An incredibly quick update for you on that TLOU multiplayer game Naughty Dog’s been making for a while now: they’re working on the doors.
That might not sound like much of an update at first blush, but it’s a little more technical than that.
As spotted by Games Radar, a recent tweet by Maksym Zhuravlov, an animator on The Last of Us Part II, shed a little light on just how difficult it was to create the animation system that governed the game’s combat doors. “I remember when I finished the anim system for TLOU2’s combat doors, I thought “Maybe [a bit, sic] much. But it’s all done now. We have it and we gonna reuse it forever. Cause like what more one can possibly desire from this damned door? Right?” Oh boy. WAS. I. WRONG.”
I remember when I finished the anim system for TLOU2 combat doors, I thought “Maybe much. But it’s all done now. We have it and we gonna reuse it forever. Cause like what more one can possibly desire from this damned door? Right?“.
Oh boy
WAS. I. WRONG. pic.twitter.com/iAA4qrZVjg— Maksym Zhuravlov (@MaksZhuravlov) February 26, 2023
In the video provided by Zhuravlov, Ellie bursts through a door with different follow-through movements each time. The door needs to react correctly to her movements each time. It needs to move like a door, respond to physics the way a door would, but also not block the camera or snag on Ellie’s model. Every possible move a player could make in relation to that door has to be accounted for — do they run straight through? Open it and stop? Open it and backpedal? Open it and run to the left or right? In a tight arc? In a wide arc? Are the crouched? Are they opening the door from the front or from behind? All these interactions need to work across carefully staged cinematics and in real-time combat. It’s a great illustration of the things systems engineers and animators have to accommodate for well before the game ever finds its way into the player’s hands
And I don’t doubt that, at the time, Zhuravlov would have felt like they’d covered off absolutely everything a player could do to a door. Well, it turns out the system is still a work in progress.
One of the people that quote-tweeted Zhuravlov’s tweet was Vinit Agarwal, the co-game director on The Last of Us‘ multiplayer game. Agarwal confirmed that the doors are one of the systems currently being worked on for the game, and that Zhuravlov was indeed wrong that no-one would ever need to touch or modify their perfect door system ever again.
Working on doors in our current game and yes, @MaksZhuravlov was wrong unfortunately. https://t.co/Oibg8SKrqx
— Vinit Agarwal (@vinixkun) February 27, 2023
In a multiplayer game where combat is the primary activity, there’s going to be an endless list of potential player interactions. The doors are going to be a critical component once again.
Doors have proven to be a thorn in the side of video game developers everywhere for as long as the medium has been around. One of the real world’s simplest concepts — a moveable barrier that separates rooms from one another, or the inside from the outside — doors have long been considered one of the more challenging real-world objects to implement in a digital environment.
That tradition appears to be alive and well.
So there you go, TLOU multiplayer fans! Your update on the game’s status: they’re working on the doors.
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