Warhorse Studios Weekly Torch

DrFusselpulli · July 19, 2017, 2:44pm

Luboš Suk was born in Nová Paka in Czech Republic and joined Warhorse Stuidos around half a year ago in October 2016. He is a part of the now bigger Quality Assurance team, to find bugs and glitches and get them fixed.
Do you have any questions to Luboš Suk? Please ask here.
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Where can we usually find you lurking in the holy halls of Warhorse?
It may sound boring (as it is…), but it’s behind my desk. This is because my job is to test the game and its content, which is hard to do from a couch or from the kitchen. I do hope one day that I will be able to say that I’m lurking in a hammock near my desk.

2) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I heard about WH studios from one of the scripters, Tereza Semecká, in the Summer of 2016. She was talking about how awesome it was to work here and how she has fulfilled her dreams, bla bla bla. So when I moved to Prague, (due to my girlfriend who is a PhD student here), I tried to apply for a job. To my surprise, it was successful! I then joined Warhorse Studios in October of 2016.

3) Describe your position. What is it about being a QA?
I’m working in the QA department (yay to a bunch of guys who break everything and only play games the entire time). How is it being a QA member? It’s depressing and no one likes you! Why? Because you broke their precious stuff and you’re telling them, ‘OMG! This doesn’t work!’
But seriously, what is it about being a QA? I think it’s a great responsibility (yeah, laugh now…). We are testing the game again and again to figure out as many issues/bugs as we can. Try this, try that and again… how to deal with nasty issues/bugs? It’s not just, ‘write it down and move along ,sir,’ we need to examine that bug, describe it correctly, and find as much information about it as we can (otherwise our job is useless if we just write out, “This doesn’t work…”). So we spent a bunch of time trying something again and again (and again…) to figure out what really happened.
Many bugs are tricky ones that need certain conditions to be met to reproduce them. So there is a plenty of time looking into debugging tools and logs. After a bug is reported (and fixed) our job isn’t done. There is a need to review if the fix was enough, so it’s almost back to the beginning.
To make a long story short, being a QA member can be frustrating.
Another task for a QA member is to rate the quality of a game (oooh it looks great and meh this looks shitty) which can be unpleasant. No one wants to hear that they’ve done something wrong (I know that behind everything, much effort and hard work is put into it). So, you can get an easy reply, “you don’t understand this, so STFU and GTFO” and it’s not pleasant to hear. It’s probably the same as hearing, “what you made isn’t good enough.” Rating the quality is an important part of development, because we all wanna make something great, I hope.

4) Have you ever worked on Videogames before? What have you worked on previously?
Previously, I worked (as a volunteer) on development for Czech Ultima Online Freeshard, but I think it can’t be consider ed work, because it was really for fun. And about my previous real job? I worked for TRW Automotive (now ZF/TRW) in Jablonec nad Nisou, where I worked as a support IT guy in the CAE department (tool coding, creating and maintaining databases, customer communication). The main part of the job was to create and maintain tools, which saves time for the other guys and it made their job easier.

5) Describe your usual day at the studio?
A usual day? I think that every day is unusual, but for simplicity, every day starts in the morning (some breakfast and coffee), get new data from the builder, check emails for some bug fixes from the previous days, and prepare the status for our QA review ,which is at 10 o’clock. For review, we are discussing the state of the game and the plans for the day. And that’s our our daily routine: trying to break everything!

6) What are you currently working on?
Currently I’m working on quests (as everyone else is in our department). With this in mind, I’m maintaining feature tests, which runs on tests levels and it helps us with testing common tasks (movement, basic features, shopping, etc). This way, you don’t need to test them again and again every day; you need to only look at the test results and focus on the complicated stuff.

I also have a special build on which I’m catching some nasty errors, which can have an impact on game performance and overall functionality for programmers. There is also another build where I am catching errors for NPC behaviors. After that, I need to go through the errors and distribute them between responsible people so that they can fix them (also for game performance and more deeper game testing than just simple playing).

7) What are some of your notable accomplishments?
Dunno. Maybe there are other people who can tell what notable accomplishments I’ve had (if there is something )

8) What do you like the most about Kingdom Come: Deliverance?
Probably the story-line and combat system. I like the medieval theme and the atmosphere of the game, which has great potential.

9) How, when and with what platform or game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
My first time was when I was 8 (maybe 10?). Not exactly sure, but it was on a platform called, “Didaktik” (an 8bit Czechoslovakia PC) where games was loaded from audiotapes. Then I spend some time on DOS games (Wolf 3D, Blood, Dune 1 &2, Civilization, and many, many old games). A very important gaming moment for me was when I discovered Ultima Online – a game which absolutely amazed me (along with MMORPGs). I met awesome people there and I spent a lot of time there…

10) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
As a class I prefer summoners (Necromancers are the bests) and I absolutely choose a female, because watching a chick ass while playing is much more better than playing as some dude.

11) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
There are many of them, because there are not many new games that I like. I absolutely play games over and over like Fallout 1&2, old RTS like KKND2 and Red Alert 2.

12) Your favorite music?
Picture will be enough

13) Your favorite book?
I’m mostly interested in Czech “trash” science fiction. Authors like Jiri Kulhanek, Frantisek Kotleta, Miroslav Zamboch.

14) Your travel tip?
Norway for sure! Awesome nature, nice people, Nordkapp, Tromso, Trollstigen, wildlands…. Just get your car packed, buy stuff and go, but beware of wolverines and elks (and also trolls).

15) Sport is: MTB
When I lived in Liberec (Reichenberg), I really loved bike trips (mountain trips, downhill, and hard terrain ride) but one day some bad things happened and some **** stole my bike!

16) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
Candy isn’t bad, but have you ever heard about meat?

17) Which is your favorite historic event?
There are multiple of them, e.g. battle of Vienna, battle of Wizna, the siege of Prague in 1648 (where some ordinary people did unusual deeds). Also, events like Charlie Brown and the Franz Stigler incident or Walther Wenck in the battle of Berlin

18) Knights or Samurai?
Kenshin

19) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
Keep calm and be patient (and don’t be a lousy troll)! This is not an ordinary game - there are many good ideas and cool features, which can be fun in a game, but it’s not easy to make everything work together.

Do you have any questions to Luboš Suk? Please ask here.

DrFusselpulli · May 10, 2017, 10:10am

Here are the community answers from Luboš Suk:

Mainly I testing on PC version. Stuff like quests, NPC behavior and etc… but when I working on profiling I need to switch on consoles too. (and sometimes almost break my fingers on the controller. (yep im clumsy with that little plastic toy)

Im specialised on breaking Terezas’s stuff and she hate me for that! But i dont think we aren´t specialised on bugs here, because you never know what breaks, so you need to deal with everything what appears.

In not focused on console testing, so I can’t answer this question correctly. But I think that consoles are awesome and without bugs

Yep, what was in alpha/beta was a bit annoying. But for now save and load seems fine and will works like a charm

It depends on what you call main bug don´t be worried and wait for the surprise.

It depends on what I currently doing. While testing game quest & features we need to listen to the game or discus with colleagues (lot of chitchat here ) but when i need to focus on something music is great choice (some epic music ofc).

Hmm currently im relaxing by writing thesis, so only planning how I will relax after work But probably new MTB, some travel (need to try new hammock) and you know Starcraft remastered version coming soon…

DrFusselpulli · May 12, 2017, 3:51pm

Martin “Šouris” Šourek was born in Desná, in the very north of the Czech Republic and he is our tool programmer here at Warhorse Studios. Martin Šourek is very talented, when he sits in front of the computer and finds amazing solutions for every upcoming challenge in the development of our Warhorse tools.
Do you want to know more about Martin “Šouris” Šourek? Just ask here!
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Where can we usually find you lurking in the holy halls of Warhorse?
I’m usually at my desk, in the AI office.

2) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I heard about Warhorse 5 years ago, when there were first mentions about a medieval RPG (Hussite’s times) from a new Czech based game studio. Next year I visited and I watched GDS conferences. After the Kickstarter campaign I became a real fan . I watched video updates and I read most of the news about the game. But to be honest, I never imagined I could work there. Being a game developer is kind of a dream job, like dustman, cosmonaut, or a train driver, but large games are developed mainly in C++, which is not my cup of tea.
2 years ago, I was looking for a new job and saw a Facebook post of my green-bearded university colleague, Viktor Podhajecký, who was also working there. They were looking for a WPF/.NET developer asap. So here I am.

3) Describe your position. What is it about being a programmer.
I am responsible for Skald, our in-house design software. It’s used widely by our designers for writing game quests with branched dialogues. Quest document contains several parts: gameplays, dialogues, and cutscenes. Based on the gameplay, the scripters try to set up the game in game editor and also set various properties to each dialogue branches (eg. Entry conditions, objectives…). Our cinematics guys take the cutscene parts and use it like screenplay for the scene. The actors record responses automatically generated for each voice, based on roles set in dialogues.
Testers need to know the quest content, to test all the possible outcomes. There is also a database of roles, characters, locations, items, voices, etc… with statistics (usage in quests, association). The graphics department uses a build-in map of game objects (houses, NPCs, stashes, rivers etc…). Then I participate in automated profiling - download current game builds for each platform (PC,XB1,PS4), set them up, run a variety of tests (performance, memory, graphic stress), proceed them and visualize it on the web.

4) Did you ever worked on Videogames before?
No, it’s my debut in the game industry. But I used to have a job at a similar position in the company doing thermal vision.

5) Which job would you not want to do?
QA, as mentioned by another colleague before, it is not as fun as it looks. I don’t think I would like the game after a whole day of repeating the same quest(s), or parts of it.

6) Please describe Warhorse Studios:
Like a ZOO, there are so many professions, both technical and artistic kinds. Even the offices are thematical - somewhere there is dark, somewhere there is sultry and light and somewhere there is a funny smell. I love the ZOOs

7) Please describe one of your colleagues or your department:
I sit in the AI department, one of the smaller offices. The AI programmers are in the minority. There are also sound department guys, 1 “common” programmer and 1 – one-man so-called Skald department.

8) What is your favorite team activity?
Beer drinking in a pub (sometimes Kontušovka included ), summer grill parties, and of course, our annual team building on the Malešov fortress, where all the weird stuff happen to me.

9) Describe your usual day at the studio?
In the morning, I check the mail for news, newly assigned bugs or not completely recorded sessions to delete from the database. Next, I check automatic profiling results and failures. When everything goes well, I can implement new features to Skald or polish old ones by current needs. I’m also validating translations and voiceovers directly in our database, because the quests are often edited, translated, and recorded simultaneously, which can break our usual pipeline.

10) What are you currently working on?
Diff/merge quests. We need to merge our release database branches back to the main branch. Because the dialogues have a tree structure, it’s not just a simple row-to-row comparison.

11) What are some of your notable accomplishments?
I have made Skald usable, fast, and user friendly (a little )

12) What do you like the most about Kingdom Come: Deliverance?
It’s easy to repeat our strong aspects, such as realistic graphics (it’s like home, no need to visit real life forest anymore). It has a great story with various choises to make in the game. KCD aslso has advanced world mechanics, which will be fun to break in repetitive gameplay.

13) How, when and with what platform or game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
My childhood was quite computer-free. The first game, I remember, was VLAK (train in Czech). I played in my primary school computer classes, when I was like 7 years old. Do you remember the sound when the train crashed? Later, we bought the Famiclone and played NES hits like Super Mario, Contra, Super Tank, and 999+ (in one) other games.

14) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
Mage, or archer, long range. Hit, run, and drink a potion at once. I prefer a female character, at least for the 3rd person games - it’s more pleasant to watch.

15) Which videogame character are you?
Snorlax… a wild Snorlax appears.

16) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
Gothic series, Gothic 2 especially. A believable compact world, with lot of stashes and details.
GTA:Vice City - 80’s radio playlist, neons, an appropriate amount of content compared to following GTA:SA.

17) What would a perfect game according to your wishes look like?
A complex, story-based RPG game with cooperative multiplayer (not the MMORPGs). I believe there is nothing like it.

18) Most hilarious bug you have ever encountered or worst video game experience?
I saw one of the funniest bugs last month in out automated profiling (because the video is also recorded). In one of the test scenarios, the Oktoberfest NPCs sat on their asses like dog with worms and moved like sledge hockey players on meth.

19) What game have you been really looking forward to but turned out to be a total disappointment?
As I mentioned above, I’m a Gothic fan, so my biggest disappointment was the Gothic 4/Arcania. It a wasn’t true ancestor at all, just a simple clicking festival.

20) How do you relax after a hard day at work?
Music, movies, TV series, pubs.

21) A personal story?
Did I mention, my name is Martin Šourek, and šourek means scrotum in the Czech language? With my calculations, it makes me possibly the greatest scrotum in the whole world.

22) Your favorite music or Spotify playlist
Almost everything. I don’t use Spotify playlists, just shuffle on all songs. If you like details, check my last.fm profile (last.fm/user/shurin).

23) Your favorite movie or book?
American 80’s action movies with Arnold Schwarzenegger. Book reading makes me sleep, so the only things I have in my Kindle are the comic books (Čtyřlístek collection currently).

24) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
I’m not a fan of healthy food, so you can lease me with candy, but if you want to buy me, try kebab or a baguette.

26) You have to fight in medieval times… who are you?
Bard, articulacy, and caution rule the world of muscles.

27) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
A large RPG is like a 10,000 piece puzzle image of a calm ocean and azure sky: not so easy to finish, but the results are worth it. So don’t speed up the hype train, but don’t slow it down either.

Do you want to know more about Martin “Šouris” Šourek? Just ask here!

DrFusselpulli · May 10, 2017, 11:30am

Here are the answers from Martin “Šouris” Šourek to your community questions.

Thanks for the tip

It was JR’s Secret Santa gift, but he didn’t want to wear them, so I had to try it, because, yes, I enjoy wearing trendy swimsuits and showing my baroque body and scaring/amusing colleagues as well

Check these videos, they are over a year+ old, but you can make a picture.

CZ

EN

You just named the variants, we discuss. But there are lot of hardcoded things in the application and database, to be changed to make it generally usable. So someday, I hope, there will be some kind of public release.

Yes, but there are some advantages:
1) No colleagues, no communication errors and hidden fuckups.
2) All users are my testers. No beta/stable version, one current version for everyone can be published immediately after change/fix
3) All data are stored in database, which is exported during game build process, so it is quite interfered from the game changes.

Sure, consoles are basically mainstream PCs from 2014, so current PCs can run faster or/and with better details. The game is developed primary on PCs, so we are profiling PCs mainly for the reference to the console results.

I hope so, but not sure, we are collecting them systematically.

DrFusselpulli · June 30, 2017, 1:56pm

Jiří “J.R.” Rýdl was born in Prague in the Czech Republic and joined Warhorse shortliy after the Kickstarter campaign in the beginning of 2014. As a marketing manager he takes care about a lot of community work in the background, like the database of backers, the production of the physical items. And many more. Do you have any questions to Jiří “J.R.” Rýdl? Please ask here.
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Where can we usually find you lurking in the holy halls of Warhorse?
In the morning, I am standing in front of the coffee machine and in the afternoon, I am sitting next to Tobi’s shop. From time-to-time you can’t find me at all, because I am talking to journalists about E3 or having a beer with fans at Battle of Libusin where we will be this saturday.

2) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I worked with Martin Klima for ALTAR games a few years ago and it was him who contacted me when the Kickstarter campaign had started. I was first assigned to answering hundreds of questions from the fans all around the world.

3) Describe your position. What is it about being a marketing guy?
My task is to take care of the backers, community, and business partners.

4) Describe your usual day at the studio?
Checking the twitter feed on the way to office, reading through emails in the morning, having a meeting with colleagues about the box cover/trailer or incoming event, going for lunch, having a cup of coffee with a famous Czech artist about production of the statues for the collector’s edition, reading through media campaign plans in the afternoon, and updating our website with current screenshots in the evening. It is changing pretty much every day and now in May we are preparing for our E3 presentation.

5) Did you ever worked on Videogames before?
I’ve worked with several teams on several games already, which is always fun! Sometimes, I’ve worked with a company throughout the entire project like ALTAR, I’ve worked on advertising campaigns, I organized events for IDEA games distributor, I was responsible for creating the website for UFO: Aftermath and Aftershock games, I presented the first ArmA at E3, and I was also behind the community port of Fish Fillets to Linux.

6) Which job would you not want to do?
Telling fans the bad news. No one likes the bad news and that makes me sad.

7) What are you currently working on?
Planning our presence at the event Battle of Libusin in Czech republic, where we go together with Pivovar Malesov, our exclusive producer of KC:D beer sets. We plan to meet our fans face-to-face, drink some beer and give away some posters. Looking forward to it!

8) What are some of your notable accomplishments?
Actually, backer rewards production is a huge project and together with my colleague Josef we were working on the pre-production for a few months now, doing everything to fulfill the backers’ expectations. Another big task ahead of us is to gather addresses from all the physical backers, so we will be able to deliver the rewards to them. If you are not registered on our website yet, please do!

9) What do you like the most about Kingdom Come: Deliverance?
The community is great and supportive; it is very pleasant to meet the backers face-to-face at the gaming events or even on the street. I like to talk to them and hear how they are looking forward the game; that is great. Thank you!

10) How, when and with what platformor game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
I started with games like Arcanoid with my friends on Sinclair ZX Spectrum, Giana Sisters on my first computer (Commodore C64), or Leisure Suit Larry on PC. I am pretty old ;-]

11) What was your most touching video game moment?
I was quite sad when I died in Red Dead Redemption.

12) Which videogame character or figure is the best?
I spend a lot of time with Master Chief in the Halo series, including the first strategy game. He is definitely someone I would like to meet in the pub.

13) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
In case of fantasy RPG I am usually ranger class, sometimes woman, but usually man. Warriors are too repetitive, wizards too weak, especially from the beginning, so I pick someone in the middle, able to use both magic and sword.

14) Which videogame character are you?
I see myself as mix of Lara Croft and Alan Wake, but my friends say that I look like Gordon Freeman!

15) What would a perfect game according to your wishes look like?
A game that plays itself!

16) Your favorite music playlist
Metallica, Prodigy, Nine Inch Nails, Audioslave, Rage Against the Machines, Linking Park, Korn, Garbage, Nirvana, Deftones, Alice in Chains, Faith No More, the list goes on …

17) Your travel tip?
Prague is beautiful city and when you are in the Czech Republic, you can visit the Sazava Monastery!

18) Sport is:…
I used to play NHL and FIFA on Xbox, but I don’t have much time now :-]

19) What’s your guilty pleasure?
Watching action B-movies from the 80ties.

20) What was your greatest mistake?
Waiting rather long for the best time to have children.

21) Do you have a Bucket List?
I don’t plan till the death; I have some short-term plans (finishing the bookshelf in the living room, finding a proper school for my second daughter) and mid-term plans (pay the debts to the bank, rebuild the garden). I am quite a happy guy who fulfilled his dreams already - I have a great family and kids.

22) What will be your famous last words?
No.

23) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
Definitely.

24) What is your kryptonite?
Stupid people.

25) What was your favorite subject and your most hated one at school? What were your grades in history?
I was keen on history and literature. I had all the grades you can imagine, sometimes better, sometimes worse. I was able to learn something if I had to.

26) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
I am looking forward to meeting you all at the Battle Libusin event, and of course, later on at the events all around the world! If you say the secret password, I can give you a poster :-]

And many more. Do you have any questions to Jiří “J.R.” Rýdl? Just ask here.

DrFusselpulli · May 3, 2017, 1:12pm

@Vojtroslav had a question for @WH_JiriRydl in the the barrel of questions:

Yes sure, but only in a small window.

DrFusselpulli · May 12, 2017, 4:07pm

Conor Doyle is one of the Animators in our team. As such he is working on cutscenes and ingame animations to make the game as lifelike and immersive as possible. He was born in Dublin in Ireland and Joined Warhorse Studios not long ago in January 2017.
Do you have any questions to Conor Doyle? Just ask here.
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Where can we usually find you lurking in the holy halls of Warhorse?
I’m quite boring, 9 times out of 10 I’m at my desk.

2) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I heard about Kingdom Come shortly before moving to Prague, it came up in conversation usually if me and my friends were talking about kick started games.
At the time, I was working for Bohemia Interactive (Arma 3, Apex) when I was contacted by warhorse. During then I was mid-way thought a project but once it ended I remembered there offer. Warhorse interested me more than realistic shooters as I’m more of an RPG fantasy fan. Since I contacted them I have been lucky enough to join the team, that was 5 months ago. Since then I have worked on some really cool bits of work.

3) Did you ever worked on Videogames before?
I studied computer games animation at Teesside University and luckily while I was there I was able to help out a few projects mostly for short films and smaller projects. But since leaving I have built up quite a back log of work, I have worked on projects like Arma 3 Apex, a few unreleased games, Films/Documentary’s and helped out other games like Battlegrounds & Project cars 2.

4) Which job would you not want to do?
Programmer, what they do is black magic. I tried my hand at it before but I have more of an artistic mindset and get lost easily if you drop numbers or a new language on me, I would like to learn Python at one point. Mostly to make some of the more tedious parts of animation easier where possible.

5) What are you currently working on?
My main tasks at the moment are cleaning up and polishing cinematics, I also create a few in-game animations where needed. I usually get cinematics that are just taken from the raw motion capture and placed where the cut scene designers want it. From there I start clean up and making the animation look good, to fit within the shot/frame and make sure everything is happening as it should.

6) How, when and with what platform or game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
My first gaming experience that I fell in love with was Baldur’s gate, I had played others before then but what drew me in was the freedom, the story and the roleplay. Since then it has always been my style of game, to the point that I run my own D&D games quite often for my friends, It also got me interested in games like Kingdome come.

7) What was your most touching video game moment?
One that always sticks with me was playing Dragon age 2, there was an elf character (Merrill) I didn’t like her that much and found it fun to not allow her to do anything, at one point we had gotten into a fight and I thought it would turn into a proper fight or she would leave the party, but what I really was not expecting was a cut scene to play (Sex scene) and it lead to us getting married and moving in together. I was in a fit of laughter after that for far too long to the point I was in pain.

8) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
I actually try to branch out a bit. I like to roleplay my characters so I mostly pick male, but when it comes to class I try to mix it up, if I pick a sorcerer this time next time I’ll pick a paladin. I do tent to lean towards magic casters but sometimes hitting something with a big cub is just as fun. ( I tent to develop the motivation, hardships and challenges the character needs to overcome more then what lass I’m playing) Saying that, I’m using D&D as my main example and usually I’m the one stuck DMing

9) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
There have been a few, I guess the first I played multiple times was Neverwinter knights.
Since then I think the one I finished the most was Dark Souls or Bloodborne.

10) How do you relax after a hard day at work?
At the moment. Krave Maga or persona 5. if I have the energy and time to plan, coming up with D&D games, Cosplay or LARPing.

11) Your favorite music playlist
I’m not that varied. I like Industrial, Metal (ish) and then I have a few odd ones out like Dido and Beethoven

12) What species is your spirit animal?
I want to say platypus as I have a feeling no one ever picks them. Platypuses need love to. If not is dragon an exemptible answer?

13) What was your greatest mistake?
Not taking over the world while I had the chance…

14) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
Yes (Short answer) but I would be tempted to stab you for saying candy, I also ask you nicely not to tempt me, I am Diabetic.

15) What is your kryptonite?
Surprisingly it actually is Kryptonite….

16) How do you like living in the Czech Republic?
Prague is the nicest place I have ever lived. people are nice and life is easy. But I do miss having native English speaks around more.

17) What was your favorite subject and your most hated one at school?
Dose all of school count, I dropped out to do only Interactive media study’s. I liked history, I had I nice teacher, but Irish history is really boring. Or the way he thought it was. Grades…… don’t think I sat enough tests to get a grade.

18) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
Always be yourself. Unless you can be batman, then be batman

Do you want to know about Conor Doyle or his job here at Warhorse? Please ask here.

DrFusselpulli · January 5, 2018, 12:25pm

Conor Doyle answered your community questions:

At the moment, I know there are animations for swinging swords from horseback. Fighting on horseback will be possible, but it will be a bit simpler than primary planned.

There are animations for pulling people off horseback. It will be possible, yes.

Only bows for now. I would like to add crossbows or slings if we have time.

Sadly no. it’s a nice idea but hard to implement.

Probably a terrible one.

Personally no. we have an animator on the team Jiri Sejvl who is amazing at making them look realistic. I use his animations to add to cut scenes.

Animal animations are quite hard to get looking right. Mocap allows you to capture people nearly perfectly and getting animals looking as good is a really big challenge, in my books.

No we do not.

The main program I use in Motion Builder, I can use 3Ds Max and Maya as well. But Motion Builder is best for Motion Capture.

I cannot speak a word of czeck, I tried for a few months but it’s hard and would take years. Hell I still have problems with English.

DrFusselpulli · May 12, 2017, 4:14pm

Senior Programmer Michal Bartoň is one of the experienced Warhorse Studios veterans, who is beeing a member of the team from the early beginning of the project. He was born in Nový Jičín, a middle size city near Ostrava in the Czech republic.
Now he is one of the developers who is responsible for the console port onto PS4.
Do you have any questions to Michal Bartoň or his work? Please ask here.
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Where can we usually find you lurking in the holy halls of Warhorse?
This may be a bit tricky to answer. You’d expect to find me in a programmer’s room but if you tried to find me there, you would probably be disappointed. Most of the day I’m usually lurking next to someone else’s desk, helping to solve their troubles. When I come back there are often several people looking for me already so I have to sneak around to the kitchen or toilet if I need to get one more minute of peace.

2) How did you hear about Warhorse?
It was like 5-and-a-half years ago (“wow, is it really 5 years already?”). I was working with Dan Vavra and several others on Mafia II. After we finished some DLC’s and started working on Mafia III, there were some rumors going around that Dan was about to start a new project and he happens to be looking for programmers. I didn’t hesitate too long. I went to see Martin Klima in our old offices and everything looked so cool that I quit my job the same month and spent my whole underspent vacation working for Warhorse. Then we had to choose the engine we were going to use for Kingdom Come: Deliverance, which was a really challenging job.

3) Did you ever worked on Videogames before?
As previously mentioned, I worked with 2K Czech on Mafia II and many others before Warhorse. I joined the team in the middle of the Mafia II project when they needed someone to help with 3DMax export tools. Then I moved into the core tech team and helped with port to PS3 and Xbox 360. After I finished MII we were working in small teams on DLC called “Jimmy’s Vendeta,” while others were helping with Top Spin 3.

4) What is your favorite team activity?
I enjoy team yachting on a near reservoir called Orlík. There is only one rule: what happens on the boat stays on the boat”.

5) What are you currently working on?
Lately we’re all working hard on getting the game to be released It involves mostly code optimizations and bugs fixing. Besides that, I take care of the PlayStation 4 console build. For those of you who don’t know, there is a big list of technical requirements (we call them TCR’s) from Sony. As soon as we think we have our game ready to be released, we send it to Sony first, they test each TCR (every one of them), and only if we pass, they’ll approve our game and we can start making Blu-Ray Disks.

Some of them are really easy to accomplish and we do those things anyway for the PC version as well. Some others are still easy but PS4 specific so additional work is required. For example, there is one I never noticed when I played a game on PS4 before but there aren’t any PS4 games that have a “quit” menu option, which is normal for all PC games. So we had to remove all exit menus.

The last group of TCR’s are the worst. They are completely PS4 specific and they’re very hard to implement into the final game if you haven’t designed the game for it. Like, there is a requirement which lets you play the game for at least one hour before you finish installing the game. It means there has to be some game content available before all data are installed or even downloaded into the console. This was really tricky for our game with an open world where we don’t restrict the player to stay in one specific location. We have almost created another small game, which you would have to play before we let you into the open world. Anything else related to this is classified so I cannot go into much detail here and you’ll have to wait and see for yourself.

6) What are some of your notable accomplishments?
One of my first tasks for Warhorse was to create a dialog module for the game. As you might have already seen in some other posts or in Dan Vavra’s talks, we have a pretty complicated dialog writing tool in place. There are thousands of dialogs written with several thousand lines. We have a living world with NPC’s doing theirs daily routines and everybody can talk to you about something. It would be impossible to write dialogs for each NPC separately, since there are a number of topics that almost everybody can talk with you about. We did extensive research among other open world games and we have concluded that the one used in Skyrim had a really good approach but it was too complicated for us. So we started from scratch and built our own dialog system based on principles from Skyrim. This means that when designer writes a new dialog he writes it for a specific role in the game. A role can be totally generic like a female NPC to a completely specific role like Henry, for example. Then we assign roles to NPC’s dynamically as the game goes on. For example, a guy working in the shop knows how to sell things just by getting assigned a salesman role, as he will inherit this behavior. This allows us to create an immersive living environment.

7) How, when and with what platform or game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
I was fascinated by videogames from the beginning. It means I’m too old because I remember the oldest videogames. Unfortunately, our family wasn’t rich enough to buy me a computer or any gaming device so we had to play on our friend’s computer right after school or occasionally, we went to the arcades. One of my favorite arcade games was Mortal Kombat. I mastered that really quickly and I even remember most of the fatalities!

8) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
I always try to pick the most overpowered ones. I hate losing so anything that is good for my team. It doesn’t matter if it’s a tank or a healer, as long it leads our team to victory

9) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
I’m a multiplayer guy only so there is not many single player games I’m returning to. But every time I see Transport Tycoon somewhere I cannot resist to make some good old virtual dollars. Now it’s even easier when one can play this super game on mobile as well.

10) How do you relax after a hard day at work?
Relax? What is that? Our work on Kingdom Come is not done so we are not allowed to relax. We have a strong commitment to our backers and the game is not going to finish itself. But I like to relax with a cup of good coffee between compilations.

11) Your travel tip?
Yeah, I love to travel. I hope we finish the game soon so I can travel again. I love scuba diving, so I really recommend Thailand or other Asian islands like Bali. Maldives are also beautiful. I’ve also been around Europe and I love Northern Europe such as Scandinavia – it’s very beautiful.

12) What’s your guilty pleasure?
It has always been a chocolate!

13) What will be your famous last words?
“This bugfix does not break anything!”

14) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
Nah, not really. I don’t like sweet stuff but you can buy me with good meat.

15) How do you like living in the Czech Republic?
Currently, I think Czech Republic is best place to live in Europe. We are in the middle so it is close to everywhere north as well as south. Prices here are still reasonable in comparison with western Europe, so we are still capable of buying and owning houses. People here are friendly and the weather is always in good balance, which means we have the same number of cold days and warm days. And of course, we have a really nice nature here.

16) Imagine you are a cake, what kind of cake are you and why?
I’m always on the latest version of cake so currently, I’m Nougat.

17) Which is your favorite historic event?
I guess my date of birth is my favorite. I celebrate this event every year and a lot of people are coming to visit the place where this historical moment happened.

18) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
I don’t want to spoil anything here but sometimes I get to play parts of the game to track a bug or reproduce strange behavior and I catch myself really enjoying it. Often I lose track of what my first intention was and I start exploring the city or the surroundings. What we have created here is a unique medieval experience and I hope that the wait will be worth it.

Do you want to know more about Michal Bartoň?Just ask here.

DrFusselpulli · January 5, 2018, 12:10pm

And now it is time for Michal Bartoň to answer your community questions

We are not 100% sure yet. But there definitely will be higher resolution or better graphics quality settings but the game itself have to be equal to base version.

As I pointed out in my answers we managed to pass this criterion without additional content. But please keep in mind that Xbox have similar prerequisite.

We will not. You can go as fast as you can and we managed to have content ready to play. We might disable game load as you might be able to jump too much forward.

TCR is never-ending process. We have completed every one that we could at this point. Then there are others which we cannot complete yet since we don’t have some related game features in place. We will continue working on those as soon as possible.

Haven’t count them but we started with just two but now there are several other PS4 Pro kits along with several test kits.

You will see about it in some future weekly torch

We are not VR game genre, whatsoever and I would not recommend using this type of game in VR if you have any weakness for simulation sickness.

We are using standard PS4 trophy API as others. No additional menus.

Yes!

I’m afraid this is really complicated. Any game modification has to be approved by Sony. But we can always make free DLC from any good mode created for PC.

Not sure what is your question but we managed to fit into memory and we still working on improving our memory footprint.

It’s hard to say. Each console has its good and bad things. I guess the tools were better on Xbox but PS4 is catching up recently. PS4 is also more different from PC hardware so there is more work to be done. There is nothing major to complain about though.

Yes, you can already pre-order it on some online shops like Amazon for example. There are also other shops which you could try. But the Beta is for PC only, and it only available for our supporters on Kickstarter and on our homepage.
A pre-Order for console on our homepage is not possible.

If you already own one of the Kickstarter Tiers of Baron Level or higher, please wait for more details. This is a different category.

DrFusselpulli · July 19, 2017, 9:35am

Alisa Zavodina was born in the city of Almaty in Kazakhstan and joined Warhorse Studios in late 2015 as a tester for the quality assurance departement. Recently she switched to the scritping team because of her interrest in technical design.
Do you have questions for Alisa Zavodina and her position at Warhorse? Just ask here.
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Where can we usually find you lurking in the holy halls of Warhorse?
During my time in QA, I could normally be seen running around the studio with an axe and chasing colleagues, who usually vanished when they noticed me carrying another bug in their direction. Now that I’m on the other side of the field doing script programming, I can squash a few of them (bugs, not colleagues) myself.

2) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I heard about Warhorse from my friend whose husband works with us as a Character Artist. She knew about my passion for being a gamedev and she helped me push myself over the edge in making a decision, for which I’m forever grateful.

3) Describe your position. What is it about being a Scripter?
Being a script programmer means bringing the designers’ work to life. We put together the works of other departments - design, animations, functional details, etc. We use our tools to liven up the world, fill it with up NPCs, wildlife, and we aid designers in their quest duties. Afterwards, we work on the quests and then we give the quests some more touch until all of them are crafted and polished.

4) Please describe Warhorse Studios:
The atmosphere at Warhorse differs massively from the other engagements I’ve been a part of. It’s much less formal and much more friendlier; people are always there for you. There’s little to no competition between us as we all strive for a common goal, which is to polish the game. As a result, we’re no strangers to spontaneous after-work beers or outside activities as a team.

5) What is your favorite team activity?
I’m all about running and shooting (Lasergame), racing (karts, small cars at Matejska pout… or Rocket League) and of course I enjoy movie evenings with the team quite a lot.

6) What are you currently working on?
As of now I’m involved in livening up the game world, specifically providing jobs, food, and places to rest for our dear NPCs. Each house should have a certain set of content to suit the NPC’s needs and the workplaces should be equipped accordingly (i.e. a farmer’s got to have a hoe and a field to work). After a busy day, each NPC enjoys a particular hobby, that, in its turn, requires specific objects, and it’s part of my job to keep the stock full.

7) What was your most touching video game moment?
All of these moments happened during the completion of the Sleeping Dogs’ story. I’ve never been affected by a game as much as I have with this one. Someday I’ll play it through it once more.

8) Which videogame character or figure is the best?
Dante of DMC: his charisma and big mouth always deliver.

9) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
As a kid, I’ve replayed Dune 2 - The Battle for Arrakis on Sega Mega Drive as House Harkonnen multiple times, then it got replaced by HoMM. I’m also a big fan of Devil May Cry and on an unpopular note, I’ve played the 5th game the most (and discovered Combichrist). Having rather warm feelings for the Bioware universe, I’ve also completed Dragon Age quite a few times.

10) What game have you been really looking forward to but turned out to be a total disappointment?
I had big expectations for Prototype 2, but since they’ve turned Alex Mercer into antagonist, I was too disappointed to even give it a shot.

11) Your favorite music playlist
Metal, metal and more metal of all kinds, especially live. Otherwise I’m attracted to various genres as long as it rocks me.

12) Your favorite movie or book?
That’s a tough one as I’ve been influenced by many books. George Orwell’s 1984, Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude and Stephen King’s The Running man are definitely there. My favorite movies are book-based too - Palahniuk’s The Fight Club by David Fincher and Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Miloš Forman. Like many, I’m a big fan of Quentin Tarantino’s movies, Pulp Fiction in particular. I never grow tired of watching it.

13) Your travel tip?
China. Marvelous country, ancient history, tons of sightseeing and on the other hand, a lot of hi-end decisions and scientific research. And if you’re into good food, this place has it all as each of China’s numerous regions has its own cuisine, the common thing being both quality and quantity. The nature’s something else, I mean, the country has karst hills, so what else could you possibly want?

14) What will be your famous last words?
I live, I die, I live again!

15) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
You can only buy me with meat.

16) Who is your favorite historic character?
Sir Winston Churchill was not just one of the history’s most prominent minds in terms of politics and military strategy, he was also a true intellectual genius. Nikola Tesla’s another brilliant man - a mind so revolutionary for its time that he was considered insane,. That’s the brain I’d love to pick.

17) Knights or Samurai?
Vikings!

18) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
We’re trying our darndest to make this a truly interesting and remarkable game and we really do put our heart and soul into making it just that. I hope in KCD you’ll find another realm you’ll be glad to return to.

Do you have more questions for Alisa Zavodina? Just ask here.

DrFusselpulli · May 25, 2017, 12:39pm

And here are Alisa Zavodina´s answers to your community questions.

I’ve lived here before I started working in WH.

there will be some dice game in the pubs.

Nope, but I played Alpha/Beta in WH.

You will see it in the game

Yes, and this mini game is great.

There are no random quests. We are trying to limit filler content as much as possible. All quests are hand crafted. But in the game are random events, for example, you can be attacked by bandits or you can investigate a murder.

There is one achievement where you have to find all the names of the higher kickstarter backers that we have in our game.

This is some debug for beds, benches etc. If it’s not working (or not correctly) – sheep is spawned on this place.

DrFusselpulli · July 19, 2017, 9:24am

Petr “Hudy” Hudeček is one of the newest members of Warhorse Studios, as he joined the team just recently in April 2017 as a tester for the quality assurance departement. He was born in Brno, in the east of the Czech Republic. But now he is here in Prague and helps to make Kingdom Come: Deliverance a better game.
Do you have any questions for Petr “Hudy” Hudeček or his position as a tester? Just ask here!
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I first heard about Warhorse soon after its successful Kickstarter campaign. It caught my attention for its uniqueness. I‘ve been working for Warhorse since April 2017, so I’m one of the latest additions to the team. There is of course a less fancy name for it.

2) Describe your position. What is it about being a quality assurance?
I’m helping my colleagues to identify and eliminate problems in the game so we can deliver the highest quality product possible.

3) Did you ever worked on Videogames before?
I’ve created a few custom-made games for my friends so to be honest……no, not really.

4) Which job would you not want to do?
There is no such job. Any job you do can branch you out in a spectacular way. However, I know what I would love to do: design the whole concept of the game – gameplay, business model, monetarization, message to the players, etc.

5) Describe your usual day at the studio?
If possible, I start my day by dishing out offensive jokes towards Luboš Suk or Prokop Filcík. Afterwards, I start downloading new data while waiting for their sweet revenge. After that, I’m looking for problems in the game that might downgrade player’s experience. Part of the job is to analyze the reasons behind it and then see who the problem(s) should be reported to. It takes a lot of time and focus, but whenever I have some spare time, I’m of course inventing new offensive jokes towards Prokop and Luboš.

6) What are you currently working on?
Currently I’m working on E3 content, which brings both great fun and responsibility. Most of the E3 content is part of the main story (without spoiling anything major, of course). Besides that, I’m working on the crime system, ambush events, and several quests.
I like how the perception of NPCs in the crime system works, especially when you are trespassing into someone’s property. You can sneak through their backyard without being noticed, but if you’re not careful enough, they will come after you and hunt you down.

7) What do you like the most about Kingdom Come: Deliverance?
The whole package. It’s either that or nothing, as it always should be.

8) Which videogame character or figure is the best?
For me it’s almost all Bioware characters. I also love the Mass Effect series’ characters and Star Wars’ characters, how they ask the right questions and create emotional relations. The BEST one would probably be Kreia - she knew how to open one’s eyes. She made me realize how naive I can be about consequences and assumptions. It was the perfect thing to teach a young growing boy like me.

9) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
The most fun of course. I’m open minded about it, but it depends on the gameplay. However, if I have the chance to play a supportive character, even in a small way, I usually take the opportunity to do so.

10) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
No matter what I do, somehow I always end up playing SWTOR and LoL. I’m intensively trying to analyze why.

11) What would a perfect game according to your wishes look like?
I believe I will bring that bad boy to life one day. For now, I have my own fails to make. I can reveal that it will create a new genre, but it is all a work in progress. A second best game would be described in the world-renowned book: Ready Player One. I’ve never felt so passionate about the gaming world before. Ernest Cline created and described something very unique there.

12) Most hilarious bug you have ever encountered or worst video game experience?
Definitely something in KCD. Funny things happen during game development.

13) What game have you been really looking forward to but turned out to be a total disappointment?
Atlas Reactor. Information from developers was non consistent with the game itself. It was really a great idea that was badly executed, and the tutorial didn’t help much.

14) What species is your spirit animal?
Panda

15) Your travel tip?
Decide to go, then make the first step.

16) What’s your guilty pleasure?
Nutella, Lotus biscuits, peanut butter and chips.

17) What will be your famous last words?
Oh! So I was wrong again, I guess.

18) What is your kryptonite?
Nutella, Lotus biscuits, peanut butter and chips. I’m so weak around it.

19) Which is your favorite historic event?
Hannibal Barca’s campaign against the Roman Empire. Everyone in business should know his story.

20) If you could fight 100 duck-sized horses or 1 horse-sized duck, which would you choose?
Fight them? I would befriend them! That would be the ultimate badass achievement.

21) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
Brace yourself! Its coming.

Do you want to know more about our tester Petr “Hudy” Hudeček? Please ask here!

DrFusselpulli · May 31, 2017, 4:12pm

here are Petr “Hudy” Hudečeks answers to your community questions.

I find it difficult to admire people as idols. I always try to question everything and everyone. Including myself. I would do some things differently, but who am I to judge right now? You guys will be the judges that matter.

No I haven’t. I had general idea about the game from youtube, but that’s all.

In one word: inconsistency. But it’s improving.

Not to spoil too much, I can say that NPC reacts to noises in a way and dogs can be soothed right now.

Haven’t seen it yet, but I will definitely give it a go!

Oh yeah! Yeah! Lovely babes are all over me… begging for my attention, guys ask me what is it like to be so important! That’s a NO by the way.

That is interesting theory. But more important question is: why are you asking?

I haven’t spent that much time with everyone to tell. But I can say this. Ending of every project is hard. It’s not always sunshine and butterflies, but it definitely isn’t “just a job”.

DrFusselpulli · July 19, 2017, 9:14am

Jan “Bodkin” Němec is one of the designers here at Warhorse Studios, and his crazy mind makes for very interesting quests. He was born in Kyjov, in the southern Moravian part of the Czech Republic.
Do you have any questions for Jan “Bodkin” Němec or his position as a tester? Just ask here!
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I can’t remember when I heard about Warhorse for the first time, but I do remember that I said something like, “Fuck, I wanted to make an RPG about the Hussite Wars!” Sometime later, Warhorse was looking for Designers and I was looking for work… just a simple destiny thing. As they say, ‘If you can’t beat them, join them.’
A few years later I joined the studio just two months before the Kickstarter…

2) Have you ever worked on Videogames before?
Yeah, back in the DOS times, I once opened Gorillas small QBASIC game, deleted one line of code and never made it work again.
In the early 2000s I was part of a team behind a game which was very popular with teenage boys.
Around 2009 I started to work on Roguelike to end all Roguelikes, as it never saw the light of day.

3) What are you currently working on?
Nowadays I am trying to play my quest, squash bugs, add moods, rewrite logs and weep silently.

4) What are some of your notable accomplishments?
There is one sentence I am really proud of.

5) What is most difficult in designing a quest?
To know where to stop. Or better yet, to find the right balance between over-designing and under-designing the quest. It’s too easy to add so much cool stuff that it is not actually possible to make it work together (or test every possible fringe situation) and it is too easy to miss an obvious solution, because you already have 3 and it is more than enough.
The other super hard thing is actually finishing the quest. The beginning is all fun and roses and beer (or other alcohol), but then the reality sets in and you start throwing out things that don’t work (but you loved that idea so much) and it’s not fun to play, it looks stupid, and it breaks your heart and you start to detest it sooo much, that you want to take the quest behind the barn and finally end its suffering. Furthermore, everything is your fault, it was your stupid idea!

6) Do you have a favorite quest?
My favorite quest is one where you can solve everything by just punching people in the face. Yeah, you can also solve it by other means, but this had a great feel of a stupid 80’s action movie.

7) How, when and with what platform or game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
In the early 90’s, I remember playing Captain Comic, Cosmo, Prince of Persia, and Crime Wave at my uncle’s computer. Later, Prince of Persia was the first game I played on my first computer - 386DX/40MHz (Yeah, I’ve been an AMD fanboy my whole life without knowing it…)

8) Which class, gender, or type do you usually pick?
I don’t like class-based systems in my RPGs! And because of the first Baldurs Gate, I absolutely hate magic casters (1 spell, 4 HP, bloody Tarnesh…). Arcanum of Steamworks and Magicka Obscura were the best: you could create elven time-bending sword masters, Half-Ogre Intellectuals, gnomes with grenade launchers, magic throwing dwarfs, and everything in between… VtM: Bloodlines and old fallouts too had fun systems.

9) Which videogame character are you?
Duke Nukem. I too have balls of steel. Childhood accident.

10) Most hilarious bug you have ever encountered or worst video game experience?
Does this count?

11) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
Nowadays it’s a rare occurrence, as I am wasting time with MP games and roguelikes, but I’ve played through the first Deus Ex several times and my play-through count of Fallout1&2/Arcanum goes into the dozens.

12) What would a perfect game according to your wishes look like?
Far Cry 2 (or Metal Gear Solid V) mixed with Jagged Alliance 2, gently stirred with a pinch of simulation.

13) How do you relax after a hard day at work?
If my work day was creative, I’ll play games (MP shooters, Strategies, RPGs and roguelikes) or I’ll read a book (Scifi or Horror). If I didn’t reach my creative satisfaction, I’ll write short stories or short comic scripts or things like that - something that is finished in one go or in a day or two…

14) Your favorite movie or book?
Books: Terror by Simmons, Dune by Herbert and the Hussite Trilogy by Sapkowski
Movies: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly, Snatch, and Kung-fu Hustle

15) What’s your guilty pleasure?
Jaywalking, lollygagging, and infanticide. (Also reading TV Tropes)

16) What is your kryptonite?
UV radiation - I’ll burn to a crisp.

17) What is your weakest trait?
My attention span is that of a hyperactive kitten and the memory of a goldfish with Alzheimers.
Also, written English…

18) Which is your favorite historic event?
That is quite a hard question, as History is full of interesting/mind-blowing things. I’d say that the burning down of the library in Alexandria is my favorite (not in a positive way but as a warning and it makes me really angry).
Also, it could be, as we Czech says: “Pořádný fajrák.”

19) Knights or Samurai?
Pirate actually. Pirates, Vikings and Knights was a great HL mod.

20) Jan was a very important name in Czech History, Jan Hus, Jan Žižka, Jan Nepomucký. How do you feel being part of this tradition?
This is quite a funny question, because you don’t use Jan in a casual conversation. It is one of those written names that history is full of, but nobody says them aloud. You use the home version of the name or the nickname.

21) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
Well, summer is near, the sun is shining so please use protection! I mean it! Also, thank you for your support. I mean that too!

Do you want to know more about our tester Jan “Bodkin” Němec Please ask here!

DrFusselpulli · June 7, 2017, 4:22pm

And here are the answers from Jan “Bodkin” Němec to your community questions.

That ‘bug picture’ is from alpha/beta so no, it is not final

There was a English snippet of Hamlet in a book for literature class and bodkin had a really nice sound when read aloud (yeah, I’ve had no idea what it is, just that it is some handheld tool). And that’s it. I am sorry.

It’s always smart to have protection! But this was around our armor video and I was curious how does it feel to have it all on you. So after 10 minutes I found, that.
a) it is not that heavy,
b) I was dying from overheating.

Some smart pun. I guess. Unless someone else renamed because it was too stupid.

Sometimes there were problems, when I was counting on too many systems working together flawlessly, so it was cut out or simplified.

So there is this quest, with this one guy and when you choose the right answer to his question, he will say it! Sorry

Truth to be told, I was using examples from nearly all of my quests. I did a few mainquests and not-so-few sidequests. I couldn’t write a love story to save my life…

But you can’t write with your gloves on!

Well, I had to change all of my cynophobic NPCs to polephobic.

DrFusselpulli · July 19, 2017, 9:01am

Karel “pan Tau” Taufman is an Animator here at Warhorse Studios. He was born in Hradec Králové here in the Czech Republic. Check out what he has to say.
Do you have any questions to Karel “pan Tau” Taufman or his position? Please ask here!
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) Describe your position. What is it about being an animator?
I work at Warhorse Studios as an animator/motion editor, which makes me co-responsible for motion of all characters and props in the game.
Almost all of our animations begin in a mocap studio, where we record actors playing out the required moves or acting out their roles for cutscenes. Although the recordings are very good and mocap itself has become an indispensable tool for any AAA game production, it cannot be used in the game as is.
Animations need to be looped, stitched or blended together, timing-adjusted, gestures enhanced or reduced, body language altered, and interaction with props must be corrected.
A good example from KCD is killing a person in a fight. We can’t really expect the actors to attack each other with deadly force and put mocap swords through their torsos. Actors record the motion as close to the intended result as possible and then the animator makes it look fatal.

As you can see in a photograph nearby, killing with a mocap sword is just not possible. We need to implement a workaround – the animator.

2) What’s the difference between an animator and a motion editor?
A traditional animator is responsible for the character’s motion and its concept from start-to-finish. He or she gets to choose when the character hesitates, what leg she puts the weight on, or how hunched she walks.
Mocap-based animation on the other hand, is a collaboration between a mocap actor and the animator. The better the actor’s performance the less work for the animator.
Sometimes the quality of the actor’s performance may pleasantly surprise you. Details like the blacksmith tossing the hammer into the air for a quick bit before getting to work make the animation more unique and interesting. Sometimes, on the other hand, you end up improving the actor’s performance by adding motion into an otherwise dead spot. In the end nobody knows who created what aspect of the final animation. If I do my work perfectly, everybody thinks the mocap was just that good

3) Is it beneficial to have an in-house mocap studio?
Mocap is a must for any game with a considerable amount of humanoid animation. The majority of game developers cannot afford their own mocap studio, so they need to commission one. Although a common practice, this presents many problems for the workflow in the ever-changing world of computer game development. It is not only about planning the mocap sessions to be as few and economical as possible, it’s also about the distance to a good studio.
At Warhorse the animators are separated from the mocap studio by some 2 meters. It is just across the corridor, which is a blessing. Whenever there is an issue we can quickly record a new motion. There is no ordering process or negotiation slowing us down. We can experiment and spend as much time in the studio as we want.

4) What are some of the difficulties of game animation?
Coming up with interesting motion is getting more and more difficult. In every game we get to see walks, lifting, or dropping items and random gestures during dialogues. The complication is, there just isn’t an infinite number of ways a biped character can pick up an item. Because of that, similar motions turn up not only in games but also in animated children television programs. This puts more stress on work of everyone involved with the recording in a mocap studio.
Technical issues also come into consideration. When the cameras in the studio cannot see the markers (little plastic balls attached to actors and props), no motion can be recorded. I confronted a very bad example of this issue when working on a cutscene, in which our hero finds himself in an intimate situation with a girl. Since both actors recorded the motion with their bodies very close to each other, many markers were hidden from the cameras and the actors’ motion could not be recorded properly. I took up the challenge and hopefully made the animation work. I admit that research for this particular animation was rather peculiar.

5) Is there any part of animator’s job that may be surprising to us?
I don’t know about surprises, but perhaps something that could happen unexpectedly. Being an animator is not only about moving objects by hand; the experience in scripting and programming also comes in handy. Our macro scripts may be as complex as the one depicted on a nearby screenshot.
I used a simpler one for the stone that gets loaded into a trebuchet. Considering the type of motion, it made really no sense to animate the stone by hand, so I used a script to move it along with the character and roll along the ground (trebuchet). It was fast and with a few polishing touches it worked very nicely.

6) Did you ever worked on Videogames before?
I started in the gaming industry as a journalist for printed gaming magazines. I got to play games, travel to trade shows, interview game designers, and I was well paid for it. Can you imagine? For a young kid that was a dream come true.
After that I was a game designer, screenwriter, project leader, 2d and 3d artist and animator on forty six games. Until KCD happened, the biggest game I worked heavily on was ArmA III. I also worked as a VFX artist, copywriter, TV commercials writer, and director.

7) Please describe Warhorse Studios.
The atmosphere at Warhorse is very good. Even after so much time spent working on one game, people are still enthusiastic about it. The interaction among colleagues is very pleasant. You don’t see any bullying, mobbing, or bossing going around as it’s been unfortunately reported in some other game development studios today.

8) What are you currently working on?
The whole animation department is currently back at work on cutscenes. We are doing another quality pass that includes (among other things) detailed hand/finger animations and most importantly, facial animations for all characters.
We use an in-house tool to procedurally build basic mouth animation from the dialogues. This is just as great of a help as mocap itself. I used to do such animation by hand only a few years ago, so I would know. There is no ay a game of this magnitude could be accomplished the old way in our lifetime.
After adding procedural mouth animations, we hand tune them in every cutscene. At the same time, we add all facial animation: smiles, frowns, eye movement or blinks. All cutscenes combined take more time than a very long movie, so there is a lot of blinking to add.
The secret to a proper facial animation is subtlety. Sometimes not so much though as you can see in a screenshot nearby. Also in the same screenshot, note our very secret rig for facial animation.

9) How, when and with what platform or game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
The first game I played was the first commercially successful game in the world: Pong. At the time, it was only available to me occasionally in traveling arcades. I was instantly hooked on the phenomenon just like all the other kids. Pong had no AI, so you had to find another kid to play against you. Sometimes no one was available so you had to stoop to playing against your sworn enemies! It made the game that more interesting.

10) What was your most touching video game moment?
Probably not what you might expect. It was actually when I animated the hero of “Evil Days of Luckless John” and his girlfriend. After escaping the bad guys in a deadly chase the couple finally got to share a kiss by the sunset. It was very romantic and pretty cheesy and it was the first time my own animation touched me emotionally. I created an illusion of love by moving bones of a character skeleton. It blew me away. I couldn’t wait to see it in the game.
EPILOGUE: There was a mistake in the design and I was asked to reanimate the whole scene for the opposing camera in a fraction of the originally allocated time. Oh well, sigh…
Things like this do happen in game animation though, and you must never take them to heart.

11) What game have you been really looking forward to but turned out to be a total disappointment?
I was a big fan of Ultima RPG series when Ultima IX: Ascension was announced. Considering the grand ending of the preceding Ultima VIII and the subtitle of the game, it promised to be a proud finale to the third trilogy in the series.
Use of a 3d engine in what was previously an isometric game, was supposed to give the player an unprecedented freedom and immersion. That’s in a game series famed for allowing players to mix ingredients and bake their own bread. Not that you had to but you could. Over the development of the game, Origin Systems would release sneak peaks at the prerendered cutscenes that were second-to-none at the time and hinted at a truly epic story.
The development of the game took five long years. In the meantime, with no new Ultima to play, I’d finished all of the series’ MS-DOS/EGA installments. I wrote walkthroughs for them that were printed in the Excalibur magazine along with the maps I drew (you can see one somewhere nearby).
When Ultima IX finally appeared it failed in every department except for the cutscenes.

12) How do you relax after a hard day at work?
I am a very digital person but lately I started to feel a need to create something I could touch with my hands, so I started working with wood. I built my first cabinet only a few weeks ago. Surprisingly it looks good. The door works and most importantly - it does not disappear when the power goes off.
I also write a little bit. In fact, I’ve been writing screenplays for a comic book series for almost fifteen years now. It brought me together with some of the kindest people in the world, so it’s a little treasure in my life.
The real challenge of writing for comics is telling your story with short bursts of text that can fit into the speech balloons. Forget graphomania, you cannot use any fancy sentences and you often find yourself deleting your best dialogue simply because it is too long for the balloons that are available. So writing for comics is definitely not for everyone.

13) Your travel tip?
Anywhere with someone you love. Still, maybe not Mogadishu.

14) What will be your famous last words?
You mean I get to say my last words now?!

15) Is it possible to buy you with candy?
Nope. You can try to be a nice person though. That should be enough.

16) What is your kryptonite?
I certainly have one, but you will never know.

17) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
With pleasure: Rictusempra, Tarantallegra, Levicorpus, Rictusempra, Liberacorpus, Molliare, Rennervate, Episkey, Erecto, Aguamenti, Obliviate.

Do you have any questions to Karel “pan Tau” Taufman or his position? Please ask here!

DrFusselpulli · January 5, 2018, 12:06pm

And here are Karel´s answers to your community questions:

Greetings to Thee, Baron Blacksmith. Thank you for your questions.

This is my favorite question in the batch. You could write a thesis on this topic alone. It touches upon animation, game design, programming, hardware and more. Unfortunately I have neither the time nor expertise to give you a deserving answer. Let me try my best.
We have several distinctive animation sets for normal, subordinate, regal etc. characters. These were required by designers and will be used throughout the game. That is why it makes sense to create whole sets of motions for them.
Why only make full sets for selected character types? One reason above all is RAM. Every animation that is being played must be loaded into RAM. That is every motion of every bone in every character on the screen. This is the main reason why all game characters in all games tend to share the same sets of motions. It is also why game characters have so few bones. For example the rat I modeled and rigged for DayZ had a limit of 18 bones only!
Obviously more character variety is needed and it is usually achieved by inserting characters with limited motion sets. For example a beggar who can only beg and react to people passing by in both positive and negative ways.

Technically we can do lipsync for any language. The automatic process that we use is only a start though and there is a huge amount of hand tweaking and polishing. Because of this and because of the very many hours of cutscenes and dialogues, lipsync will be fitting for English only.

Nope, I am only an animator

There is never enough time. Neither in game development nor in life. But I would like to pass the question to Martin Klekner who will be certainly happy to answer in more detail in the next Weekly Torch.

Nice idea, but arm wrestling was never intended to be a mini game and as of now, there are no plans to make it into one.

In the beginning, Warhorse Studios bought some mocaps of a horse. We did it because we needed those motions very fast and also because the horse did not fit through the corridors leading to our mocap studio. I am not joking. There are mocap studios designed specifically to let big animals or vehicles in. This requires a ground floor and an appropriate building. Our mocap studio is on the fifth floor and covers 99.9% of our mocap needs. It is possible to mocap animals though, but it is very difficult especially with those that are not easily trained. Also animals tend to find mocap markers all over their bodies very unnatural and often reject wearing them. Can you imagine attaching mocap markers to a cat? You can find horses tamed enough for that or dogs trained for obedience, but even they may prove quite a challenge in the studio. I know this because I worked with a dog mocap and it was quite unusable. It would work for an episodic character in a movie, but could not be used to create motion loops needed for a game. Currently we animate all animal motion manually in the studio. Even the original horse mocap was heavily altered during the production and there was no other mocap/animation purchase after that.

@savvym has already answered your question correctly, so I will only fill in some details.

Accidentally you ask the right person, because I did the animations for the trebuchet. We now have anims for loading up the rock, pulling down the trebuchet arm and firing; including all the trebuchet motion. They are now at the disposal of designers and scripters to use as they please. As far as I know, the trebuchet will be fired both in a cinematic and by the player and I think it’s been already implemented.

Facial mocap would produce much better results than manual animation of facial rigs, but we don’t use it on purpose. Firstly recording facial mocap and accompanying contact sound and reference video for all of our cinematics and dialogues would require tremendous amount of storage. Mere management of this amount of data would require much more hardware, a lot of additional manpower and time. Secondly, it would take much more time and manpower to polish facial mocap than it takes to animate the rig by hand. In both cases we are talking a difference between a car shop and NASA. That is why facial mocap is so successfully applied in film production but not so often used in computer games. It is about the difference in the amount of data (i.e. animation) that needs to be processed at every stage of production.

Hi! Thank you for your questions and good wishes!

Cumans will play a very important part in the story, which is very unfortunate for our hero.

KCD was designed from the get go with the first person view only in mind. A lot of the production is heavily influenced by that.
For example all the player animations, that we see through the POV cam, were tailored to look as good as possible in the POV cam. The modifications we apply to achieve that often make the animations look unnatural in the 3rd person cam.
If there is a 3rd person mode in the end, it would only be in a form of an Easter egg, but it will not play well.

Hi and thanks for your questions. This is what I’d call the Andromeda effect. One thing is the animation itself, while the way it is used in the game is another thing alltogether. Animators cannot really influence in any way how characters move around the streets or the country. We can do the animation cycles as well as we can, but the motion of characters around the world is totally in the hands of scripters, AI guys and programmers who then combine those animations to create illusion of living beings. You may need to approach them for a more detailed discussion.

Yes there is an awful lot of foot sliding and there is no way around it. I know, I couldn’t believe it either. Although again this has nothing to do with the character animation. The reason is Cryengine’s way of interpolating feet between two animations. Instead of going from one pose into another, it sort of interpolates the first anim feet into a kind of default pose and then into the feet of the next anim. Our technical animators would be required for more in-depth explanation.

Perhaps Dan would be better qualified to reply.

Absolutely no bad feelings. Thank you for your time. Best of luck to you too!

Hi, umar! I am not sure what part seemed wooden but again this appears to be related to how the animations are used rather than how they are created. The dialogue system is in constant development and characters are still being heavily worked on. I can’t really tell more without better description of the parts you found displeasing.

NOTE: Karel didn´t saw the E3 presentation, so he don´t really know what exact animations you were talking about.

Thank you everyone for your time and your questions. Best of luck to you all!

DrFusselpulli · June 30, 2017, 2:11pm

Martin Klekner is our Lead Cinematic Designer here at Warhorse Studios. He joined the team after the Kickstarter Campaign back in 2014 and enriches the team with his excellent visual sense. He was born in Liberec in the north of the Czech Republic, but now he is here in Prague of course.
Do you want to know more about Martin Klekner and his job as a lead Cinematic Designer? Don´t hesitate and ask here!
You can find a Spanish translation of this interview here.

1) How did you hear about Warhorse?
I am one of the many people who first heard about Warhorse through their Kickstarter campaign. It’s funny, because I never actually thought that I could become part of the WH team. However, by total accident, I got invited in. Back in 2014 I was working on a student project called Chronicles: Prague - basically an iPhone app, tourist guide and video biography of Charles IV.'s life, all in one - and for this app me and my friends built a pretty substantial 3D model of the 14th century Prague. I wanted to lend a helping hand to Warhorse’s project so I sent an email to Dan Vávra, offering him this model. It turned out completely different than I expected. Several weeks later, Dan sent me a message, in which he told me that he saw Chronicles and he wanted me to join the project. I was to be helping to create the game’s future cinematics. To be honest, I have always been more of a freelance guy, but this was an offer I simply could not refuse. I’m glad I didn’t… and I’m really grateful for the opportunity Dan gave me.

2) Describe your position. What is it about being a Cinematic Lead?
Well, it’s pretty much about trying to persuade the rest of the team that our open-world RPG needs good looking cutscenes as well But really, what I love about this job, is that it’s many things in one. One day I find myself drawing storyboards for Dan’s story, other times I’m directing actors on motion capture, even fooling around in mocap suit myself, the rest of the time it’s about working with a talented team of cinematic guys and animators, editing cutscenes in MotionBuilder and CryEngine and trying to achieve the best results possible in our limited conditions. It’s an adventure, often strenuous, but I guess that’s what I love about it.

3) Have you ever worked on Videogames before?
All of us in the cinematic department - Petr Pekař, Tomáš Kraus, Jiří Švarc and me - have come from the film and vfx industry. Everybody - except Petr - never worked on a game before (Petr worked on Mafia 3)… After three years of doing this, I must say, games are probably the most difficult projects to work on - there’s so many elements that must come together for the game to work, so many different departments, and all of it is constantly buggy and crashing. You may finish some task on Friday and find it completely ruined on Monday, without apparent reason (I don’t actually laugh when this happens). But we’re doing our best, learning on the run, solving one problem at a time. I believe it will pay off in the end

4) Please describe Warhorse Studios:
It’s an adventure, simple as that. Sometimes we hate each other, sometimes we despair, sometimes we feel immense pride in what we were able to achieve. It’s a process of trial and error, so it really can’t be any different. What makes it different from any other studio project I’ve worked on, is the enthusiasm.

5) What is your favorite team activity?
Our (more or less) weekly screenings of cutscenes, where we debate what can be improved. Especially when accompanied by a bottle of beer Also, lighting and fine tuning cutscenes with our Art Director Mikuláš Podprocký. Miki has a great eye for detail, one can learn from him a lot. The fine-tuning phase is when all our work finally comes together - and it’s always a great feeling.

Also, the mocap recording with our team of actors. I think I will never forget this experience

6) Describe your usual day at the studio?
A hot cup of coffee. That’s where it always starts Otherwise, it varies. A year ago, the process was completely different from now (we were mocaping the cutscens), two years ago as well (that was when I drew the storyboards) . After that, we edited the rough cuts of the cutscenes, putting the mocap data together, adding cameras and cuts.

These days we are in the finishing phase of cutscene production. Which means, first thing in the morning, I start downloading the latest data build of the game and in the meantime, I solve some bugs reported by our testers. Then, I start working on my cutscenes, same as the rest of the cinematic team. We polish the camera moves, the lighting, the environment, add particles etc. etc. Anything to make the cutscene look nice, while not lowering the FPS too much.

7) What do you think is the most important part of the game?
There’s this atmosphere of believability about the whole thing. For example, I remember the first time I walked into Talmberg village. It was at night - and suddenly, this huge black shape appeared in front of me. It was the Talmberg castle. And for some reason, it made a greater impression on me than any other castle from any other game. It was not the biggest, not the most awesome looking castle I’ve seen in a game, no. But since it was set in this realistic, down-to-earth environment, it stood out. And I realized: wow, this is how it must have felt to see a real castle in the Middle Ages.

I get the same feeling from all the elements in the game, from the story, the combat system or just from strolling around through the environment.

8) As a lead cinematic designer you can surely tell us more about the Global announcement Trailer?
Well apart from the fact that we had a crazy deadline and generally it was one big chaos, trying to make the best possible result without a final edit of the video up until the last moments… it was fun! Required a few sleepless nights spent in the studio, but it was worth-it. A great team effort. And a lot of people seem to like the trailer, which is awesome

9) You were involved in the recent change of Henrys hair-style, can you tell us more about that?
Well, I’m not really sure about the importance of my role in this change, in the end, it was a joint decision of Dan Vávra, Mikuláš Podprocký and Ivan Čerevko (our character artist working on the characters’ haircuts). But I did make some comments about Henry looking a bit too metrosexual for a son of a blacksmith. And I probably mentioned this to Dan, Miki and Ivan… I think the new haircut is much more fitting, which means it helps to tell the story of the game… And that’s the most important thing for the cutscene department.

10) with what game did you first get acquainted with videogames?
Prehistorik! I loved that little fella

11) What was your most touching video game moment?
Oh, there’s so many. I think the time around 2003/2004 was when, for me personally, the most influential games were released. Max Payne 2, Half-Life 2, Far Cry, Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time… I realized then, that games are capable of telling a gripping story. The next wave of games I loved came around 2010: Witcher 2, Mass Effect. I am also happiest when I win a battle in Total War games - oh, I love their games.

If I had to pick, though… probably the ending of Max Payne 2.

12) Are there any videogames you repeat playing over and over again?
Total War games. I’ve also played Mass Effect series, Dragon Age 1, Max Payne 1,2,3, Witcher 2 and Half-Life 2 several times.

13) Most hilarious bug you have ever encountered or worst video game experience?
New and exciting bugs are created every single day in our game! There’s a lot of hilarious stuff. I remember a bug from recent days, that made me laugh: “Sir Robard appears to be holding a chair in his hand and flying around the map with it.” You wouldn’t come up with these ideas the game produces even if you tried. Of course, we in the cinematic department, encounter our fair share of strange stuff.

14) How do you relax after a hard day at work?
Reading a good book, swing dancing or brazilian jiu-jitsu sparring. Especially the last one. There’s something about being choked by your sparring partner that makes you forget about KCD… at least for a while

15) Your favorite movie or book?
The Lord of the Rings. Yes, movie and book.

16) What’s your guilty pleasure?
The movie 300. It is atrocious… but awesome at the same time.

17) What was your favorite subject and your most hated one at school?
Now when I think about it, I probably loved history lessons the most. I love great stories. And history is full of great stories.
Most hated? That’s easy - Math, Physics, Chemistry. I can’t really say which I hated the most

18) If you could say something to the fans of Kingdom Come: Deliverance, what would it be?
Thank you for your patience and your faith in our project. It never ceases to amaze me how many people are interested in an RPG situated in 15th century Bohemia, a relatively unknown part of history. I think this is a once-in-a-life-time opportunity to make a game like this and we all do our best to make you happy in the end

If you still have questions for our lead Cinematic designer Martin Klekner, just ask here!

DrFusselpulli · January 5, 2018, 12:04pm

here are the answers to your questions about Martin Klekner.

Well, I think that the original idea came from Dan Vávra and Mikuláš Podprocký (our Art Director). And to be honest, the concept art Miki did for Henry’s undercut looked great! He looked gruff, rugged, anything BUT metrosexual. It seemed to work…on paper, but when our character artists tried to replicat that haircut in game, it simply did not work on Tom McKay’s type of head.
It’s worth mentioning, that the undercut is historically accurate. It was quite common among higher classes and fighters of the time, probably because it is easier to put on a helmet, when you have sides of your head shaved.

Yes, we go through a lot of stages. First there was a rough cut, then polished cut, then some first camera polishes, overall polishes, etc. We schedule the completion of each phase around some important milestone our management gives us. In each round of this process, we try to improve the look of the cutscene as much as possible.

All of it, probably But you know what? I think that on every project worth doing, there’s never enough time, money, tools or people. It’s just about what you can do with what you’re given.

Yes, we are all very much aware of how Mass Effect: Andromeda ended up, so our animation department will definitely try their best to make the facial anims as polished as possible. It’s a tough job, though, especially in the span of 4 hours of dynamic cutscenes.

You are probably referring to the “dead faces” seen in our E3 demo. No worries there, the facial “moods” for in-game dialogues are one of the last things that are implemented. Basically, for each paragraph of our in-game dialogues, a character mood needs to be set and somebody has to set it. This, however, was not finished when we set out for E3 this year. Don’t worry, it will be ready for the final product, the characters will be blinking, have different emotions etc.

Creating different good-looking hairstyles for the main hero takes a lot of time. At this stage, we rather focus on polishing the stuff we already have

That really depends on the type of a deadline. For E3 trailer deadline there really is no plan B, it needs to be finished on an agreed-upon day. For game-related deadlines, there are often plans on how can we make things simpler or what we can cut, to finish everything in time.

I wish I could tell, sorry, I wasn’t tracking the hours It took us about four weeks from first cut to final polish. That, however, was just a process of polishing shots that have been in production for more than a year. However, in those 4 weeks, I think our team often worked double the normal workweek hours We were also still working on finishing the rest of the cutscenes throughout the production of the trailer.

I try not to think about it too much, one can get crazy thinking like this

It is my opinion, that one has to be familiar with the game we’re making, with its story, the medieval setting, the historical characters etc… generally, you have to live it and put a lot of heart into it, to make good cutscenes set in the world we crafted. Outsourcing is not really an option.
However, the cinematic team is pretty well balanced at this point, everybody is great at something, we work really well together and made good improvement since Beta. So I am confident we can make something worth watching.

The whole layer system adjusts to everything the character is wearing, changing shape so that it can fit to the layer above it. I am not really an expert on this topic, however. I think there is a videoupdate about this, probably update #2.

Filming a movie or a series from medieval era, that would be great.