Guild Wars 2

I was watching this documentary on the development of The Last of Us and it got me wondering what the process is like at Arenanet developing an MMO?

Does Anet have a motion capture stage like that, or are all the animations done by hand? I’m curious because WoodenPotatoes once mentioned he “liked the mocap” in one of the Heart of Thorns trailers, but I wasn’t convinced it was mocap. Admittedly I’m still just a student, but I know enough that the shot in question didn’t need mocap, and it contained a dragon which would be very hard to put in a mocap suit. Also I just wanted to share this documentary with everyone.

Mocap stage or not, this is what it’s like behind the scenes in a major game studio. I often feel like the average player’s impression of the devs is that of a bunch of interns and dudebros who hang out all day messing around on their computers. However, they don’t just throw things together quickly or press a magic “code it” button. Watch the video, and imagine the Anet team in their place. Then realize that The Last of Us was a single game that was made and released. Naughty Dog are done, and they moved on to new projects. Anet has been doing the same thing continuously for GW2 for 5+ years, and the process is STILL ongoing with Heart of Thorns. Something to think about.