Animating Real- Time Game Characters-P10: My intent in writing Animating Real-Time Game Characters has been to share my work methods, thoughts, and ideas about animating real-time characters in 3ds max 4™ and character studio 3®. Any factor that affects the animation process using these two tools has been covered. | 260 Animating Real-Time Game Characters A standing jump can be divided into four distinct parts. FIGURE A running jump needs longer beginning and end phases than a standing jump. the longer anticipation and landing recovery that should be there. The only thing that most game engines take into consideration when characters jump is their relative velocity while in the air. They can cover that extra distance when required. Chapter 7 Keyframe Animation Part II 261 Implementing the Real-Time Jump To make a character jump in the game the motion has to be broken up into pieces or segments that a programmer can trigger based on how high the character needs to go how far and when he hits the ground. To be implemented the jump can t be one long motion because it s impossible to tell how long a character would be in the air after the launch and how far it would go since velocity changes all the time. The only way a jump can work in a game is if it s thought through a bit differently and is divided into three parts jump 1 idle 2 and landing 3 Figure . FIGURE The jump sequence has to be broken into three parts to be implemented. Anticipation for a jump isn t even considered because of the requirement that a character react instantly to input from the player. The launch is expanded to include the hang-time up to the point just before the character lands so it s really launch and hang-time combined hence the new name of jump . The frame just before making contact with the ground becomes an idle pose that the programmer can hold for as long as it takes to make contact with the ground then the landing animation can play. Put differently the jump animation has to accommodate three things input to jump waiting to re-establish contact with a surface and contact with the surface once again. Another stipulation for the implementation of a jump is that it s animated in place. This means the characters don t attain any height during the animation because they .
