Indiana Jones - E3'06 First Look Preview

Since the last Indiana Jones movie, it's been up to videogames (and the Young Indy TV series) to keep the flaming torch of the archaeologist's tales alive with three releases since 1992: The Fate of Atlantis, The Infernal Machine and The Emperor's Tomb. Next year sees the release of a fourth, which is so far simply called "Indiana Jones" although expect an "...and the..." suffix to follow in future months.

The first unveiling of the game, which took place at E3 2006 behind 'nearly closed doors' (appointments only on the first two days), revealed some of the intentions that LucasArts has for the game most noticeably from a technical standpoint. It also revealed some memorable sound bits such as the belief that Indiana Jones will use "...technology that changes the ways that games are played." Bold claims, but can they be fulfilled?

Set in 1939, a year after the events of The Last Crusade, the demonstration of the game began in the Chinatown district of San Francisco and allowed LucasArts to show off the recently announced Euphoria 'behavioural-simulation' engine from NaturalMotion. Using Indy to drag and throw a number of enemies into a parked car, it was easy to see some of the breadth of the technology at work with some enemies trying to fight against Indy's actions by dragging their feet, whilst some tried to break their fall with their arms.

Taking Euphoria further, LucasArts explained that development was progressing with 2 vs.1 behaviours also being worked on, so that one enemy can grab hold of Indy whilst another tries to attack him. The technology works by giving characters what amounts to a central nervous system and a detailed set of behaviours that allows them to make decisions based on their circumstances rather than specific animations. It does have to be said however that the collisions with the vehicle didn't really have much impact, it felt quite light, although hopefully this was something done for the benefit of the demo and will be corrected during the course of the next twelve months of development.

It does however look like an Indiana Jones adventure, despite the lack of catacombs and Nazis in the demo, thanks to the demonstration of the tram-train chase sequence down the hilly sides of the Californian city. With Indy stuck on the roof of the tram whilst a number of enemies try to knock him off, you could see how complex Euphoria actually is, with chasing cars trying to dodge a falling colleague (although sometimes they weren't successful) according to the engine rather than any predetermined script or animation. Besides the combat, what clearly showed the potential of Euphoria in effect occurred when an enemy was thrown off the cabin roof only to reach out and grab onto the edge, dangling by a single arm for his life. This 'behavioural AI' as LucasArts described it will almost certainly create a game with character movement and reactions of a very high standard.

In addition to the character behaviour, LucasArts also demonstrated the rather elaborate sounding 'Digital Molecular Matter' (DMM), which essentially breaks down into describing how various objects such as wood, glass, stone, and plant life, in the game deteriorate according to their real life counter-parts. For instance, throwing an enemy through a wooden door will cause it to splinter, but going further, the door will actually breakdown according to the type of wood. The team have actually created a virtual fifty-foot high jelly and thrown characters into it just to see how the DMM works with just an unusual material. Like the Euphoria technology, it'll be really interesting to see the applications of DMM beyond the visuals of Indiana Jones and whether it'll have an actual impact on gameplay. One thing's for sure following the presentation, LucasArts are very excited about DMM and Euphoria working together and what it'll bring to Indiana Jones and their future output.

Besides the unveiling of the two technologies, LucasArts also confirmed that since its move to share the same building as Industrial Light & Magic they've working closely with its sister-company in order to push their games forward. Using the light rendering in Indiana Jones as an example, LucasArts confirmed that they were using the same 'render farms' that ILM use during the post-production stages of major motion features, and that further co-operation between the two companies was happening on a daily basis.

To further demonstrate the Euphoria technology in action, LucasArts gave a short presentation featuring Indiana Jones on the typical Indiana Jones prop, a rope bridge. Using the controller to move and shake the bridge in real-time, the representative showed how Indy reacts to certain situations and movements, from stumbling right through to going over the top rope and grabbing hold of the bridge at the last minute. All reactions were simulated through Euphoria and not through any pre-defined animations, and really helped to get across the extent that the technology could be used. Seeing Indy pelted by increasingly large stones and rocks, which he dutifully tripped over, and reacting as someone really would when a heavy object hits your shoulder only helped to solidify the point further.

George Lucas has also said that he think there's no character better suited to a videogame than Indiana Jones, something that was agreed upon (probably obligatory) by the LucasArts representatives, but then again this is the same guy who created Jar Jar Binks too. Whether Indiana Jones will bring about a pushing of the boundaries, as LucasArts hopes, or whether it will just be a realistically reacting third person title will have to be seen in 2007.