{"id":35978,"date":"2024-08-26T18:24:07","date_gmt":"2024-08-26T09:24:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=35978"},"modified":"2024-08-26T18:24:13","modified_gmt":"2024-08-26T09:24:13","slug":"nintendo-looked-for-ways-to-automate-game-development-processes-without-losing-something-valuable-in-tears-of-the-kingdom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/nintendo-looked-for-ways-to-automate-game-development-processes-without-losing-something-valuable-in-tears-of-the-kingdom\/","title":{"rendered":"Nintendo looked for ways to automate game development processes \u201cwithout losing something valuable\u201d in Tears of the Kingdom\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

At Japan\u2019s Computer Entertainment Development Conference (CEDEC) held on August 23, Nintendo held a lecture on The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom\u2019s<\/strong> development (as reported by Famitsu<\/a>). The presentation, given by the dev team\u2019s lead QA engineer, environment programmer and lead terrain designer, focused on how Link\u2019s brand-new Ascend ability was implemented in TotK. It also revealed some interesting insights into what kinds of automated processes were used (and avoided) during the game\u2019s development. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of the biggest innovations Tears of the Kingdom brought to the Zelda series when compared to its predecessor, Breath of the Wild, was its vertically complex world \u2013 featuring aerial, ground and underground levels. The underground level \u2013 The Depths, is a system of over 200 caves that each allow a wide range of gameplay, making it one of the biggest additions to the game.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Tears<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The development teams\u2019 basic workflow when creating TotK\u2019s caves was: Conceptualization > Implementation > Playtesting. Based on the results of playtesting, things would go back to conceptualization, and the cycle would start once again. Going through this cycle multiple times was crucial for raising the game\u2019s entertainment value, according to lead terrain artist Takehara. That\u2019s why, TotK\u2019s team looked to automate parts of the development process in order to increase the number of cycles they could afford to perform. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHowever, if we were to pursue this blindly, the game could potentially end up losing something valuable,\u201d he notes. In order to prevent over-automation, the team started out by considering what aspects of the process they must not<\/em> make automatic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They decided that level design is at the core of the playing experience, and thus must be done \u201cby hand.\u201d The same goes for asset placement relevant to level design, such as where to put resources and enemy bases. Art too informs gameplay and shapes the playing experience, and thus needed to be overseen by real artists. Therefore, they decided that they would only automate processes that were not related to gameplay. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Procedural
Procedural decoration (Image via 4Gamer)<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Procedural
Procedural decoration (Image via Famitsu<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Based on this premise, they formulated the \u201ccave system\u201d \u2013 the optimal workflow for creating Totk\u2019s caves. The cave system introduces procedural modelling (controlled by artists) for areas that are \u201cdecorative\u201d and do not affect level design.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before introducing this workflow, in each cycle of \u201cConceptualization > Implementation > Playtesting,\u201d the team had to first finalize level design\/gameplay, and then do manual detailing as a separate process. After this step was complete, it was hard to go back and make gameplay changes, thus slowing down the cycle. However, using procedural modelling, TotK\u2019s team was able to work on both gameplay and art in parallel, without the two processes conflicting with each other. The \u201ccave-system\u201d proved to be so cost-effective that it went on to be implemented not only for caves but for generating stalactites and Sky Islands too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interestingly, Takehara also notes that this innovation changed the artists\u2019 mindset. Upon seeing that processes could be automated without losing creativity, they became eager to propose new ideas for further automation, rather than insisting on doing everything manually.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nintendo’s engineers talk about how they automated game development processes to create The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdoms caves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":35979,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[64,3],"tags":[17,63],"class_list":["post-35978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-game-development","category-news","tag-japan-related-news","tag-zelda"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"\nNintendo looked for ways to automate game development processes \u201cwithout losing something valuable\u201d in Tears of the Kingdom\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Nintendo's engineers talk about how they automated game development processes to create The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdoms caves.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/nintendo-looked-for-ways-to-automate-game-development-processes-without-losing-something-valuable-in-tears-of-the-kingdom\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Nintendo looked for ways to automate game development processes \u201cwithout losing something valuable\u201d in Tears of the Kingdom\u00a0 - 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