Sword of the Sea is a high-speed adventure inspired by skateboarding games in which players, as the Wraith, surf on a 'hoversword' over landscapes like sand dunes, lava and ice to find a lost ocean. The trailer has been knocking people for six thanks to the incredibly smooth animation, which has many wondering how it was done.
Well, the developer Giant Squid, the people behind Pathless, has shared some insights into just how they achieved such dynamic surfing over the moving terrain (for other kinds of animation, see our pick of the best 2D animation software).
Giant Squid, which is working with ABZÛ, used the principle of overlapping action to create smooth, flowing movements, using Blendspaces to interpolate between animations. Lead animator Joel Finney wrote in a blog that made it a "personal goal to make the movement as smooth and buttery as possible".
"You would think that since the character doesn’t have to walk or run along the ground, that might make the animation easier, but game animation always provides unique challenges," he says.
Speed matters! We added a 4th dimension to our blendspace, adjusting the Wraith's stance based on velocity.#SwordoftheSea #gamedev #indiedev #indiegame pic.twitter.com/Rv4LLAorN7November 14, 2024
The developer found that its first tries using a 2D blendspace for leaning left and right lacked fluidity so it created a 3D blendspace with "delta leans." This added overlapping motion when turning, making movement look more natural.
Given that the player has to surf over dunes, slopes are crucial. They oriented the character to the terrain and counteranimated for smooth transitions on dunes. And to make the reaction to speed feel realisitc, they added 4th dimension to the blendspace, adjusting the Wraith's stance based on velocity. For high-speed boosting, the developer created a unique pose inspired by downhill longboarders, and to add life to static poses it implemented "surf fidgets" – small, random animations that play on top of existing movements.
Sword of the Sea's release date is yet to be announced. You can wishlist it on Steam. In the meantime, also check out the unique look of Netflix's Squid Game video game.
