It has everyone frantically running around lost and confused, trying to down play their enthusiasm but they can’t. They ALL caught it. “Caught what you ask?” The doctor says we all got MOTION MADNESS. It’s not our fault though, we have been told this is how it is going to be from now on, so we will adapt.Nintendo lets you waggle, Microsoft hopes you Kinect the dots, Sony wants you to Move along and fanboys everywhere will be arguing that their picture-ma-bob is better than the other guy’s flashlight and vice-versa. They forgot one thing though, motion controls were here last gen with the Eye Toy. The Eye Toy is not a very high tech camera, but with enough proper lighting it does exactly what it is supposed to do, pretty effectively.
As a gamer who also lives a pretty active lifestyle but lives in a very rainy area, I fell in love with the Eye Toy. The games are simple, but fun. Easy to pick up and play, all without a controller. The Eye Toy is the reason why I had held onto my original 60 GB PS3, so my family and I can still get off our butts, jump around, kick, punch, dance and laugh. Sony released an updated camera for the PS3, called the PS EYE . When it came out I was excited, hoping for upgraded versions of the types of games I have been playing, but with newer better tech. For 2 and a half years I have been waiting for developer support, aside from a few interactive art pieces and taking my driver licence photo in Burnout, Nada. Then that all changed.
In May of this year indie company Virtual Air Guitar Company announced they will be making a PSN exclusive title called Kung-Fu LIVE, and I for one can’t stop smiling. Kung-Fu Live is a side scrollin’ action adventure beat’em up, with a catch. The catch is, you are the one doing the ass kickin’. The game inserts you into the screen via the PS EYE, then it removes all your surroundings and replaces it with a background. You punch, kick, flip, and launch special moves, all without the use of a controller. When I saw the video I was floored, it looked to run smooth, and it made you look like you were in Mortal Kombat. I immediately grabbed my duster and my PS EYE, anticipating a PSN purchase. Then the reality set in, I realized that this is the first real support for the PS EYE, and I tried to squash my fanboy hopes dreams, but I can’t. I am a gamer. This is the best part of writing about games, when something catches your eye and you want to know more, so you ask. Sometimes you are lucky and get to wade through the masses and be heard, this was one of those times.
I watched the first trailer for Kung-Fu Live and I was excited but I had questions, just from my own personal Eye Toy experience and how it looked like Kinect’s tech. I reached out to them and they responded in a big way. Teemu Maki-Patola, CEO of Virtual Air Guitar Company got back to me and said he would answer my questions. Virtual Air Guitar Company is a small, but very educated team from Finland, with very impressive tech. Their FreeMotion tech is designed to track your skeleton, kinda like the KINECT, but it does something I have yet to see from KINECT. In Kung-Fu Live there is no avatar or character you control ,you are actually inserted into the game to become the controller. This is from a PSN title, now you see why I am stoked. A game for a fraction of the price of all the titles announced at E3, and no expensive tech purchase just the camera I already have. Since it is a PSN title there is also that lack of pressure. You know that pressure, the one that burns into the pit of your stomach because you just spent $60 dollars on a game so you feel the pressure of only finding what is right about it and defending it until you reach fanboy status. We all get it especially in this day and age of bad economy and pre-orders. Afraid you spent $60 bucks on a 2 hour campaign with crappy controls. I never feel that pressure with the PSN. Awhile back my friend was shocked to see I had purchased 54 PSN titles, and asked how many were not worth it, so I went through the list and counted….3. 3 out of 54 were stinkers , so about 95% success rate. I will take that any time. Without the pressure I am just able to have fun and play the game the way the developer intended. That is why I am excited for Kung-Fu Live, smaller budgets take more creativity, focus, and usually have a vision. They can’t go the Activision route, and just throw money at it, so they have to work their asses to bring us enjoyment, and I commend them for that.
Here are the questions I had for Teemu, please keep this title on your radar, and enjoy.1) It says on your site you were founded in 2006, is Kung-fu live your first title?
It is the first title that is actually coming out. We were working on another title for a few years along with another studio, but the project was canceled when the finance crunch began. We do not own the rights to that game and thus its not in our hands anymore.
2) What other titles have members of your team worked on?
Our team members have been working on loads of mobile games (such as War Diary: Crusader, Need for Speed: Carbon, etc.), one of the first ever camera games (Qui Qui’s Giant Bounce), PlaySignMusic (containing singing pitch detection before the first SingStars), Transworld Snowboarding, Stuntcar Extreme Advanced, award winning Kick Ass Kung-Fu installation and loads of hobby and research projects such as Animaatiokone, Virtual Air Guitar installation, naval simulator software, musical instruments using virtual reality hardware (data gloves, 3D goggles, etc.) and so on. We have also many computer vision doctorates who have worked on various research projects. So its an interesting mix of research and game backgrounds.
3) It says on your site that you make games for the 360 and PS3, With this looking right up Kinect’s alley how did this become a PSN exclusive?
As you said, our tech is quite in the Kinetic Alley although we have been working for it long before anyone knew about Kinect. Our tech only needs a normal 2D webcam. With Sony’s Move coming to increase the user base of PSEye camera owners, the good quality of the PSEye and some company background PS3 coding, it seemed suitable to launch our own tech with our first game on PS3 bringing full-body tracking also there.
4) Your FREEMOTION Technology looks like it works like Kinect says it is going to, by tracking the player’s skeleton. I am wondering how well the camera will lock on to the player and will things like pictures hanging on the wall that have reflective surfaces, will that cause any issues?
It locks very well and tolerates other people in the view (removes them). But the player should be the only one who is moving a lot, otherwise the tracking might switch to another person for a while as it assumes only one player.
The tech relearns the background all the time while you play. So even if lighting conditions change, doors open, people change places in the background etc. this usually does not affect the playing at all. Big reflective surfaces might cause some visual artefacts if they are very close to the player (e.g. close behind the player), otherwise the reflections are removed just as other people are. I haven’t had issues with pictures hanging from the walls as they are usually not that big and usually not nearly as reflective as a mirror is.
5) One issue I have playing with the Eye Toy is, it requires a good balance of space and alot of light. With the PS EYE I know it runs at 120 frames per second. Does that help track the player in lower light?
It doesn’t run that fast in VGA resolution, which is what we want for the player to look good. Also the faster you run the camera, the more light you need. We are updating the player at 30fps, which allows for best use of light and with all delays minimized in the system design and with some tricks, still gives you a very reactive game. Loads of people have played our demos and they all wonder how instantly reactive it feels. There is little enough latency that the player’s do not seem to notice it at all.
The light sentivity of the PSEye is lightyears better than that of the old EyeToy. And the PSEye has a wide angle setting for the lens, so that you can fit into the image from smaller distance. Of course you need some space: an adult needs about 2,5 meters = 8 feet between him and the camera. A child can play already from 5 feet distance. And you should have some space to kick onto both sides.
I have ran the game in many livingrooms. Sometimes you need to move some items, such as the livingroom table a bit, or not play directly in front of the tv (direct the camera a bit to the side) but with little setup it has worked in all of them.
6) Like I said with the EYE TOY requires alot of light to run correctly and you cannot use the compact florescent bulbs because they flicker. This causes alot of heat and energy usage on top of the energy being sucked by the PS3. This is something that would worries me a bit about this game and Natal. Does the PS EYE running at 120 FPS correct this?
Flicker is not an issue for our game. We remove the flicker and it works with fluerescent tubes without problems. Also, as I said, the PSEye is much much better camera than the old EyeToy was. It sees in considerably less light. A normal livingroom lighting should be well enough.
7) What frame rate and resolution are you trying to get this locked into and is there any lag?
VGA resolution for the player feed. 720p for the game. I already covered the lag above, but in summary there is little enough of lag that people do not seem to notice it at all.
Will the technology track all my flailing about, with speed, location, and force or is hands from point A to point B to trigger to the moves?
It tracks all your moves, even if you do a sommersault, jump kick or alike and detects the speed of it. You trigger speal powers (such as lightning) and special moves (such as assisted flips) by full-body poses and/or gestures.
9) I saw someone demo-ing this title and they said the camera can scan you picking up an item like a stick to fight against someone is this true? Will it give you a predetermined weapon or will it measure the item?
You can pick up an item like a toy sword or alike and it will track that item and induce damage from the movement of that item, yes (so it basically measures the item). The gameplay will be balanced and designed for hand’s free fighting but if you like, you can play around with an additional weapon as well.
10) Can you scan pics say like your boss to put on the bad guys? I would to take some frustration out sometimes.
Heh! Unfortunately not. That might be something for the future, though. 
11) Will there be DLC or expansion packs and custom soundtracks?
This is still to be decided. All music has been made for this game.
12) After this whats next for your company, are you going to stick with just camera based games or are you going to try out the new motion controllers.
Remains to be seen and depends on the success of this title. We are very interested of integrating our tech with the Move sticks to make augmented weapons etc. So please buy this game. That will allow us to work on more stuff in the future.
13) Last question, when can I expect to be kicking a big hole through my tv, due to my martial arts bad ass-ery and at what price?
Later this year. Price is still to be decided but is likely to be less than 15 dollars.
Once again thank you for your time, like I said your title has me excited. I am a gamer first who cares about your creativity not your budget or magazine covers and the smaller indie titles are the ones I care about most. I look forward to future communications with you and your team moving forward and I can’t wait to give this a try.
Great! Thanks for the interest and keep your Kung-Fu moves in shape as you will soon be able to give them a go with some serious ass kicking.
******** ON A SIDENOTE **********
Teemu wrote to me on his way to E3, told me he was battling the flu, international flights and said he would get to me shortly. I thought good communication, but I wouldn’t hear back for week or so. It would be very understandable showing off his title in another country at E3, but true to his word this morning he got back to me before E3. This tells me a few things. He doesn’t know me from adam. We are a small site not a big gaming magazine, they are in the middle of E3, and he didn’t have to talk to me at all, but he did. This tells me he is very confident and proud of his tech, cares about his game, and the most important thing to me he kept communication and his word during this whole process.
With everything I have seen, read, and interacted with tells me that this will work exactly like they say it will, and I can’t be happier. After this all I can say is these two words………..DAY ONE.
“All music has been made for this game.”
thats too bad.
Would be awesome kicking ass to some sick tunes the same game songs on repeat can be a little tedious in 2011
But an awesome game nonetheless tho
WOW!!!!! I’m soooo excited now! Can’t wait!
it will probably be like a normal beat’em up where you are faster and stronger than the goons
yeah, that will be great, but would it be fair to the person who is playing with the eye? If I was in the same room with you and saw you getting ready to jump or kick or whatever, I would just be able to press a button to counter what you are trying to do?
Just saw that up to 4 other players can join in via controller to control the bad guys so this could add some serious depth if you don’t have the same attacks coming at you
yeah, this just sold me. can’t wait.