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Since the announcement of Halo, Bungie Software’s incredible looking action title has been receiving the bulk of the attention from both the press and gamers. Before that, however, the center of attention was around Oni, Bungie Software’s anime-inspired action title that was set to fuse several concepts and gameplay features into one that would bring a refreshing change to a normally lackluster and overworked genre. Thanks to a few delays, however, Oni fell from the limelight, only to bust back onto the scene during this past E3, due much to the fact that Rockstar Games revealed that would be bringing out a PlayStation 2 version. It’s taken some time, but now Oni is less than two months away from its release, and anticipation is riding high that Oni will live up to all the anticipation - and then some.In the year 2032, Oni has players under the control of Konoko, a tough, beautiful, ass kickin’ woman a part of the Tech Crimes Task Force team who’s been assigned to infiltrate and take out one of the most influential and dangerous crime syndicates in the world. On the outside, Oni might seem like the same old plot that’s been used a million times over only with switched names, but underneath the shell, Konoko will be finding out the truth behind her identity, and learn of things from her past that are crawling up from behind to haunt her in the present. There are bound to be quite a few surprises that Konoko will have to encounter, and considering the uniqueness of Bungie’s previous titles, how they’ll be presented will certainly be interesting.
One of the most hyped up aspects behind Oni has been its seamless integration of a hand-to-hand and weapon-based combat. Bungie had developed Oni so that the player does not become entirely reliant on using their firearms; there will be limited amounts of ammunition scattered through each of the enormous 14 levels, and since the fighting system that Bungie is so unlike any other, they want you to use it. Konoko has a multitude of acrobatic movies at her disposal right from the start, and she learns more as she progresses in the game. But she’ll have some competition during her travels; Bungie is working on programming some artificial intelligence that’s actually intelligence into Oni. Bungie describes the AI as “pre-conditioned, constrained neural net AI, with variable offensive and defensive postures and aggression levels.” Basically, it means that they’re set to kick your butt in about a million different ways. In addition to making numerous advances in the action genre, Bungie is also incorporating a series of new and tweaked technology features that make the game more appealing to the eye, and aid in immersing the player in the surreal environments that Konoko finds herself in. - Interpolation allows one animation sequence to blend smoothly and instantaneously into other ones. In other third-person games, for example, a "run" animation must progress through its whole sequence before a "jump" can be executed, creating a delay between the player hitting the jump key and the character actually jumping. With interpolation, a run can turn into a jump at any time, making the character instantly responsive to player commands. Konoko can spring forward, tuck into a dive roll, and then pop up into a flying kick, all in one smooth, continuous movement with no delays or "popping" between animations.
- Radiosity lighting effects paint the setting with natural light by modeling the complex way in which light bounces off of surfaces and creates natural luminosity gradations.
- Oni features high polygon-count models. They range from about 800 polys for some of the more basic characters to around 1200 for the more central ones, like Konoko. Not only does this give the characters a greater range of possible animations, in doing so it also makes them appear more lifelike.
When we had our first look at Oni on the PS2 around E3 time, things weren’t shaping up the greatest, but since then, Rockstar Games seems to have ironed most, if not all, of the problems that were present in the earlier build. While we cannot be sure how the gameplay will end up turning out (but considering Bungie's track record, we are not too concerned), we can be sure that Oni will be a beautiful looking title with smooth character animation, environments that seem to span for miles on end (and filled to the brim with impressive architecture and detail, not to mention deadly enemies) and an artistic style unlike any other. Our fingers are crossed that the frame rate has improved, but from viewing these new screen shots and seeing how much of an improvement they are over the previous batch, it is hard not to think that it won’t be fast and consistent by the time January rolls around. Oni will arrive on the PS2 in January of next year, and PC and Macintosh owners will also have a chance to give Konoko a run when Gathering of Developers releases those verions at the same time. Given the popularity of action gaming at the moment, Oni seems to have all the elements needed to make it the first must have game of 2001.
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