The story is very clear from start to end, exploring the zombie movie genre such as 'Dawn of the Dead' or '28 weeks Later'. You and your team have been left behind in a zombie infected city and your objective is to get out to safety.
The characters types are all clearly established zombie movie cliches from the tough biker to the army veteran. The facial animation is slightly over-exaggerated which makes characters clear and avoids the uncanny valley effect.
The pacing is similar to the game play in that it goes from calm to barely surviving with hordes of zombies after you to back to calm. The storyboard of the intro/trailer cinematic is built around the idea of preparing the player mentally for the different types of game play mechanics involved, another words creating a tutorial as well. Examples of this would be not shining a torch at a witch or setting off car alarms. During the movie the characters have to save each other a couple of times, this is an important element to simulating the movie genre experience. Team work is key, it is not till you play this game on co-op with your friends that it really comes alive. The group dramatics, specially with audio communication, become very similar to the group dynamics in classic zombie movies.
The transition from the movie into the game is very clear. The camera pans away from the team on a roof top and they are safe. Even though you start the game in a safe location the movie has communicated that once you leave the rooftop you will more than likely encounter alot of zombies very soon.
The game cinematic works on many different levels as the story acts as a game intro, trailer and tutorial. It sets the player up for what type of gameplay is expected as well as clearly establishing the characters. It has a refreshing style of tutorial that entertains as well as giving the information needed. The intro movie is a zombie movie genre chiche in every way and does it better than any other game has before.
Left 4 Dead - Intro - HD from Edsta713 on Vimeo.
No comments:
Post a Comment