Capcom artist Ryota Kanematsu talks Megascans and Monster Hunter: World
Monster Hunter: World, one of the most anticipated RPGs of 2018, is here — and is already Capcom’s fastest selling game of all time (Forbes, February 2018).
And as the franchise makes the leap onto current-gen console hardware, the development team at Capcom held nothing back and called in Quixel Megascans!
Capcom has focused on making the best version of Monster Hunter possible. And so Megascans was utilized by the development team to add our signature richness and depth to the environments and elements of this stunning project. And the production team loved what Megascans was able to do for their workflows.
We had the chance to speak with Ryota Kanematsu, environment artist at Capcom, who was part of the development team on World.
Q: What is your impression of Megascans?
RK: Megascans doesn’t stop at just tileable textures – they include atlases, 3D assets, and LODs. Megascans is a culmination of the very best assets to help simplify game development and aid in creating the highest quality games possible. Megascans covers everything you could possibly need for high res, photoreal assets – so it’s incredibly easy to recommend.
Q: Did Megascans help you achieve results that were not possible before?
RK: Since Megascans has everything you need right off the bat, it makes the trial-and-error that’s necessary for initial prototyping a breeze.
Q: How much time did Megascans save in the development cycle?
RK: In terms of texture creation for assets, Megascans helped us minimize the amount of time we’d otherwise be spending on selecting images to start with and polish up from there – so all in all a savings of about 20-30%. In terms of 3D assets, Megascans has everything you need – models, textures, and LODs. Had we learned about Megascans’ 3D asset solution earlier in the development cycle we would have been able to save even more time.
Q: Did our photorealistic assets, surfaces, and atlases inspire you as an environmental designer to try new things?
RK: It did – in addition to the usage of the materials as-is, we also experimented with using the materials as brushes for sculpting in ZBrush.
Q: Are photogrammetric assets the way of the future in the minds of Capcom designers and developers?
RK: While it certainly depends on the concept of the game – the fact of the matter is that as hardware specifications increase, so does the demand for photorealistic graphics. I expect that the need for the kind of assets Megascans provides will only become stronger as a means to achieve that reality.
Thank you, Kanematsu-san!
The Monster Hunter franchise is famous for its challenging gameplay and complex skills trees. Now geared toward a global audience, many players — new and old — are sure to come to inhabit this fantastic world.
Monster Hunter: World is proof positive that Megascans is fast becoming the gold standard in high-end environment texturing for even the most ambitious AAA titles.
