Grand Theft Auto IV
"In terms of the characters, as we were bringing up the quality of the graphics and the physics and the animation, the quality of the writing and story structure were always balanced to reflect those [things]...the reasons we could pull that off and make the cutscenes slightly longer is because we've got such good facial animation that you can afford to be a little bit more slow-paced in them and a little more intimate with some of them. They've got to look beautiful, some of the cut scenes, and they hold the game together nicely."
Grand Theft Auto IV (GTA IV) by Rockstar Games introduces main character Niko Bellic, who has just arrived in Liberty City from Eastern Europe. Notorious for creating some of the most cutting-edge gameplay today, Rockstar Games turned to Image Metrics to take facial animation to the next level in the eleventh installment of their blockbuster gaming franchise. In total, Image Metrics produced 80+ characters and over 300 minutes of cutscene animation for the game, and did it in less than 6 months.
