The developers of Possession, a next-generation zombie revenge game, are
getting some development help with some very clever tools. NaturalMotion's Endorphin 2.5 is an animation tool that uses
artificial intelligence to create the proper animation for the character, leaving the developers free to worry only
about tweaking the finer details and not fretting with completely modeling the animation themselves.
The website for Endorphin touts its ability to, for
example, have two football players automatically know to tackle each other, and to do so fluidly with little effort on
the part of the game maker. This animation in particular can be seen in the "Zombie Takedown"
video hosted by IGN, where one girl is amusingly
and repeatedly tackled by two zombies. The software itself is a hefty $13,000 for use, but for the time it saves
programmers and 3D artists it is probably more than worth it.
Possession is still early in development, but may be finished in time for Christmas of next year.
