How Mirror's Edge gave legs (and more) to Battlefield 3
The dextrous legs of Mirror's Edge heroine Faith helped to shape the movement of characters in Battlefield 3, EA DICE general manager Karl Magnus Troedsson said in a speech today during GDC Europe. No, you don't spend too much time parkouring around the war torn arenas of Battlefield 3, but various animations - Faith vaulting over obstacles, for instance - directly shaped the way BF3's soldiers interacted with their environment.
"Not just the legs, but the actual movement," Troedsson told us in a followup. "So in BF3, when you jump over something, you can see the vaulting, etc. So the whole animation setup has actually changed quite a bit." Beyond just the animation, he said, it changed how first-person perspective was designed in Battlefield games. "Before in our games - before Mirror's Edge and before BF3 - the camera was actually just something that was floating. Now it actually sits on the animation rig that we have, which is a big difference."
When we pressed for more news on Mirror's Edge within DICE and the potential for a sequel, Troedsson was predictably coy. "How many people want it? We'll see. You have to wait and see," he said. "As I mentioned, we want to do other things in Battlefield, so of course making a sequel to a game like that could be an option moving forward." And hey, it if it helps DICE's "core franchise," it could be worthwhile even without the level of financial support Battlefield sees from fans. At least that's what we're hoping.
"Not just the legs, but the actual movement," Troedsson told us in a followup. "So in BF3, when you jump over something, you can see the vaulting, etc. So the whole animation setup has actually changed quite a bit." Beyond just the animation, he said, it changed how first-person perspective was designed in Battlefield games. "Before in our games - before Mirror's Edge and before BF3 - the camera was actually just something that was floating. Now it actually sits on the animation rig that we have, which is a big difference."
When we pressed for more news on Mirror's Edge within DICE and the potential for a sequel, Troedsson was predictably coy. "How many people want it? We'll see. You have to wait and see," he said. "As I mentioned, we want to do other things in Battlefield, so of course making a sequel to a game like that could be an option moving forward." And hey, it if it helps DICE's "core franchise," it could be worthwhile even without the level of financial support Battlefield sees from fans. At least that's what we're hoping.
