Maxis co-founder and games industry veteran Jeff Braun spoke at Wilfrid Laurier University yesterday

Braun had plenty to say about the interactive media biz, but also shared some interesting information about his current involvement in the industry-

Braun announced, his involvement with the Oddworld series creators Oddworld Inhabitants (OWI) on a new product. "They're such a talented group of people and I really trust their ability to create compelling content," said Braun. But with a slow and measured production schedule subject to Braun's own entrepreneurial business model, it may be "years" before the game is actually shipped.

The next OWI game will feature a revolutionary new 3-D animation system allowing videogame players to experience a cinematic quality on a "1 to 1 scale" to that of computer-generated motion pictures. Braun spoke with enthusiasm for how both a videogame and film could have identical graphical quality: "The rendering tools are getting so good now for 3D animation that you can literally create a linear animation and create a video game using the exact same objects... . The tools are finally getting to the level where we can come out with a show and we can come up with a game."

The product's digital assets could be created and then used for both linear films and interactive games. "You're literally on the set," said Braun. With this technology in mind, Braun hinted that the next Oddworld product may be released in episodic content.

You can read the article in its entirety here.
cordweekly.com/cordweekly/myweb.php

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It sounds interesting, but I hope it isn’t going to be worked on by maxis; they’re an EA-vil brand, and if EA-vil has shown me one thing it’s that it can turn good IPs into mass produced garbage.