doubt it as the same video would be converted and used on each platform.
This sets up the final level, one that I found a fair number of bugs in, especially for one that is sos short and features a QTE that doesn't have that many outcomes to be tested.
The full level playthrough of "The Great Destroyer" is here:
Theres quite a few scripting bugs to deal with before I highlight the animation issues in the QTE.
As the player runs along there are a few areas where, once you've got your mitts on a firearm, the player needs to jump down through a couple of holes. Now, the best practice here would be to ensure the player can drop down safely and deal with the threats following the canned jump down animation, but no...
Here the player can still shoot while jumping down, and empty the clip, leaving themselves vulnerable to attack from the enemy below. Not a nice piece of design, especially if the player isn't expecting the enemy, the canned jump down animation, or indeed the enemy below. As in my capture the player lands with an empty clip and the reload plays itself out without triggering the reload... animation.
This one has the same issue, but is a lot more severe as there are more enemies and a distinct lack of cover once the player has landed and reacted to the situation...
These issues were ones we had to deal with a lot while working on GoldenEye (both Wii and Reloaded) and 007 Legends, and required an event in the animation to prevent this. I'm sure if Eurocom could solve this problem then a technical and talented studio like DICE could solve it too...
This isn't the only issue with scripting I had while playing through the level. As I sprinted towards a ladder to complete the objective, the trigger failed to activate, leaving me stranded at the bottom of the ladder unable to continue... Luckily, after backing up and trying again it activated...
This is a pressurised rush to the end of the level and these kind of bugs break the immersion. If i hadn't been aware of what the issue was / what to do, the player could have been wandering around that area for a while wondering what the hell to do... not nice.
Then there's the scripted car chase immediately following this (if you manage to trigger the ladder climb ;) )
The player is chasing down the big bad Solomon in a scripted chase, at the end of the chase Solomon's car hits a barrier to trigger the final QTE.
Just before this the wheels of his car are clipping through the floor...
This would be excusable if this was dynamic but as it is a scripted animation it is surprising as surely it plays out the same everytime and should have been picked up.
Oooh, time for a nice QTE to finish the game...
I found a couple of issues here, one that is repeatable 100% (at least on my PC settings)The next couple of issues are not 100% reproducible, and the first appears to occur most after a checkpoint reload, or load game after completing the game
The driver of the player's car in the previous script as well as an onlooking NPC can be seen to be T-posing (or the Jesus pose, similar to that that afflicted players in the NBA Elite demo from 2010)
and the NPC who is so shocked he has reset himself to Zero pose
This then brings me to the very final cinematic, but it can also affect the final QTE. The player HUD, direction and weapon / ammo count can sometimes appear overlaid on the final video
There are other animation issues, as well as scripting issues throughout Battlefield 3 and with my background of testing and then producing and setting up animations it annoys me that other developers have the same issues that we busted our balls to fix at Eurocom and are happy to ship with. Some may say "it was probably spotted by QA and waived by management", this may be true, but that highlights the lack of polish and pride that can be found in game studios, at least at upper levels anyway, and how little respect and attention is paid to the animations that make up the game and create the chracters and world that are so essential to most modern games.