MK HD Kollection

jarvis653 · Oct 12, 2010

Tim Static said:
This thread should be closed. opinions are opinions and facts are facts. not many people seem to get the difference. the trolling is just getting stupid.

Seriously? Where in the discussion did anyone call their opinion fact? I certainly didn't, I stated many times it was my personal opinion. I think highly enough of the community to think that they do get the difference. This topic is meant to be for discussion of things that I haven't seen discussed about this game yet, and it must be interesting considering the amount of views it's racked up in just a couple of days. I hope this forum isn't only for facts.

Araknyd03 said:
How much of a selling point would the MK 9 demo be, if the HD Arcade Kollection gets delayed past the MK 9 release date?

None, which is why MKHD can't be delayed past MK9 release date or even too far after it's initial release date. Which is my point exactly, why I still think that the Kollection can't be true HD remakes, because if it were, it would be receiving a hell of a lot more promotion for the work they would've put into it. On the other hand, an upscaled HD collection doesn't need much promotion for returns, because it's easy to make and promotes their main product.

Eks · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

jarvis653 said:
Seriously? Where in the discussion did anyone call their opinion fact? I certainly didn't, I stated many times it was my personal opinion. I think highly enough of the community to think that they do get the difference. This topic is meant to be for discussion of things that I haven't seen discussed about this game yet, and it must be interesting considering the amount of views it's racked up in just a couple of days. I hope this forum isn't only for facts.

I think what Tim is getting at is you keep saying the the HD Kollection will look bad if the number of animations is not increased. Since this is the crux of your argument and "looking bad" is an opinion, there's not much reason to keep responding to you.

jarvis653 said:
None, which is why MKHD can't be delayed past MK9 release date or even too far after it's initial release date. Which is my point exactly, why I still think that the Kollection can't be true HD remakes, because if it were, it would be receiving a hell of a lot more promotion for the work they would've put into it. On the other hand, an upscaled HD collection doesn't need much promotion for returns, because it's easy to make and promotes their main product.

HD is solely indicative of the resolution, not the amount of animation.

jarvis653 · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

Eks said:
I think what Tim is getting at is you keep saying the the HD Kollection will look bad if the number of animations is not increased. Since this is the crux of your argument and "looking bad" is an opinion, there's not much reason to keep responding to you.

Not the crux of my argument, just something I got carried away with. There's definitely other elements I find interesting in regards to making a true update of the games. Trust me it's not my intention to piss anyone off.

Eks said:
HD is solely indicative of the resolution, not the amount of animation.

I agree, even despite my opinion about animation of digitized actors. Though I don't see what it had to do with what you quoted. If it was in regards to the amount of work I think they would've put into it, then I still stick with saying that a considerable amount of work would have to be put into it. It seems everyone is only thinking about the re-filmed actors, when there are many other aspects to consider. Even a HD update, just the graphics, is a big job. I hope people can open their minds about it.

Umon Daisuke · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

jarvis653 said:
What you say is true. But tell me, has anyone ever seen a modern game with HD digitized actors? Maybe one exists, I personally haven't seen it. And since realistic 3D models have fluid animations, it stands to reason that the digitized actors would too. Otherwise, it'd be unnatural, and defeat the whole purpose of capturing the footage to begin with. Finally, those extra animations don't stick out, they are subtle! Like real humans have subtle movements, not robotic. Which digitized actors in HD would move like without realistic animation.

The whole purpose of this is having a proper HD image quality, ie. true HD, not uspcaled sprites. Certainly not pushing for more realism.

To answer your question, there was one that never made out the door and while we didn't see it in motion, it looked awful (look up the company Galloping Ghost). The footage in the MK games wasn't and won't be used as is, since they modify them to fit the overall look of the games.

Lastly, extra frames as stated many times already, can and will change a game. Serious and competitive fighter fans alike use frame data, in other words, every frame is counted for. It helps you know the advantages/disadvantages of moves, when and where to use them in combos etc. It's not like other genres where adding additional frames wouldn't affect gameplay at all.

reptilesmile · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

^ the clay figures will probrably be replaced with 3d renders

so the re shoot actors and make goro, kintaro, and motaro in 3d

Eks · Oct 12, 2010

jarvis653 said:
Not the crux of my argument, just something I got carried away with. There's definitely other elements I find interesting in regards to making a true update of the games. Trust me it's not my intention to piss anyone off.

I doubt you're pissing anyone off. I think you have a lot to learn, but I don't really have a problem with that.

jarvis653 said:
I agree, even despite my opinion about animation of digitized actors. Though I don't see what it had to do with what you quoted. If it was in regards to the amount of work I think they would've put into it, then I still stick with saying that a considerable amount of work would have to be put into it. It seems everyone is only thinking about the re-filmed actors, when there are many other aspects to consider. Even a HD update, just the graphics, is a big job. I hope people can open their minds about it.

I was addressing the that "true HD" refers ONLY to the resolution art direction/design (or the other stuff that's been mentioned). I hope they tastefully update the design, but they need to keep it simple and close to the old sprites to prevent confusion. (If they start incorporating shitty sashes and extra flowing stuff, HEADS WILL ROLL.)

threadwood said:
alright, all this jazz about capturing all new footage, while possible, seems HIGHLY unlikely. it's not even the part about shooting new actors and cleaning frames in photoshop that seems ridiculous- but redoing all of the claymation would take a lot of work. surely the puppets are either destroyed or too brittle to be animated, which means all new puppets (sculpting, molding, fabricating armatures, etc etc)
it just seems like WAY too much work for it to go without promotion at this point.

that being said, i still don't see why they can't simply clean the raw footage. raw footage meaning the original stills they grabbed back in the 90s of the original actors.
the sprite animations are what- 10 frames at most for a move? it's really not that big a job if you have a production team. even if they were using the lowest of the low-grade cameras when they shot the first MK, the original would still be at high enough resolution to be scaled and cleaned. i frequently convert standard-definition footage to high-definition footage at my workplace, so i'm fairly familiar with the process.

anyways, that's my opinion.

As Umon pointed out, cleaning up the old footage wouldn't be true HD, so that's not what's happening with this.

No to mention that claymation is about 10 years obsolete. A good 3D team could have Goro, Kintaro and Motaro modeled, skinned and rigged in a week. Then it would be a simple matter of putting the models in the positions needed to replace the sprites and rendering them. They could likely have the all of the sub-bosses redone in a month or two.

jarvis653 · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

Umon Daisuke said:
The whole purpose of this is having a proper HD image quality, ie. true HD, not uspcaled sprites. Certainly not pushing for more realism.

I do see your point. I think the realism factor, however, would be the best way to retain the integrity of the classic games. As I believe that's what they were aiming for, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who considers realism important in such a remake. However, it all depends on what they can do with the time and money they have, and while aesthetics is a matter of opinion, there's a degree of effort required for any game to be of a professional standard. A HD update of an iconic game franchise is an important release IMO. Using digitized actors in HD also makes it a first. Just consider how long it usually takes for games of this stature to be made, and how early they are promoted. In which case, it looks as though they simply don't have time or money on their side to put in the degree of effort to pull this off. It would all be going toward MK9, and if the HD remake has been worked on for a long time already, why no promotion? No money for a lot of promotion? Then probably not enough money for a remake in the first place. You wouldn't make a product like this and not tell anyone about it, because good companies know hype is a powerful thing. I could understand they could've wanted the focus on MK9 at first, but to wait this long? You have to wonder about such marketing strategies.

Umon Daisuke said:
To answer your question, there was one that never made out the door and while we didn't see it in motion, it looked awful (look up the company Galloping Ghost). The footage in the MK games wasn't and won't be used as is, since they modify them to fit the overall look of the games.

Since they modify them to fit the overall look of the games. And this is what gets me, because as I already stated in my giant paragraph above, it takes a lot of work. Again, while aesthetics is a matter of opinion, you can't just re-film actors and get away with minimal editing to make them fit in with all the backgrounds (probably CG) and sfx. I'm confident a pro would make back me up on this. It needs...(refer to giant paragraph above)

As for the extra frames, don't worry I won't continue that argument. That's one scenario, and I could be wrong about them doing that. But if I am, and they're not aiming for realism, then I'm positive a heavy artistic direction would be involved. Even you said that untreated digitized actors look awful. In which case...the top of this reply. Hope I can make even a bit of a believer out of you.

Commander · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

threadwood said:
"HD" is anything that is scaled 100% at HD resolution. it doesn't need to be SHOT at HD res. Earthworm Jim HD is "HD" because the artwork/graphic elements were redrawn at a higher resolution. why wouldn't the same idea be adequate for MK HD?

Earthworm Jim was a cartoon , to begin with.
It's as you said, Earthworm Jim was re-drawn.

MK 1 thru MK Trilogy were done with REAL people, being filmed.
That being said, it would probably have to be re-shot.

Eks · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

threadwood said:
"HD" is anything that is scaled 100% at HD resolution. it doesn't need to be SHOT at HD res. Earthworm Jim HD is "HD" because the artwork/graphic elements were redrawn at a higher resolution. why wouldn't the same idea be adequate for MK HD?

Because having digitized actors isn't the same as having hand-drawn ones. Redrawing a cartoon at a higher resolution is the same thing as recapturing a photo at a higher resolution, but since drawing an authentic looking person is tedious and time consuming, that wouldn't make sense. (Not to mention that they'd then need to animate (ie redraw) the characters again.)

threadwood said:
yes they were REAL people and they were FILMED.
the stills captured from the film were then run through photoshop or the like for cleaning/simplifying/effects/color adjustments, etc.
i re-state my point that the original footage, no matter how low-grade the cameras, should still be at high enough resolution to be scaled and cleaned.
as long as the output is at 100% scale, it is considered HD. that is my point.

Pat has some sources that said there was a reshooting specifically for the HD Kollection. Being that TRMK's main purpose is MK news and it's got a decent track record, I don't have a reason to doubt that they're replacing the old sprites with newly captured/generated ones.

Also, the amount of refining that would need to occur to upscale the original sprites would extremely tedious and time-consuming and would effectively mean they were drawing them, which defeats the purpose of having digitized character to begin with. It wouldn't provide an authentic look, either.

jarvis653 · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

threadwood said:
yes they were REAL people and they were FILMED.
the stills captured from the film were then run through photoshop or the like for cleaning/simplifying/effects/color adjustments, etc.
i re-state my point that the original footage, no matter how low-grade the cameras, should still be at high enough resolution to be scaled and cleaned.
as long as the output is at 100% scale, it is considered HD. that is my point.

I actually agree with you on this. The PS3 outputs at true 1920x1080 HD resolution, but AFAIK, for the majority of games on that console, that is not their native resolution. The same thing can be said about blu-ray releases of old movies. The footage was not captured in HD, but is cleaned in order to be squeezed for all its detail at that resolution. And it is still advertised as a HD release. Same way as a simply upscaled MK collection could be advertised as a HD release, the degree of cleaning (if any) is irrelevant.

Eks · Oct 12, 2010

jarvis653 said:
I actually agree with you on this. The PS3 outputs at true 1920x1080 HD resolution, but AFAIK, for the majority of games on that console, that is not their native resolution. The same thing can be said about blu-ray releases of old movies. The footage was not captured in HD, but is cleaned in order to output at that resolution and milked for all its detail. And it is still advertised as a HD release. Same way as a simply upscaled MK collection can be advertised as a HD release.

That's because movies generally incorporate the scene as a whole while a game is made up of many different pieces - the stage, the characters, etc. With a game, you can regenerate all of the pieces individually and then recreate the game. That's not the case with movies.

threadwood said:
yes and we were also told that we would be getting tons of cool stuff on mortal monday.

We weren't told anything. Netherealm put up a counter and didn't say anything about what would happen when the counter expired.

And I was talking about info dropped by TRMK, not Netherealm, and TRMK has a good track record.

threadwood said:
yes, upscaling SPRITES would be ridiculous, i agree. i am suggesting that the RAW FOOTAGE of the actors (meaning the original film captured)- if it's still available- should be at a high enough resolution where upscaling/image processing should not be too difficult. somewhere there exists the very first images captured of the actors standing in front of a dropcloth performing sweet moves.

take a look at my avatar- that is not what the still image of Daniel Pesina looked like when they captured it. that image when through a series of image adjustments to look like that. details and shadows are simplified, colors are adjusted, etc., aka stylized.

as much as everyone here seems to believe that they took photos and plugged them straight into the game without stylizing them, that is not the case.

ALL I'M SAYING, is that even if they do shoot new actors- they will have to adjust the images in something like photoshop ANYWAYS, so why not eliminate the incredibly tedious process of re-shooting everything?
again, i convert SD footage to HD footage almost daily- it's part of my job.

Oh OK. That could work, but I think updating the costumes and stages is a good idea. This also relies on the footage still existing and if they're missing a few pieces from one of the characters, they'll need to reshoot the whole set, too.

jarvis653 · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

Eks said:
Pat has some sources that said there was a reshooting specifically for the HD Kollection. Being that TRMK's main purpose is MK news and it's got a decent track record, I don't have a reason to doubt that they're replacing the old sprites with newly captured/generated ones.

A new thought about this just popped into my head. Did the sources actually say what was being re-shot? Is it possible that it may not even have been the actual gameplay animations, but just character icons, vs screens, re-filmed MK1 bio clips etc? I guess if they didn't want to go to the effort of updating the gameplay graphics (apart from maybe sfx and blood) then it'd be worth making everything else in native HD. Just a thought!

Although, the sources did say that reshooting had been going on for a few months didn't they? So unless there is some bizarre problem with schedules, I suppose it makes little sense.

Commander · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

jarvis653 said:
A new thought about this just popped into my head. Did the sources actually say what was being re-shot? Is it possible that it may not even have been the actual gameplay animations, but just character icons, vs screens, re-filmed MK1 bio clips etc? I guess if they didn't want to go to the effort of updating the gameplay graphics (apart from maybe sfx and blood) then it'd be worth making everything else in native HD. Just a thought!

Although, the sources did say that reshooting had been going on for a few months didn't they? So unless there is some bizarre problem with schedules, I suppose it makes little sense.

Taken from a TRMK News thread, a few months ago:

http://www.trmk.org/news/13089/mortal_kombat_hd_kollection_confirmed_in_development.html

"Unlike Capcom's Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix, which required new character drawings, remaking Mortal Kombat in high definition is not as easy. In order to properly recreate the series in HD, Warner Bros. needed to film actors performing the moves like they originally did 20 years ago, just now with better high-definition cameras. Resorting to hand-drawn characters, or using 3D models in place of real actors would just not look right and cause many fans to revolt. However, things are not as simple as that. Since the previous actors are now 20 years older and - in most cases - wouldn't look to be the right age in high definition, Warner Bros. has hired new actors for the various roles and have been busy capturing them over the past few months at a Warner Bros. Studio in Los Angeles. TRMK has also heard that some of the original cast is involved in the filming in some capacity as well.

For an example of the quality of the original captures, take a look at the recently released raw footage from Mortal Kombat 1 over on Daniel Pesina's YouTube account. Clearly back then, the camera used was not of the highest quality. Also, many of the filming sessions were not shot in front of a blue/green screen for easy chroma key. Obviously, a reshoot would be necessary in order to get a proper High Definition worthy image of the characters for an updated Mortal Kombat game."

Commander · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

threadwood said:
We've all seen this and most of it seems more opinion based than anything else as per what needs to be done in order to achieve HD MK (last paragraph). TRMK is great but we're allowed to have our doubts about the info.

Warner Bros. has hired new actors for the various roles and have been busy capturing them over the past few months at a Warner Bros. Studio in Los Angeles. TRMK has also heard that some of the original cast is involved in the filming in some capacity as well.

^^^
I'm pretty sure those 2 sentences are not opinionated, coming from reliable sources.
Why would TRMK just make that up?

Umon Daisuke · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

threadwood said:
i am suggesting that the RAW FOOTAGE of the actors (meaning the original film captured)- if it's still available- should be at a high enough resolution where upscaling/image processing should not be too difficult. somewhere there exists the very first images captured of the actors standing in front of a dropcloth performing sweet moves.

Same news post:

For an example of the quality of the original captures, take a look at the recently released raw footage from Mortal Kombat 1 over on Daniel Pesina's YouTube account. Clearly back then, the camera used was not of the highest quality. Also, many of the filming sessions were not shot in front of a blue/green screen for easy chroma key. Obviously, a reshoot would be necessary in order to get a proper High Definition worthy image of the characters for an updated Mortal Kombat game.

From 1991-1994 when the footage was taken, high resolution was certainly not much compared to what it is today. Besides, who knows if the footage is in a decent condition? If it were, I doubt WB Games would commission a restoration project to re-use the footage (and nothing was shot on film anyway). That certainly would be more work than hiring new actors who resemble the original ones.

If you're doubting Pat's source, then you shouldn't be. The site has had a great relationship with MK team since the late 90's, so his sources are reliable.

brucewayne · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

This game in HD would look pretty much like Threadwood's avatar, just to give ya an idea....

kontankarite · Oct 12, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

You'll go to hell for lying.

mdsfx · Oct 13, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

Fort he love of GOD, give us some info about the HD Kollection. The lack of info has made me more excited for this than MK next year

Tim Static · Oct 13, 2010

Re: MK HD Kollection. Not what we hoped.

mdsfx said:
The lack of info has made me more excited for this than MK next year

dont tell them that! they will be think that this is cool! lol

rekishiotaku · Oct 14, 2010

How is this game going to work?

Will it be that we have the option of choosing MK1, 2 or U3?
Or will be be able to play all at the same time?
ie, choose MK2 scorpion, fighting UMK3 Jade, at the MK1 courtyard?

MK HD Kollection

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