Smashmouth Pro Football Ballcarrier Capture Part II: Running Styles

[TheWatcher]

In this thread, I want to show the progression of the running captures between builds. Using real world examples, you'll see how things like stride length and running urgency in Smashmouth will have similarities to some of the runners you see playing in the Pros today.

LaDainian Tomlinson's stride vs. Vincent Davis's stride






Although their running styles differ, as you can see in the above photos the runner (Vincent Davis) in Smashmouth matches LT's stride length almost identically.

Ball-handling and running urgency

Every pro ballcarrier has a unique style of his own. Some players have more pronounced arm motions, some have less. Some players have a high ball holding placement, some have a lower one. Some backs stride long, some not so long. Some players run with a lower-center (usually shorter backs), some backs run very upright (usually taller backs). Some backs run with a very calm and smooth form, while others run wild with reckless abandon.

The most urgent running style in the pro's today is that of Adrian Peterson's:



With his wild ballcarrying arm swings (see 1:08 of the video), jumpy hitching and bouncing while running downfield (see throughout the vid), he is very animated when he touches the football. He also has a tendency to tilt his head downward while running, like a bull, as if he's zeroing in on his ultimate goal... the endzone. It's a very old school style I like to call the "Bull run".

While Vincent Davis is not exactly a bull runner, he shares a few of those characteristics. In this video, you can see a bit of that in addition to the progression of the running captures between builds.



Getting your feedback on the early prototype capture was fantastic. Getting things as tight as possible now instead of waiting way too late into the process will make for a better final game, so please keep the feedback coming!

[Skyboxer]

Just....wow.
Nice work! Coming along nicely....

Quick question: Is that full speed... Looks like it's a "I'm scoring for sure as no ones around....so I'm looking at jumbo tron" speed...
Know what I mean? Looking great though. Just wondering if there is a full sprint with D player on my butt looking animation.

[Gridiron]

Yo my man move'in fluid. It's gett'in iller for real. I think this the only reason I come to this site other than check'in TW's posts on other games.Aye, do they celebrate? I want some dope joints. I wanna humiliate fools before I get that 6.

[mmorg]

This game is certainly looking interesting.

Quote: Originally Posted by Gridiron

Yo my man move'in fluid. It's gett'in iller for real. I think this the only reason I come to this site other than check'in TW's posts on other games.Aye, do they celebrate? I want some dope joints. I wanna humiliate fools before I get that 6.

What language is this?

[Cryolemon]

Quote: Originally Posted by mmorg

What language is this?

It's probably best not to ask lol.

[huskerwr38]

Much much better running motion from what I can see. It's very small to get a good enough look at it imo.

[TheWatcher]

Quote: Originally Posted by Skyboxer

Just....wow. Nice work! Coming along nicely.... Quick question: Is that full speed... Looks like it's a "I'm scoring for sure as no ones around....so I'm looking at jumbo tron" speed... Know what I mean? Looking great though. Just wondering if there is a full sprint with D player on my butt looking animation.

That's a good question, Skyboxer. Right now, I'm working mostly with base captures. I'll make a few examples about how it all works:

In every football game you have a base ballcarrier running animation. The base animation has to be a slower speed than full. Games in the NFL 2K series took their base ballcarrier animation and made it where it sped up when the user tapped 'A' quickly. So the animation itself never actually changed it only moved faster by user command (APF 2K8, NFL 2K5).

In the Madden series, they've dabbled with having a base run animation and then a faster animation that kicked-in by user command (holding down sprint). So they've actually been working with two animations for the run (Madden 10).

In Madden 09, it appears that they attempted 3. There was the trotting animation that took place before you held down sprint, then the full speed animation when you held down sprint, and then there was a third animation that would sometimes (but seldom) kick in on long breakaway's.

Backbreaker and BCFX are the same as 2K with how they speed up instead of using a different animation.

Taking the 2K approach would be the easiest for this, however I plan to have a run capture that kicks in for each level, but that wouldn't happen until the final game. I also want a breakaway capture that includes on-the-way-to-the-endzone celebrations (Gridiron ) in the final game.

[TheWatcher]

Quote: Originally Posted by huskerwr38

Much much better running motion from what I can see. It's very small to get a good enough look at it imo.

Yeah, I should've explained that... in order to extract a capture from the environment, the characters have to be prepped. The larger they are the more memory is consumed and the longer it takes to prep and extract. One with a lot of movements can take as a long as a week for me (just because I'm doing a number of other things). So to avoid that taking up a lot of time, I just did a smaller version.

But you can get a slightly bigger version by clicking on the vid; It will take you to Youtube, then click the "Expand" icon on the video task bar.