{"id":67296,"date":"2026-05-27T23:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=67296"},"modified":"2026-05-28T09:44:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-28T00:44:09","slug":"wuthering-waves-is-full-of-beautiful-technical-headaches-that-would-make-the-average-ue-developer-say-please-dont-make-me-do-this","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/column\/wuthering-waves-is-full-of-beautiful-technical-headaches-that-would-make-the-average-ue-developer-say-please-dont-make-me-do-this\/","title":{"rendered":"Wuthering Waves is full of\u00a0beautiful\u00a0technical headaches\u00a0that would make the average\u00a0UE\u00a0developer\u00a0say\u00a0\u201cplease don\u2019t make me\u00a0do this.\u201d\u00a0From\u00a0Mornye\u2019s\u00a0crystal legs to\u00a0Camellya\u2019s\u00a0acrobatics\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Ever since its launch in 2024,&nbsp;Kuro Games\u2019 anime-style open-world RPG&nbsp;<strong>Wuthering Waves&nbsp;<\/strong>has earned praise for its&nbsp;impressive&nbsp;graphics.&nbsp;Although it&nbsp;doesn\u2019t&nbsp;take an expert to tell that&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;a&nbsp;beautiful&nbsp;looking game,&nbsp;the average player&nbsp;probably doesn\u2019t&nbsp;know what makes&nbsp;Wuthering&nbsp;Waves\u2019s&nbsp;level of quality stand out in a technical sense.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>With that in mind, AUTOMATON Japan spoke to Masahiko Nakamura, head of Indie-us Games and a technical artist well-versed in Unreal Engine, to break down the strengths of&nbsp;the game from the perspective of a game developer.&nbsp;In this&nbsp;installment, we explore from a technical perspective&nbsp;what\u2019s&nbsp;actually going&nbsp;on \u201cunder the hood\u201d in Wuthering Waves\u2019s highly praised visual direction and presentation.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can check out&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/column\/even-from-a-developers-perspective-wuthering-waves-use-of-unreal-engine-is-borderline-perverse-a-ue4-game-decked-out-in-custom-technology\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">part one of this series<\/a>&nbsp;for&nbsp;a look at Wuthering&nbsp;Waves\u2019s&nbsp;use of Unreal Engine&nbsp;4)&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Wuthering Waves Resonator Combat Showcase | Chisa\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/99Gb873nmQ4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"mornye-s-transparent-legs-are-something-many-developers-wouldn-t-even-attempt\">Mornye\u2019s&nbsp;transparent&nbsp;legs are something many developers&nbsp;wouldn\u2019t&nbsp;even attempt&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014We\u2019d&nbsp;like you to analyze some of Wuthering Waves\u2019 finer technical details.&nbsp;For example,&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;been a lot of talk on social media, about how detailed&nbsp;the&nbsp;hair&nbsp;physics on&nbsp;Chisa&nbsp;are.&nbsp;Is there some kind of special technique being used here?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>I believe the hair physics system is&nbsp;probably using&nbsp;a plugin called&nbsp;KawaiiPhysics, created by&nbsp;Okazu-san, who formerly worked at Epic Games and is now active independently. He mentioned it himself on X, so&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;a high chance the hair movement is thanks to&nbsp;KawaiiPhysics.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"ja\" dir=\"ltr\">\u304a\u3001\u9cf4\u6f6e (Wuthering Waves)\u3067 <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/KawaiiPhysics?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#KawaiiPhysics<\/a> \u3092\u5229\u7528\u3044\u305f\u3060\u3044\u3066\u308b\u307f\u305f\u3044\uff01\u3084\u3063\u305f\u30fc\uff01\uff01\uff01<br><br>\uff08Reddit\u306e\u30b9\u30ec\u30c3\u30c9\u3067\u30ed\u30b0\u306b\u66f8\u3044\u3066\u308b\u3068\u3042\u3063\u305f\u306e\u3067\u8a66\u3057\u306b\u307f\u3066\u307f\u305f\u3089\u2026\uff09<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/Kl54GgU4hg\">https:\/\/t.co\/Kl54GgU4hg<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/jBmksZFBDl\">pic.twitter.com\/jBmksZFBDl<\/a><\/p>&mdash; \u304a\u304b\u305a (@pafuhana1213) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/pafuhana1213\/status\/1811427969673703614?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">July 11, 2024<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>But&nbsp;actually, what\u2019s really impressive about the hair is the&nbsp;construction&nbsp;itself.&nbsp;Character hair&nbsp;contains&nbsp;internal \u201cbones,\u201d and those have been&nbsp;placed&nbsp;very carefully and&nbsp;thoroughly. On top of that, the skin weights, which&nbsp;determine&nbsp;how smoothly the polygons deform&nbsp;against the skeleton, have also been meticulously&nbsp;applied.&nbsp;What stands out most to me is the&nbsp;modelers\u2019 craftsmanship in carefully tuning&nbsp;everything&nbsp;so the hair moves naturally during animation.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014That\u2019s&nbsp;fascinating. Another thing that stands out in Wuthering Waves is the characters\u2019 eye movements. Players also&nbsp;often&nbsp;praise the game\u2019s facial expressions, but what are your thoughts on that?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>The&nbsp;depiction of&nbsp;highlights inside the eyes moving&nbsp;around&nbsp;isn\u2019t itself&nbsp;particularly difficult to achieve. With anime-style eyes, you can create something like three separate layers&nbsp;for&nbsp;the iris, the&nbsp;sclera, and the highlights,&nbsp;and control them individually.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>What\u2019s&nbsp;impressive here, though, is how carefully they synchronize the movements&nbsp;of the eyes, eyebrows, and mouth to express&nbsp;different&nbsp;emotions and facial expressions. Nowadays, facial animation is&nbsp;generally driven&nbsp;by facial tracking techniques. In Unreal&nbsp;Engine&nbsp;especially,&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;the famous&nbsp;MetaHuman&nbsp;service and toolset, which allows you to&nbsp;easily track and&nbsp;capture facial&nbsp;movement&nbsp;with just a camera.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Wuthering Waves Story Cinematics | Origin\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/DXRqVumTFh4?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>However, applying real human facial motions&nbsp;directly onto anime-style characters is extremely difficult and requires a huge amount of adjustment.&nbsp;That&#8217;s&nbsp;why,&nbsp;in the case of Wuthering Waves, I suspect they&nbsp;aren\u2019t&nbsp;relying very heavily on facial tracking.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014Does that mean it&nbsp;mostly comes&nbsp;down to manual&nbsp;animation?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>I think&nbsp;everything is&nbsp;manual, yes, including&nbsp;the facial expressions&nbsp;and&nbsp;the subtle&nbsp;\u201ctremble\u201d&nbsp;of the eyes.&nbsp;This is just speculation, but I imagine each cutscene has storyboards, and&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;someone directing exactly what kind of expression they want in each shot, giving detailed instructions for everything, and then the animators craft the expressions around that.&nbsp;That\u2019s&nbsp;my guess, anyway.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014So,&nbsp;although there\u2019s sophisticated technology underneath,&nbsp;the finer details&nbsp;ultimately come&nbsp;down to craftsmanship. From a player\u2019s perspective,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;easy to assume there must be some kind of \u201cmagic\u201d&nbsp;at work, but really,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;the accumulation of countless&nbsp;small details.<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>Yes, you can really feel the&nbsp;manpower&nbsp;behind it.&nbsp;I imagine they have a lot of highly skilled&nbsp;staff.&nbsp;The turnaround between updates&nbsp;is&nbsp;pretty short, but if you have enough talented staff, you can&nbsp;divide up&nbsp;the work and distribute the load, making large-scale production possible.&nbsp;Plus,&nbsp;if&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;a strong director overseeing everything and giving precise instructions, then you can create these&nbsp;kinds of&nbsp;incredibly elaborate, soulful&nbsp;scenes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014Was there anything that personally really impressed you in Wuthering Waves?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>I&#8217;d like to bring attention to the character&nbsp;Mornye, who was added in the&nbsp;latter&nbsp;half of Ver.3.0. Her lower body is transparent like glass, with these sparkling legs\u2026 Honestly,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;so impressive that&nbsp;I would&nbsp;never even&nbsp;want to&nbsp;attempt&nbsp;it.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1080\" height=\"608\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1080px) 100vw, 1080px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-001-1080x608-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-67298\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-001-1080x608-1.jpg 1080w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-001-1080x608-1-380x214.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-001-1080x608-1-768x432.jpg 768w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014(Laughs) You&nbsp;<\/strong><strong><em>wouldn\u2019t&nbsp;<\/em><\/strong><strong>want to?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>One of the&nbsp;classic examples of&nbsp;things game developers&nbsp;don&#8217;t&nbsp;want to deal with is translucency. With translucent&nbsp;objects, you&nbsp;need to&nbsp;make them see-through so that the objects&nbsp;behind them&nbsp;are also visible, but modern games&nbsp;(not just Unreal Engine-developed titles)&nbsp;have a technical problem where it becomes extremely difficult to&nbsp;determine&nbsp;the rendering order of overlapping translucent&nbsp;objects.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Games use something called a G-Buffer&nbsp;to&nbsp;render&nbsp;various graphical effects. By combining G-Buffers, developers can later&nbsp;composite&nbsp;various visual effects together. But the weakness of this method is that it&nbsp;loses the ability to&nbsp;properly preserve translucency&nbsp;information partway through.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The buffer&nbsp;essentially&nbsp;treats&nbsp;front-and-back depth relationships&nbsp;as&nbsp;2D information instead of full 3D data. Because of that, engines like Unreal&nbsp;Engine&nbsp;use separate rendering methods specifically for translucent&nbsp;objects. Within the rendering pipeline, translucent materials follow an entirely different rendering route from ordinary 3D meshes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That approach lets&nbsp;developers&nbsp;preserve depth relationships&nbsp;to some extent in&nbsp;3D space, but&nbsp;that\u2019s&nbsp;where&nbsp;another major problem&nbsp;arises:&nbsp;effects. Once particle effects and translucent objects overlap, the engine can no longer properly&nbsp;determine&nbsp;which one should appear in front&nbsp;of the other.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>And yet, Mornye&nbsp;constantly has transparent legs&nbsp;while&nbsp;effects&nbsp;appear&nbsp;around her, and it all still looks natural. Honestly, I can only assume they struggled tremendously with this and are doing&nbsp;something&nbsp;special behind the scenes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Wuthering Waves Resonator Combat Showcase | Mornye\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Hr6ltK-p4pg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>An ordinary developer would never want to do&nbsp;something&nbsp;this\u2026 (laughs). If someone told me to implement&nbsp;this,&nbsp;I\u2019d&nbsp;probably&nbsp;ask&nbsp;them to give up or make it opaque instead.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014So&nbsp;you&nbsp;reckon&nbsp;there really might be some kind of&nbsp;\u201cwizardry\u201d&nbsp;behind&nbsp;Mornye\u2019s&nbsp;transparency?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>(Laughs) From a technical standpoint, I\u2019m&nbsp;pretty curious about&nbsp;it. I really want KURO GAMES to explain how they did it, though I&nbsp;think&nbsp;only a&nbsp;small number of&nbsp;developers like me even care about this sort of thing.&nbsp;To sum things up,&nbsp;Mornye&nbsp;is amazing. Her animations are impressive too, but the technical foundation behind&nbsp;the character&nbsp;is also incredibly impressive.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"camellya-the-kind-of-character-who-makes-developers-cry\"><strong>Camellya, the kind of character who makes developers cry<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014In Ver. 3.1, an update was implemented that made characters\u2019 feet properly align with&nbsp;stairs&nbsp;when&nbsp;going up and down&nbsp;steps, which also got players talking on social media.&nbsp;I believe this has&nbsp;become&nbsp;fairly&nbsp;common in modern games,&nbsp;but&nbsp;is&nbsp;there&nbsp;any particular&nbsp;difficulty involved in&nbsp;achieving&nbsp;realistic&nbsp;feet positioning?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>In UE5,&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;already a template feature for matching foot placement on stairs, so&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;not like&nbsp;people use&nbsp;some especially extraordinary&nbsp;technology for it&nbsp;nowadays. However, there is one really impressive thing connected to this whole foot-placement-on-stairs topic, and that\u2019s the attack animations of the character&nbsp;Camellya.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014She\u2019s&nbsp;one of the earlier Wuthering Waves characters, right?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>That\u2019s right. Camellya\u2019s&nbsp;animations are obviously&nbsp;amazing&nbsp;to begin with, but&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;this&nbsp;one move&nbsp;among&nbsp;her attack combos&nbsp;where she&nbsp;balances on&nbsp;one leg while swinging the other leg in a full circular motion from back to front,&nbsp;almost like&nbsp;rhythmic gymnastics. Even while&nbsp;she\u2019s&nbsp;in that one-legged stance,&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;still a mechanism&nbsp;in place that correctly restores&nbsp;her&nbsp;foot positioning.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"\u300e\u9cf4\u6f6e\u300f\u8a18\u4e8b\u5185\u52d5\u753b\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ylV4lC4gS2w?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The technology used to properly handle stair movement is called IK (Inverse Kinematics). With IK,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;relatively easy&nbsp;to move a foot forward and plant it in the correct position. But having a foot swing all the way around from behind and then return to its original position like that usually&nbsp;isn\u2019t&nbsp;something the system is designed to account for.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014Now that you mention it,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;not exactly the kind of movement you see very often in the first place.<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>And yet,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;built in a way where IK processing still works perfectly without the&nbsp;form of the&nbsp;body&nbsp;being compromised&nbsp;at all, so I think&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;probably some&nbsp;sophisticated technical control going on there.&nbsp;It\u2019s&nbsp;also an enormous&nbsp;hassle,&nbsp;so&nbsp;from the perspective of someone making games,&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;another thing&nbsp;I\u2019d&nbsp;probably just&nbsp;opt not to even attempt&#8230; (laughs).&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014(Laughs)&nbsp;So, the stair technology itself is&nbsp;fairly standard,&nbsp;but Kuro Games is&nbsp;taking on challenges in related areas.<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>Yes. And&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;not just&nbsp;stairs,&nbsp;slopes&nbsp;are&nbsp;tricky too. Even a single rock can be troublesome. Rock surfaces are uneven, which means&nbsp;collision detection&nbsp;isn\u2019t&nbsp;smooth either.&nbsp;So even for something as simple as placing a foot on top of&nbsp;a&nbsp;rock,&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;usually a&nbsp;good deal&nbsp;of adjustment work done behind the scenes to prevent things from breaking visually.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1080\" height=\"608\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1080px) 100vw, 1080px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-002-1080x608-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-67299\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-002-1080x608-1.jpg 1080w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-002-1080x608-1-380x214.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-002-1080x608-1-768x432.jpg 768w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>On top of that, character height changes things too. In other games, when developers try to use IK for stair movement on short characters, if the steps are too high,&nbsp;the system can fail to process them correctly, so sometimes they end up \u201cadjusting the staircase height to fit the character.\u201d&nbsp;It\u2019s something&nbsp;environment&nbsp;artists have to take into account as much as engineers do.&nbsp;So even&nbsp;with&nbsp;IK processing, matching foot placement properly is still&nbsp;a complex&nbsp;task. As for&nbsp;Camellya, not only does she have that leg-swinging motion I mentioned earlier, but her whole design is&nbsp;generally very&nbsp;demanding, so I imagine&nbsp;they\u2019ve&nbsp;spent an enormous amount of time fine-tuning her.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014Incidentally,&nbsp;there\u2019s&nbsp;also an animation where&nbsp;Camellya&nbsp;is suspended&nbsp;by vines&nbsp;from above. What do you think of that?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>That also looks incredibly demanding\u2026 honestly,&nbsp;I\u2019m&nbsp;not even entirely sure how&nbsp;they\u2019re&nbsp;controlling it. I doubt&nbsp;they\u2019re&nbsp;using actual physics simulation there, but if physics were involved, it would become unbelievably complicated. The vines would need to stretch and contract like springs in response to the&nbsp;character\u2019s&nbsp;movement, and that would affect all sorts of other elements too. It also seems like it would be extremely difficult to create with motion capture, so it might even be&nbsp;hand-animated. Either way,&nbsp;Camellya&nbsp;really feels like the kind of character who makes developers cry.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"\u300e\u9cf4\u6f6e\u300f\u8a18\u4e8b\u5185\u52d5\u753b\" width=\"1160\" height=\"653\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/dB54zzcLIkA?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014It\u2019s&nbsp;fascinating how&nbsp;even&nbsp;among&nbsp;fellow&nbsp;developers,&nbsp;there&nbsp;are&nbsp;all sorts of expressions that seem almost unimaginable&nbsp;to recreate.<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"a-ue4-title-with-lighting-on-par-with-ue5-games\">A UE4 title with&nbsp;lighting&nbsp;on par with UE5 games&nbsp;<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014Another thing I wanted to ask about&nbsp;is&nbsp;Wuthering&nbsp;Waves\u2019 lighting. It gives off a slightly faded look that enhances the atmosphere of&nbsp;scenes. What did you think of it?<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>KURO GAMES has integrated&nbsp;Lumen, one of UE5\u2019s signature features&nbsp;into UE4&nbsp;for Wuthering Waves, so the visual quality of the lighting has definitely improved. Also, starting from Ver. 2.4,&nbsp;the game&nbsp;added an&nbsp;\u201cUltra&nbsp;Quality\u201d&nbsp;graphics setting,&nbsp;where&nbsp;various features beyond just Lumen are enabled.&nbsp;That further improves the quality of the lighting, and&nbsp;they\u2019re&nbsp;also pushing post-processing effects to the absolute limit, so the visuals end up looking extremely rich.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1080\" height=\"608\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1080px) 100vw, 1080px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-003-1080x608-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-67300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-003-1080x608-1.jpg 1080w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-003-1080x608-1-380x214.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-003-1080x608-1-768x432.jpg 768w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>While these are&nbsp;features&nbsp;exclusive to the Ultra Quality mode, they deliver truly high-end graphics.&nbsp;I&nbsp;imagine&nbsp;the developers&nbsp;are&nbsp;consulting with companies like NVIDIA and doing extensive research as well. Even though the game should technically belong to the UE4 generation, there are areas&nbsp;where&nbsp;it\u2019s&nbsp;implementing&nbsp;technology on par with UE5, especially when it comes to lighting.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014I see. As someone who casually plays Wuthering Waves, it was interesting&nbsp;to&nbsp;hear&nbsp;parts&nbsp;of the&nbsp;game\u2019s&nbsp;presentation&nbsp;dissected&nbsp;like this.<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Nakamura:<\/strong>&nbsp;<br>This is all just my speculation, of course (laughs), but I think Wuthering Waves has reached a point where you can feel the developers\u2019 passion and hard work bleeding through in ways that technology alone&nbsp;can\u2019t&nbsp;explain. The people making it are clearly creating what they genuinely want to create, and every single character feels incredibly rich no matter what aspect you look at.&nbsp;There\u2019s&nbsp;an enormous amount of detail and&nbsp;visual effects&nbsp;packed into them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>That said, I\u2019m sure KURO GAMES is actually doing things far beyond what I\u2019ve guessed here.&nbsp;Someday,&nbsp;I\u2019d&nbsp;love to compare answers with them and find out&nbsp;what\u2019s&nbsp;really going on behind the scenes. (laughs)&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>\u2014Thank you for your time!<\/strong>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1080\" height=\"608\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1080px) 100vw, 1080px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-004-1080x608-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-67301\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-004-1080x608-1.jpg 1080w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-004-1080x608-1-380x214.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/wuwa-20260406-434901-004-1080x608-1-768x432.jpg 768w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/wutheringwaves.kurogames.com\/en\/main\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Wuthering Waves<\/a>&nbsp;is available as a free-to-play title on iOS, Android, PS5, and PC (Windows\/Steam\/Epic Games Store\/Mac App Store).&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Indie-us Games is currently developing&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/store.steampowered.com\/app\/2088020\/UNDEFEATED_Genesis\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">UNDEFEATED: Genesis<\/a>&nbsp;in Unreal Engine.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We talk to Japanese game developer Masahiko Nakamura about what makes Wuthering Waves impressive, or even intimidating, from a technical perspective.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":41,"featured_media":67297,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[11,64],"tags":[17],"class_list":["post-67296","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-column","category-game-development","tag-japan-related-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - 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