115376-in-game-cinematics-feedback

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Hey folks, my name is Jarrod and I’m an animator for Carbine’s cinematics department.  I’m looking for some feedback regarding our in-game cinematics and would love to hear from the community.  My feeling from reading these forums is that we could do more to help immerse the player in Wildstar’s story and I want to gauge players’ interests in having more in-game cinematics.
 
1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!	
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{| class="blockquote"
Hey folks, my name is Jarrod and I’m an animator for Carbine’s cinematics department.  I’m looking for some feedback regarding our in-game cinematics and would love to hear from the community.  My feeling from reading these forums is that we could do more to help immerse the player in Wildstar’s story and I want to gauge players’ interests in having more in-game cinematics.
 
1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!
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I really don't know if this is a Carbine person as they seem to universally have a Studio Staff tag, but it's an interesting topic.
 
Over the course of the weekend, I had the opportunity to reinstall Wildstar from scratch (nothing to do with Wildstar, just long overdue maintenance and needing to fix something I did to Windows 8.0 a long time ago).  So when starting up Wildstar again, naturally it played the opening cinematic.
 
Man, that is STILL cool.
 
I think the choice to inject a cinematic needs to be judged on a few criteria
* are you showing something new?
* are you showing something that couldn't be displayed in a better way?
* are you showing something that upon repetition is going to get old?
 
And I'm sure there's more, but those are big shooters.
 
So, in the first question, let's take the brief cinematic that flashes at the end of killing the World Destroyer with Drusera.  Blowing up a world destroyer isn't super new (there's the one in Algoroc you mess with) but the method is somewhat new.  But, what makes that one actually kind of interesting is NOT the world destroyer in my mind.  No, rather it's the brief close up of Drusera animated with facial expressions.  And hearing the PC voice for I think the first time.  That's definitely new.  We never see Dru up close, and we never see her face animate any other time that I'm aware of (possibly for good reason -- I don't know if she honestly has typical emotional responses).  Also it was kind of funny, so that's a plus.
 
Second question, let's consider the cinematic that plays when Artemis Zin and Dorian Walker are in front of Tresayne when interrupted by a strain corrupted Torine.  Are we seeing anything new?  Nope.  Are we seeing something that couldn't be displayed in a better way?  I think here the answer is also no.  That cinematic just sort of makes me cringe.  I know there are MST3K love in Wildstar from way back, but that one just reeks of B-movie horror and doesn't feel dramatic, doesn't feel necessary.
 
Finally, repetition.  There really needs to be a clickable box, or option for not reshowing cinematics.  Entering Stormtalon's Lair every time?  Have to walk forward and rapidly hit escape to exit out of the cinematic.  Stormtalon's "birth"?  Really needs to go past the first time you see it.  I'm sure there are others.  Dungeons are done repeatedly, please let us get rid of that stuff.  Dungeon flow is NOT casual "let's see what's pretty" mode.  (not saying anything hardcore vs. casual here, just saying when entering a vet dungeon, we're on a timer, I'd like to get to business without interruptions).  Also Stormtalon's "birth" is quite screwy in that you never know exactly when he's "live" until he decides to go after someone.  He doesn't start neutral and then go hostile.  As the tank, and not having a spammable initial opening, I'm really annoyed when I launch and then find out that I was a second off of his "live"ness.
 
I don't think it really has to do with how LONG the cinematic is (though too long is bad natch, but dialing it down to how many seconds is good?  think it varies a lot).  But it does matter a LOT with story presentation that you're making a distinct and conscious choice that the cinematic is the BEST way to relate something.	
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{| class="blockquote"
Hey folks, my name is Jarrod and I’m an animator for Carbine’s cinematics department.  I’m looking for some feedback regarding our in-game cinematics and would love to hear from the community.  My feeling from reading these forums is that we could do more to help immerse the player in Wildstar’s story and I want to gauge players’ interests in having more in-game cinematics.
 
1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!
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			The Lopp Wedding would be awesome to have a cinematic for. Done the quest a few times now, and didn't even realize the ceremony was happening the first two times.	
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			If you are a Carbine employee shouldn't you have a staff tag? If I recall from the CoC it's not allowed to impersonate an employee, so if you aren't one then your breaking the CoC.	
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If you are a Carbine employee shouldn't you have a staff tag? If I recall from the CoC it's not allowed to impersonate an employee, so if you aren't one then your breaking the CoC.
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Great feedback already, thank you and please keep it coming. 
In regards to the “staff tag”, I’m working on getting that resolved.  This is technically my first post, so I’m testing the waters a bit with this.	
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Great feedback already, thank you and please keep it coming. 
In regards to the “staff tag”, I’m working on getting that resolved.  This is technically my first post, so I’m testing the waters a bit with this.
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			I think there should be cinematics for each new zone you visit for the first time. But any more during story quests would be nice.	
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{| class="blockquote"
Great feedback already, thank you and please keep it coming. 
In regards to the “staff tag”, I’m working on getting that resolved.  This is technically my first post, so I’m testing the waters a bit with this.
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What about short cinematics early in the game to show off plateau achievements.  For instance, moments like buying your first mount, building your first house, picking a tradeskill, etc.
 
As I leveled up, the +5 group quests didn't "mean" anything to me. I didn't get why I needed to rush and battle this particular boss.  And when I finally showed up to the target, he/she was just sitting there.  Could there be cinematics to help illustrate their danger or importance?  But I also don't want to sit through a cinematic every time I fight scorchwing.
 
I'd like to see more cinematics that introduce me to the faction characters like Arwick Redleaf.   
I felt like there were cinematics that nicely ended zone stories, but I don't remember the cinematics that started the zone stories.  Maybe that's just me.
 
Can cinematics replace loading screens?  For instance when you transwarp to your spawn location, can there be a short travel video?
 
Drusera's stuff really helped to spark a new interest in the lore for me.  Love her voice and her appearance animation is great.	
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I think there should be cinematics for each new zone you visit for the first time. But any more during story quests would be nice.
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			Im glad your asking feedback for this, i have quite a few things id like to share. Firstly wildstar's lore, world, and story is great, really great. So great in fact that its a real shame the game doesnt communicate that enough, which is why im glad your asking for feedback.One of the main issues for me (which probably isnt your job), is lack of voice overs, and easy to read (extra quest text), which i solved with a mod.also the poor communication to scientists that they have extra lore to read and unlock.Beyond that and more appropriate to you, is the cinematics.The amount you have are too few, but what you do have is really good.I would really like to see the games original cinematic (the pretty exile one with the explorer scientist and soldier). Added to the game, much like you would get from a blizzard title. These really get you invested.In terms of frequency i would like to see a cinematic at the end of every zone. Very much like the way the earlier zones where set up. It is clear each zone was meant to finish with some kind of epic public event accompanied by a cinematic. If each zone could continue this theme, that would be fantastic. I loved the public quests in algoroc and ellevar, i just wish there where more, and they scaled. Currently there is no obvious point at which i finish a zone, wilderun was a great example, i just kind of ran out of stuff to do. It wasnt clear i had reached a pivotal moment in the plot, and now should venture elsewhere. Alot of that is quest flow design and not cinematics. But if you had a cinematic tied to the end of every zone in a way that made it clear this was what everything was building up to and now adventure lies elswhere, that would be great and really hammer home that "theme park" experience the game is going for.Loading Screen.World cohesion is a big issue too, i dont feel like the world is alive or interconnected, there are a lot of loading screens to hop all around the zones. Thats not a cinematic problem, and its a big technical challenge to solve, but given the number of screens i see when traveling between continents and off world, Maybe there is a way for you to capitalise on that.Im thinking, what about a take off and landing sequence for the trip to farside? (think destinys loading screens). It would help hide the loading screen, and at least visually make me feel like i was traveling somewhere. What about a flight sequence between the continents? Kind of like the intro to levian bay? How cool would it be if i landed inside a ship everytime i went to malgrave and got off it like i did when going to levian bay. Keep it short and sweet, and that would be cool.I will save my last point for my next post, as its a big one, and needs its one space :PThanks for reading so far! 	
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1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
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			Keep it inside the Game or use it inside the game, in addition to promotion.Finally, and most importantly. This is a hard one to explain, but i guess i would call it, keeping the best videos/cinematics inside the game or use them inside the game in addition to using them for promotion.The BEST cinematic experiences i ever had in wildstar, where OUTSIDE wildstar... Consitently. Every Dev speak, and every cinematic (ie: warplots, housing, classes etc:) Where miles better than anything i got in the game. What is in the game is good, but what is outside the game is soooo much better! They communicate to the player the tone of wildstar and its world its characters, the reason i feel let down by the games cinematics, is becuase all the attention went to promotional stuff. I want ok promotion and great in game experiences, not vice versa.One of the main reasons i want more voice overs for the game, is becuase i know how frigging great characters like malvolio, kit brinny, and the care taker are, as shown to me in the cinematics. How robbed i felt when they hardly every spoke to me or made an appearance in game...So..... What can we do about this?Well firstly i feel all future marketing videos need to be designed with the explicit intent of being used both for promotion and ingame use.If you make a video about shades eve, or a new zone. Make it intentionally so it will appear in game and also make sense. Design the fly through, the information, and the visuals to serve a duel purpose. Knowing how great the cinematics team is, i want to see there skills fully deployed in game!Secondly, re purpose current material, there is so much great content already existing, and ready to go into the game.Carbine is designing an entire dungeon to teach players how to run dungeons! Interrupt Armour telegraphs etc:Meanwhile the cinematics team has already made an entire series of videos that does that! Why are they not in the game! Im sure the programmers and lore people can think of a way to make it make sense. Have a room maybe inside the archships dedicated to instructional video training, allowing players to watch them at their own leisure in game. Or just break the 4th wall and add them to a tutorial interface. Either way, id rather lose immersion and watch a frost vid, than not, these videos are literally that good and instructional.And the cinematics! Take the Protostar Housing cinematic and attach it to a screen outside the protostar housing HQ's, and have it all over there promotional screens in the game. It would fit perfectly as a promotional tool to get people into housing, and it fits the world/lore perfectly.Take the classes video and put in in the character creation screen, take the warplots video and put it on a protostar advertisement banner infront of the pvp vendors and in the world.Interactive advertisements could be a thing in the game world. Kind of a "would you like to know more" situation :)One of the things this game communicated so well was its personality, but it communicated the bulk of that personality in the form of promotional material, which is fine as long as the in game expereience also matches that quality. But it currently falls short, so lets get that experience into the game too and i think it would really help people to understand widlstar isn't just a wow clone, widlstar has its own identity and it frigging rules!Hope this feedback helps! Keep up the great work, you guys are in many ways the creators of first impressions in Wildstar, do us proud :)	
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I have combined these two questions because I'd like to address this in more of a 'what works and what didn't' sort of way.
 
Firstly, I'd like to say that I'd like to see more cinematics for main quest storylines with major faction characters involved. I'd also like to see more zone introduction cinematics, not the interrupting kind that show a panning overview, but like... to use an example as Dom, when you first go to Wilderrun and talk to Toric- the Toric conversation being a cinematic.
 
Now to get into that "what works" part-
 
An example of something that didn't work as it stands as a cinematic (I will be using low level examples, but will spoiler them anyway), from the Northern Wilds:
 
When Deadeye's wife dies, the ship explosion is very ineffective. Firstly it doesn't even feature her going into the ship. Then it goes on to show the explosion from an impersonal and rather boring viewpoint.
 
To make it even worse, once I exited out the action of the cinematic still played in the game world- and this was a FAR FAR superior form of it, because you could run up to the ship and watch it from a far more personal and action packed viewpoint. Does that mean watching action play out in the game world is always superior? No. Does it mean this specific instance it shouldn't be a cinematic? No. What it means is the current cinematic doesn't do anything for impact, and comes off as lazy and boring.
 
 
Generally things that work show action up close and personal, or show characters up close and personal- they make you feel the moment that much more vibrantly.
 
An example of something that didn't work because it WAS NOT a cinematic, from Deradune:
 
Generally, all the main quests involving Lex, but especially the END of his arc in Deradune. When he comes out of stealth and executes Arkos, the impact of the moment is pretty much lost by having it happen in the game world. The scene could be made so much more effective by having a cinematic that got up close and personal with the characters. And it could be used to show Lex being more physically intimidating to the player character, instead of just standing there.
 
 
 
No clue, I haven't played Exile much at all.
 
 
As often as needed or even possible for main quest storylines. But there is a qualifier here- I don't want my "gameplay interrupted" at all. I want the cinematics to be connected to NPCs or in 'safe places.' One of the most annoying things that has occurred to me in the game was having a fight interrupted by the Blighthaven cinematic- if you want zone overview cinematics like that, make sure they're either connected to an NPC that can be activated or in a location where you're likely not fighting mobs.
 
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With those questions answered, I'd like to mention a few more things about cinematics.
 
1. Audio desyncing with visuals in cinematics.
 
I'm uncertain what causes this, but it seems especially prevalent, and get progressively worse the longer the servers are from a maintenance. At least that's what seems to cause it from my monitoring of it through the introductory cinematics. I'm uncertain if it has something to do with my computer settings, as I tried reinstalling and many other things to see if they were causing it. But it seems to be server based from my observations, and generally disappears the day of a maintenance. I could be off, but I'd like to see if whatever is causing it could be fixed.
 
2. The ability to replay cinematics if I so wish.
 
I like to review story content sometimes, and it'd be quite nice to be able to return to a zone and see the cinematics again from some kind of viewing console. It would be doubly nice to be able to review all the main quest storyline dialogue from said viewing console, as well.
 
3. A text warning in a quest dialog that a cinematic will fire when I pick it.
 
Something along the lines of {"I've been told you need help here." (Play Cinematic)} instead of just {"I've been told you need help here."}. I peronally like to know when cinematics are going to happen. This could also be used to skip cinematics, for the people that don't like them, and have a {"I've been told you need help here." (Skip Cinematic)} option.
 
4. The ability to play the Introductory pre-rendered game movies from the main menu.
 
The one that plays once when you start the game the first time and then never again, and the faction introductions when you first create a character.
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I think my favourite cinematic moment, surprisingly enough, was when as a lvl 1 Draken I was first swimming up onto the shore of Crimson Isle, creeped up over that rock, and had that sneering facial expression. It was so... emotive.
We VERY rarely see our characters with any facial expression, and seeing that on my characters face did a lot to connect me to it.
 
Now there's a flip side to that.
 
The only time I've heard my characters voice was way later on... and I'm like '... really?'Nailing how a player thinks their character's voice should sound is a near impossible task. I've never played a game where I was even half satisfied with voice selection options, so best to just leave them out. Heck, leaving the character as a mute keeps the immersion because it doesn't make the character say anything the player isn't saying.
 
Mind you, you could comically get around this by having the character maybe jumping away from an explosion with their mouth moving amongst a series of BLEEP BLEEP BLEEPING BLEEEPs.	
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Hey folks, my name is Jarrod and I’m an animator for Carbine’s cinematics department.  I’m looking for some feedback regarding our in-game cinematics and would love to hear from the community.  My feeling from reading these forums is that we could do more to help immerse the player in Wildstar’s story and I want to gauge players’ interests in having more in-game cinematics.
 
1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!
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Cinematics can be a great thing in any game, but they have to be right, and feel natural. If you use too many, it gets a bit stale, and doesn't feel as special, but if you sporadically throw one or two every 30 levels, then it seems like a second-thought kind of thing, and robs the special feeling it could have. They also have to be done well, and be believable. A lot of the cinematics are kind of bland (no offense to you), in that you're throwing effects onto props, and the props stay the same. For example, I just did the Phage Cannon quests, and the cannon just has some fire show up on it, and a bit of smoke show up. It's much more believable if you had chunks flying off the cannon, and perhaps have the barrel blow open, so it really looks destroyed. As it is, the cinematics are kind of lackluster.
 
I haven't seen enough cinematics in the game to comment on whether the factions feel balanced, or what my favorite one is. So I'll skip questions 2 and 3.
 
In a story-driven game, like Wildstar, I would like to see cinematics at pivotal story points in the game. When you make your character, you get a cutscene; when you go to Nexus, you get a cutscene -- that's a good rhythm! They don't have to be long or overly complex, but they should feel like they mean something, and they should help illustrate what's going on. Every few levels, feels like a good pace, maybe one or two cutscenes per zone, maybe more depending on the size and amount of story going on, to show some big part of the story for that area.
 
Right now, we have action cutscenes, that show some kind of something going on - whether a tree is being blown up, or Zin found the Elder Cube, or the Phage Cannon is blowing up - they show action. I think the game could use a few more narrative cutscenes. Like how GW2 had vistas, and this game has Explorer beacons that give you a video tour of an area, you could make some cutscenes that involve that same process, but have the Halo announcer guy talking -- you know in the tutorials how you have that guy talking about the area, and explaining the story? You could turn that into a narrative cutscene, that shows an overview of what's going on, and perhaps you could add some scenes to help illustrate that. Also, when you walk into Thayd or Illium, it's kind of underwhelming. You get told about the next zone, and your city feels kind of unimportant. I would suggest that when you first walk into the city, you get a cutscene that gives you a tour of sorts of the city, and talks about what your faction is doing on Nexus (kind of like a recap / foreshadow thing), and talks about the city, how the races are doing, so on. Give the cities a personality and some life.
 
As for the action cutscenes, they're fine as they are, but they could use a bit of work. As I said earlier, you kind of throw textures / external animations onto a prop, and the prop remains unchanged. I know it's a bit of work, but making unique animations for the cutscenes would help a lot.
 
For actual time, every couple hours while questing, it would be nice to have a cutscene that's from 20 seconds to around a minute to break the monotony and mix things up, and to get a bit of lore for us lorehounds. :3
 
Cinematics are a great tool, but they require more than just animation to do them right! Get the sound team, writing team, animation team, art team and perhaps Mr. Kurtenacker working together to make Wildstar into somewhat of a movie experience, where we control the starring role, or a book where we lead the main character. Right now, it all feels a little disjointed and awkward, and for all of Drusera's praise, the character feels kind of like a background character.
 
Sorry for being so critical, the cinematics are good as they are, but as with many things, you can always improve. ^^	
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I would love to see a cinematic as soon as you finish the step of your prequest enabling you to step into Genetic Archives and then another one after the last step when you can get into Datascape.
 
A short cinematic of Dursera explaining why you go there and spoilering a bit of what awaits you.	
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By far the best cinematic in the game is the cut-scene when you finally get to Ohmna.
Amazing amount of effort were clearly put in to such an epic moment.  I don't want to spoil the amazing work Carbine did with the Ohmna reveal, so I'll spare the details, but let's just say, at the very least, there will be geometric shapes.	
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{| class="blockquote"
Hey folks, my name is Jarrod and I’m an animator for Carbine’s cinematics department.  I’m looking for some feedback regarding our in-game cinematics and would love to hear from the community.  My feeling from reading these forums is that we could do more to help immerse the player in Wildstar’s story and I want to gauge players’ interests in having more in-game cinematics.
 
1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!
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Hi there! Really glad to see more people posting from the creative team!
 
In reply to the questions:
 
1. I will agree that the moment Deadeye.. 
 watches his wife die 
 ..should be a cinematic moment. I was confused about it until I read the text of his reactions. There is room for so many ideas there.. I would love to see what you guys come up with for it. :)
 
I would also love some in-game Cinematics of what/who Protostar is.. what they stand for.. their unique spin on things.
 
One example would be the free house plot we get, as I kept thinking 'where/when do I have to pay for it? *laughs*' but it was just handed to me. A Cinematic with some sort of a Protostar explanation would be just amazing. Same goes for viewing the houses of the future before you get your house. There could/should be some cinematics there explaining the different options (maybe race based as there are 4 sections & 4 races?) :)
 
2. The Drusera 'I could get used to this' cinematic was what made me laugh the most. It was funny & sweet and so well composed that it is easily my favorite moment on that storyline.
 
3. I kind of feel Dominion plays out a bit better in that aspect. The Exiles did feel a bit lacking but that is just my personal opinion.
 
4. It might seem a bit too much, but I would love some cinematics before we meet an important NPC for the first time (It could be even a little bit after we meet them) explaining who they are.. maybe a few common details about their past, just enough for us to know to pay extra attention to what they say. Some personalities are very under-highlighted (they borderline on common questgiver) so far and it should be the opposite. :)
 
Hope this helps. Thank you for listening. :)	
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The in-game cinematics are very good and the feel of the cinematic is very fluent, which is something I appreciate above everything else. My personal favorite of the cinematics that are on live, is actually Osiric Descending from the Focus of Air. It looked really slick and cool seeing the giant bird monster fly down towards you. 
I am almost saddened by the fact that Avatus is dead after the Datascape, because it seems like you guys have a ton of fun animating him. His erratic movement, hissy fits and facial expressions are so well animated! 
 
The cinematics for OMNIcore-1 are all very well done. A lot of effort put into those cinematic. I won't talk about what is shown because that's for people to find out in drop 3. 
 
The only cinematics I think I could do without is the transportation cinematic from Starting zone to whatever zone you choose. They don't seem very inspired and feels like it was added for the sake of adding a starting cinematic. I think the effort into making those could've been used on something more meaningful. 
 
Overall the animation work in general for Wildstar is top notch. As an aspiring animator, I am definitely inspired by your work! :D
 
Edit: Somebody mentioned the cinematic that plays when you unlock Ohmna which I actually forgot about. I thought that cinematic was very pointless and not a lot of effort put into it. That was a cinematic I was disappointed with to be quite frank, considering you're granted acces to challenge Dreadphage Ohmna. 	
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I would love to see some class and path cinematics.
 
And like it was said i would love to be able to see the world story cinematics again. Just addind them on a menu in the character screen would be great.	
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			1. Anything to do with the world story would be great, drawing as much attention and getting players into the hype of that would be my suggestion. There are also lots of cool quest lines that go unnoticed because, well players simply click click click gimme quest rewards! so drawing on those would be good too. 2. Any repeatable content (such as elonya, or kv) please no, its obnoxious as hell to constantly exit out of those cinematics every time you go in there.3. I have not yet completed GA, or Datascape, but if you have a way of creating some sorta cool "victory" cinematic for players, that would be somewhat rewarding	
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Well, from the whole trip from 1 to 50, my THE BEST cinematic was the finale of Drusera stryline, after kicking the big corrupted annihilator's butt.
The finger click, explosions and the "Hey, I could get used to this" line, everything was 100% badass awesomeness!	
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A lot of the cinematics in-game seem to just be camera panning to show something in the distance. Granted, I haven't quested all the way through (only partway through Wilderrun on my main), but this does appear to be a trend.
 
I'd like to see more "involved" cinematics. For example, towards the end of the storyline in Farside, when you're trying to hold off an Ikthian invasion, Durek fights... I can't remember the name of the Dominion dude. Would be cool to have a short clip of them battling before the holdout starts on the player's end.
 
Another one: Towards the beginning of Wilderrun, Dorian Walker and Artemis Zin are engaging in some truly entertaining competition. At one point she explodes his bike and then laughs maniacally at his reaction. I didn't really feel much but confusion during that part, because it happened in the game world and it didn't click that Dorian's now on-fire bike was because of Artemis. A short clip of Artemis in her ship grinning and laughing, targetting the bike, sending a missile screaming down towards it... and then Dorian doing his whole "Nooooooo!" bit would've been much more impactful.
 
In general, it's moments like those that really need cinematics. Not massive ones, just little ones. Most of the times when the game shows story happening directly in the game world, it gets lost.
 
Also, I think Shiphands could be a great place for more involved cinematics as well! There's some really great story going on in those, but it can get lost in the murdering of mobs, which is unfortunate as solo/2-person content is some of the best content for things like that (you're not waiting on a group to watch cut scenes).	
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			I'd like to see more of them, especially at the end of every major quest line. Be it the zone story or just even a side quest line.	
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If you want people to get more into the story up the XP from Char\Zone\Main Store quest lines and get rid of all the Tasks \ Fetch quests. 
 
I think people loose interest in the story quests because you make them do so many other mundane quests and they get into the habit of just clicking through stuff. 
 
Each Regional Quest line should have a cinematic at least at the end to wrap up the lore\story. Maybe one at the start also to get you involved on whats really going on in that zone.
Include the data cubes in the quest lines more. 	
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I would love to see more cinematics for the raids. IIRC the only cinematic for GA is the opening of the passage to Ohmna which itself is pretty lackluster as you don't even see Ohmna, just the passage opening up. I would love to see that cinematic improved to where you at least see Ohmna. Aside from that any cinematics introduced into the raid would be awesome. I would love to see one for beating Ohmna and one upon entering GA specifically. For DS I have only entered it and attempted the first boss. I don't think I saw any cinematics for it up to that point. There may have been one upon entering DS (finishing attunement) but if not there should be. 
 
In general, at the very least I would like to see cinematics for entering the raid, finally reaching the last boss (Ohmna/Avatus), and after beating said boss. Any other cinematics would be amazing but those are the ones I think mandatory with most of the priority going after you beat the last boss (Make a kick ass end cut scene of boss dying).
 
My 2 cents. Thanks!	
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The cinematic everyone always mentions is the birth of Stormtalon. Not sure if it's a good or bad thing, but it clearly makes an impression.
 
To be honest, I don't really need/want cinematic at all (I don't mind them, just don't necessarily enjoy them), but I'm probably not representative of the masses.	
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I'm not far enough along in the story to answer #1-3 with any accuracy (although I am still very fond of the cinematic where Artemis Zin fails to capture the Elder Cube). But I have enough experience with cinematics in other multi-player games to have a very strong opinion about #4.
 
Whatever else you do, if you put cinematics in repeatable group-only content, you need to follow two rules or the screaming matches will be epic. (1) Keep them short. 15 seconds is almost certainly too long. 10 seconds may actually be pushing it. And (2) do not even allow opt-out unless everyone in the instance has seen the cinematic. (If you don't want to add a separate tracking bit for that, tie it to whatever is the first achievement after the cinematic.)
 
In City of Heroes' "Incarnate" raids, there was one cut scene per raid. Most of them were mercifully short. People who were repeating this content every day got really tired of those cinematics ... but they weren't bloodthirsty about it. If anything, they became pop-culture jokes within the community, mocking something about each one. If memory serves, they eventually made some of them them auto-skip (or manually skippable? I forget) if everybody had seen them. But nobody got angry at first-timers who hadn't seen it yet, so everybody got to see it at least once without getting punished for it.
 
By contrast, Defiance has skippable cut-scenes in all of its original repeatable instances. Even if you haven't seen the cut-scenes, people are so bored with them that if you're new to the game and haven't seen them, you will still be kicked off of must pick-up group teams if the cut-scene plays and they figure out you're the one who didn't press escape. The anger of people who waited a long time to get into an instance only to be kicked after the first cut-scene actually managed to exceed the anger of the bored instance-grinders who really couldn't stand to see that cut-scene even one more time. It was (and is) a major source of toxic behavior.
 
So, yeah, let me say it again: as short as possible, and each one not able to be skipped if there's anybody who hasn't seen it. Spare yourself and the community from a lot of rage.
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Hi there! Really glad to see more people posting from the creative team!
 
In reply to the questions:
 
1. I will agree that the moment Deadeye.. 
 watches his wife die 
 ..should be a cinematic moment. I was confused about it until I read the text of his reactions. There is room for so many ideas there.. I would love to see what you guys come up with for it. :)
 
I would also love some in-game Cinematics of what/who Protostar is.. what they stand for.. their unique spin on things.
 
One example would be the free house plot we get, as I kept thinking 'where/when do I have to pay for it? *laughs*' but it was just handed to me. A Cinematic with some sort of a Protostar explanation would be just amazing. Same goes for viewing the houses of the future before you get your house. There could/should be some cinematics there explaining the different options (maybe race based as there are 4 sections & 4 races?) :)
 
2. The Drusera 'I could get used to this' cinematic was what made me laugh the most. It was funny & sweet and so well composed that it is easily my favorite moment on that storyline.
 
3. I kind of feel Dominion plays out a bit better in that aspect. The Exiles did feel a bit lacking but that is just my personal opinion.
 
4. It might seem a bit too much, but I would love some cinematics before we meet an important NPC for the first time (It could be even a little bit after we meet them) explaining who they are.. maybe a few common details about their past, just enough for us to know to pay extra attention to what they say. Some personalities are very under-highlighted (they borderline on common questgiver) so far and it should be the opposite. :)
 
Hope this helps. Thank you for listening. :)
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			I think it would be great if you had cinematics that push players into the next territory rather than just the breadcrumb quests. It's an ideal time to promote the story and progression and lead players into the next testing grounds. I had several issues figuring out where to level personally and think that a cinematic event inbetween each level gap that would promote the next zone would be great!	
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1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!
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Sorry I didn't read the thread, only because I have a very simple request.
 
Disable all cut-scenes, preferably the non voiced 'scenic' and explorer cut-scenes. To me it's a small loading screen so I'd prefer a disable over auto-skip. 	
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Just hit the cinematic at the end of the Widomaker arc in Western Grimvault. I had forgotten how much I liked them. Having a library we can browse from the character select screen would be awesome.
 
The forced ones in massively repeated content like Storm Talon are just irksome after the first time or two - especially when they leave some people out of position in difficult encounters.	
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			The only time I don't appreciate in game cinematics is when they seem to "take control" while we may have the potential to be knee deep in mobs.  The mobs still attack you while you are watching the cinematics.  I often escape for ciematics that take control of the game at these points.  Other than that as far is if they appear in a logical break in the combat flow to enhance the story, then I am fine with them.  Make sense?	
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My favorite cinematic moment is fairly trivial and brief, but it never fails to amuse me and I wish it was on YouTube or something so I could watch it again.
It happens when you're near the Phagelabs and the Caretaker tells you about the clone of Stormtalon that needs to be killed. As the cinematic begins, you see an Eldan sentry turret locking on to Stormtalon, and then BOOM! It blasts his arse right out of the sky. I was expecting it to maybe push him back a little bit, but nope, the cinematic makes it seem like he got blasted all the way to Farside. I'm surprised he actually survived that. One tough dragon... thing.
Great hilarious brief cinematic moment.
 	
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Really liking the cinematics so far!
As for suggestions for the future, I'd like to see at least one cinematic featuring lopp, ekose or any of the other neutral races. It would be interesting see how the ekose captains operate their ships or interact with their crew in the shiphands. I would also like to see a bit more animation for your own character in cinematics if possible, like what was done in the draken intro, it will feel more like your character is part of Wildstar's universe as a result.	
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1. As an introduction to each new zone that you don't walk into (I was dissapointed when I flew to Southern grimvault and ended up on a crash site with no explanation)
2. All that gives a bit more story told, like in the exile starting zone when the story is driven by a cinematic where the rescue ship is shot down is a geat example of a good cinematic in my view.
3. No comment, mainly play on dominion. I would say it is of less importance if it is very balanced, it is all about enriching the story and providing a background.
4. Many of the quests are chains, and you don't want to be interrupted when in the questingzone, but and ending cinematic after a story is always welcome.
 
Thanks for listening.
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			Cinematics team. Any feedback on what you have taken away from this thread. I would love to hear how it might influence the future of the teams direction in the game :)	
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This is super helpful feedback everyone, so thank you for taking the time to leave comments!  There were a lot of great thoughts and ideas that resonated with our vision to tell a better story.  One way we plan to do that is to go back and add more cinematics for the starting experience to help build immersion, (besides making more for new zone content).  This includes playing up the importance of iconic faction characters and giving them special moments.  We also want to make sure there is a zone intro/outro cinematic for everywhere that makes sense, to help transition players from one area to the next.  I’d love to add a Lopp scene at some point as well! 
In  some respects, it makes me happy that there are so many opportunities to play up the story with cinematics and on the other hand- wow, we have a lot of work to do!  Thanks again for everyone who left feedback.  I personally read every post and am committed to doing the best we can with our part of the player experience.	
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Hey folks, my name is Jarrod and I’m an animator for Carbine’s cinematics department.  I’m looking for some feedback regarding our in-game cinematics and would love to hear from the community.  My feeling from reading these forums is that we could do more to help immerse the player in Wildstar’s story and I want to gauge players’ interests in having more in-game cinematics.
 
1.  What quests or in-game moments would you most like to see a cinematic for?
2.  Which are your favorite in-game cinematics and why?
3.  Does each faction feel balanced with cinematic storytelling?
4.  Ideally, how often in “play-time” would you like to see in-game cinematics (what is your threshold for having gameplay interrupted to view a cinematic)?
 
Thanks for any feedback!
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This is super helpful feedback everyone, so thank you for taking the time to leave comments!  There were a lot of great thoughts and ideas that resonated with our vision to tell a better story.  One way we plan to do that is to go back and add more cinematics for the starting experience to help build immersion, (besides making more for new zone content).  This includes playing up the importance of iconic faction characters and giving them special moments.  We also want to make sure there is a zone intro/outro cinematic for everywhere that makes sense, to help transition players from one area to the next.  I’d love to add a Lopp scene at some point as well! 
In  some respects, it makes me happy that there are so many opportunities to play up the story with cinematics and on the other hand- wow, we have a lot of work to do!  Thanks again for everyone who left feedback.  I personally read every post and am committed to doing the best we can with our part of the player experience.
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