LucasArts Showcases New Game Tech at D 2007

Ever since their SCUMM system revolutionized adventure gaming twenty years ago, LucasArts has been on the cutting edge of game development. At D 2007, George Lucas shows off two of their newest game technologies.

1) Euphoria — If you play a game long enough, you’ll probably see all possible NPC animations. So far, procedural NPC animation has mostly been restricted to the ragdoll physics of their corpses. LucasArts plans to change that with biomechanical behavior driven by AI, a technology they’ve dubbed Euphoria that will debut in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed next year.

2) Digital Molecular Matter — Ever notice how anything you break in a video game breaks only a certain number of ways? That’s because most breakable and flexible objects in video games move according to preset animations. Digital Molecular Matter will actually simulate breakable and flexible matter in real time, making breaks and waves appear more spontaneous and natural. DMM will also debut in Star Wars: The Force Unleashed.

Throwing NPCs around and breaking their stuff is about to get a whole lot more fun.

(Via John Paczkowski.)

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