One of the most anticipated games for the Xbox One is Cuphead, a 2D side-scroller that has an art style resembling those of cartoons made in the 1930s. A new report shows how the game's development team at Studio MDHR created the cool and unique look of Cuphead.
Time magazine has posted a video showing some of the character creation process that goes into Cuphead. It also interviews the game's lead artist Chad Moldenhauer, who talks about how the animation is run at 24 frames per second, like an old animated movie, while the gameplay is at 60 frames per second:
When you hold right and watch your character run, that group of animation is actually moving across the screen at 60 frames per second, which is technically slightly different from cartoons of the era, because they'd be moving at 24. But the animation on top of that runs at 24 frames per second. If you're a really hardcore purist and you watch Cuphead, you'll say "Oh, I can see the very minute differences, because the characters are running around smooth." But with the amount of action that's going on in the game it's almost impossible to feel unless as I said you're just hardcore about only making sure everything's at 24.
Moldenhauer also talks about how Microsoft's backing helped to make Cuphead a more ambitious game than first designed:
Our original idea was much smaller scope, eight to 10 bosses, nothing really crazy, and it would have just been a small indie game. But the current scope, thanks to Microsoft, is exactly what we dreamed of. So it's a double-edge sword. Sure, Sony fans aren't going to be able to buy Cuphead on their system. But at the same time, the people who do get to play Cuphead will get the full experience and not the smaller portion a three-man team was trying to pull off.
Cuphead is due for the Xbox One and PC later this year.
