Heavenly Sword acting better than Beowulf

By Robert Purchese Published 12 June, 2008

Ninja Theory "surpassed" CGI emotions.

Ninja Theory co-founder Tameem Antoniades believes we are so used to seeing poor cut-scenes that we've developed a bit of a sour taste for them.

He feels the dramatics his team conjured up for Heavenly Sword using a real-time engine were not only better at conveying emotion than CGI extravaganzas such as Beowulf, but also around 15 to 20 percent cheaper.

"I think gamers are used to poor cut-scenes. That's one of the reasons they are disliked so much," Antoniades told GamesIndustry.biz. "I do honestly believe that the best cut-scenes in Heavenly Sword surpass the best scenes in Beowulf in conveying emotion.

"I see CG as digital make-up. So as long as the performance is there to start with and the CG data reflects the original performance, then it should be easy enough for a skilled animator to reach the emotional resonance of the actor.

"If you aren't able to convey emotion, then somewhere along the line something isn't working as it should be. We did a lot of research in this area and know where the 'gotchas' are. So our next project will hopefully improve on what we learnt," he added.

Unfortunately what that project will be is still unknown, although it will certainly not be a sequel to Heavenly Sword.

It will focus on the core story-telling, cinematic and combat strengths of Ninja Theory, and will also potentially coincide with a self-created animated feature film - Heavenly Sword tested this route with a series of artistic CGI shorts.

Ubisoft recently revealed it also wanted to saunter down a similar path, as co-developing a film and game side-by-side while sharing assets will apparently be hugely beneficial to both.

Head over to GamesIndustry.biz for the full interview with Ninja Theory co-founder Tameem Antoniades, where he explains why he sees the Wii in the same toy-space as Simon Says or Buckaroo.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (39) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • spongebob #1 4 years ago

    Beating Beowulf is not an accomplishment. That movie sucked big time and the acting was terrible.

  • jebus #2 4 years ago

    Shame the game was crap. Plus he's wrong.

  • Dark_Era #3 4 years ago

    aww, commom i kinda like both of em.

  • Hunam #4 4 years ago

    Nariko and Kai were excellently acted.

  • des #5 4 years ago

    lol

  • thomasbeff #6 4 years ago

    Still a shit game.

  • Gnort #7 4 years ago

    I remember early in Heavenly Sword's development, Ninja Theory stated that they still had a lot of work to do, but that the combat in their game was already superior to Ninja Gaiden's, so it's not the first time they've come up with subjective, boastful claims like this.

  • alimokrane #8 4 years ago

    Fine, may be you won the best cutscene battle but the gameplay s***ed BIG TIME! and guess what you're making a game.
    Edited by 1 at 12/06/08 @ 10:11

  • bad09 #9 4 years ago

    Who cares if the cut scenes were good, the most important part, the game itself, was still poor.

  • monkie_king #10 4 years ago

    Ninja Theory: blah, blah, blah.

  • Bigglesworth #11 4 years ago

    He's pretty much correct, although as spongebob said, Beowulf is hardly a benchmark for CG film-making. Pity about the blowing of one's own trumpet, true, but remember this is came from an interview - not a press release.

  • Madafunkola #12 4 years ago

    Did anyone else find Kai strangely attractive?


    No..?



    Just me.....?


    :/

  • dloob #13 4 years ago

    I have Heavenly Sword for my PS3 and I actually quite enjoyed it.
    Looking forward to the sequel.

    Ok it was a bit short and easy, but it was fun.

  • the_dudefather #14 4 years ago

    Biowulf had considerably less twing twang

  • The-Bodybuilder #15 4 years ago

    Mass Effect's custscenes were better IMO.

  • Widge #16 4 years ago

    Game had fantastic acting and characters. Easily a cut above the usual dross we are served up. Shame that they couldn't just transplant the combat engine from God Of War in there.

    Still was enjoyable enough, and the third chapter of the game was excellent. If the plot and scripting wasn't there, you wouldn't have had anywhere near the attachment needed to the characters to care.

  • asphaltcowboy #17 4 years ago

    He feels the dramatics his team conjured up for Heavenly Sword using a real-time engine were not only better at conveying emotion than CGI extravaganzas such as Beowulf, but also around 15 to 25 per cent cheaper.

    The actual quote was that they could do something like Beowulf for 15-20% of the cost.

  • Bigglesworth #18 4 years ago

    Beowulf is considered a considerable benchmark.

    Yeah, I'm not sure how that happenned =/

    Personally, it still takes a lot to beat Final Fantasy's CG, which for me is the best in the industry and puts Beowulf to shame (they just need a little work on their dialogue, though FF XII was much improved in that area, if you can take high fantasy =) ). I do think HS got pretty close to that standard.

  • chris_ace #19 4 years ago

    Post deleted at 11:55:13 13-12-2011

  • spongebob #20 4 years ago

    Seriously, who watched Beowulf willingly?

  • dominalien #21 4 years ago

    A very good game IMHO. Will have to replay it someday without worrying about getting all the coins or tokens or whatever in every chapter just to enjoy the action and the story.

  • penhalion #22 4 years ago

    He feels the dramatics his team conjured up for Heavenly Sword using a real-time engine were not only better at conveying emotion than CGI extravaganzas such as Beowulf, but also around 15 to 20 percent cheaper.

    Yes it looked more than 50% cheaper mate and there was precious little gameplay included in your so called game! Maybe you should watch Beowolf again and note their hair, skin textures, backgrounds etc. etc. Heavenly sword didn't come close to that level of detail.

  • jonsaan #23 4 years ago

    I will kiyal your MonSTAAAHH

    Beowulf was fabulous.
    Edited by 1 at 12/06/08 @ 11:02

  • Derblington #24 4 years ago

    "The actual quote was that they could do something like Beowulf for 15-20% of the cost."
    No, it says better than Beowulf and cheaper. He's horribly wrong on the first point and I don't care about the cost.

  • asphaltcowboy #25 4 years ago

    Derb, I was just referring to the actual article - I thought it phrased the point rather strangely!

  • ozzit #26 4 years ago

    ...except that an awful lot of the "ingame" cutscenes were prerendered in order to improve loading times (I'm amazed the xbox fanbois didnt find this out at the time)

    Still a great game though, the combat was fun, and the storyline and characters were very emotive - I don't think I've ever hated a boss as much as Flying Fox (poor Kai)

    Right, m'off to play twing twang...

  • Bitkari #27 4 years ago


    The animation in Heavenly Sword was great. Really top-notch stuff.

    Shame about the gameplay.

  • MasterNameless #28 4 years ago

    After watching Beowulf, the 3D version at the IMAX no less, I spent a week trying to supress the urge to gouge my own eyeballs out with a spoon. I enjoyed it that much.

    Never got far enough with Heavenly Sword, couldn't even be bothered to get to the end of the demo. Which I heard was short anyway! Probably didn't help that I was playing Ninja Gaiden 2 just before it, the combat seemed terrible in comparison. I'm sure there's probably more to it, but if it's just 'cutscenes that are superior to Beowulf'... no thanks!!!

  • Stuz359 #29 4 years ago

    He was not talking about the level of detail in the cutscenes but the performance of the acting, which was without doubt excellent and a cut above anything else I have seen with a complete cg performance. Remember, it was directed by Andy Serkis, who played Gollum and King King which are the two greatest cg performances ever.

  • StanleyPointLarge #30 4 years ago

    i thought the cutscenes were very good, and the acting was amazing, much better than what you usually get in games. OK the game was stupidly short but I did enjoy the game. I just wish Micrsoft would add backwards compabilty for Kung Fu Chaos so that i can play it again.

  • MasterNameless #31 4 years ago

    @StanleyPointLarge

    Have you tried burning and running that backward compatability disc from Xbox.com? A friend of mine wanted to play Project Zero 2 from the original Xbox, which wasn't listed as a backward compatible game on the website and neither would the Xbox update automatically in order to run the game. He had to download and burn the BC disc from xbox.com, and after that it worked perfectly! Xbox customer support told him to try it, even though it wasn't listed as compatible, we both thought they were making it up at the time too, and was very, very surprise for it to actually work!

  • FaceOmeter #32 4 years ago

    Beowulf was quite literally the worst thing I've ever experienced.

  • WrongShui #33 4 years ago

    I like these sorts of comments, its refreshing.

    Everyone's usually too busy pussy footing around trying not to upset anyone.

  • tobsen #34 4 years ago

    Beowulf is indeed an awful movie, but seeing it in iMax 3D was mindblowing anyway.

  • onyxbox #35 4 years ago

    Mass Effect's custscenes were better IMO.

    I hope your joking.

    HS may have been an unremarkable game but the cut-scenes were very very good IMO.

  • crickson #36 4 years ago

    I realise this is slightly off-topic, but one of the things I enjoyed most about Heavenly Sword was Nitin's soundtrack. Does anyone know if it's available on CD?

  • Wyrm #37 4 years ago

    I think he needs to reconsider his priorities.

  • chris_ace #38 4 years ago

    Post deleted at 11:55:13 13-12-2011

  • Skywise #39 4 years ago

    Beowulf was the only movie I considered leaving the cinema for before it had ended. Please use a serious benchmark next time like Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, Shrek or some Pixar movie.