Skip to main content

'The Surge' developer Deck13 used a weighted vest for more brutal motion capture

The Surge - Behind the Scenes
The Surge, the upcoming action role-playing game from
Recommended Videos
Lords of the Fallen studio Deck13, features a combat style that carries a sense of weight and power that isn’t seen in other games. In order to make each of protagonist Warren’s swings as realistic as possible, the studio weighed down its motion capture stuntman.

“We wanted to make [the combat] look really heavy but at the same time he needed to have this incredible speed, and he has this enormous power to him now,” managing director Jan Klose says in a new behind-the-scenes video. “What we did was we attached like 20-something kilos to our stuntman and made him do even the fastest attack with it to really show the weight we had there.”

The result appears to be a success, with Warren’s swings against enormous robots feeling like they are doing real damage, particularly when he targets a specific armored body part and destroys it in order to craft new weapons of his own. Deck13 avoided making the powerful finishing moves too “fancy,” as Warren’s ultimate goal is just to eliminate the threats standing in his way, but they still offer an appropriate level of brutality.

Though its Dark Souls and Bloodborne influences are clear, one area where The Surge will not draw inspiration from is its narrative. As seen near the end of the behind-the-scenes video, dialogue options and traditional cinematic should make the game’s story coherent without needing to read every item description and learn the background of every side character. In fact, some side content could actually cause you to stray further from the path.

“We really tried to have different layers of stories. Some of them are really important for you and some aren’t. And some just lead you in the wrong direction,” Klose said.

We’ll be able to see all the secrets The Surge has in store for us when it launches on May 16. It will be available for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.

Gabe Gurwin
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…
NYT Mini Crossword today: puzzle answers for Thursday, November 14
The Mini open in the NYT Games app on iOS.

Love crossword puzzles but don't have all day to sit and solve a full-sized puzzle in your daily newspaper? That's what The Mini is for!

A bite-sized version of the New York Times' well-known crossword puzzle, The Mini is a quick and easy way to test your crossword skills daily in a lot less time (the average puzzle takes most players just over a minute to solve). While The Mini is smaller and simpler than a normal crossword, it isn't always easy. Tripping up on one clue can be the difference between a personal best completion time and an embarrassing solve attempt.

Read more
NYT Crossword: answers for Thursday, November 14
New York Times Crossword logo.

The New York Times has plenty of word games on its roster today — with Wordle, Connections, Strands, and the Mini Crossword, there's something for everyone — but the newspaper's standard crossword puzzle still reigns supreme. The daily crossword is full of interesting trivia, helps improve mental flexibility and, of course, gives you some bragging rights if you manage to finish it every day.

While the NYT puzzle might feel like an impossible task some days, solving a crossword is a skill and it takes practice — don't get discouraged if you can't get every single word in a puzzle.

Read more
Rue Valley puts a time loop spin on Disco Elysium
rue valley preview

Time loops are a perfect fit for video games. This interactive medium is inherently repetitious, and certain games, such as roguelikes, are intentionally designed to be played over and over. It’s natural to take that further and bring that repetition in play as a clear time loop. Deathloop and The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask are some of the most famous examples of games with time loops, but indies like Twelve Minutes and The Forgotten City are equally as experimental with that idea. Rue Valley is the latest game built around a time loop and it does so by way of Disco Elysium.

Rue Valley Alpha Gameplay Trailer

Read more