Topic: The Uncanny Valley

[Spinnzilla]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKTAJBQSm10

Interesting discussion.  The entire time I was like "huh, I guess that does make some sense".  Just thought I'd like to share it with you guys.

And I lol'd at the final line.

[Stratos]

Some good thoughts there. I never had the Uncanny Valley term unpacked for me so that was good to know.

It made me think of how this choice impacts Wii games. Stylized games like Zack & Wiki, Okami and Mario Galaxy work really well on the system.

I remember that Valve actually toned down the detail of their character models in Half-Life 2 because people were disturbed by them. They were hauntingly real, like human beings without the spark of life in their eyes.

I know animation plays a huge role in it as well. Some Disney CGI films have really clunky animation like their first CGI Christmas special. Those have no soul.

This reminds me of all the work put into Jurassic Park. They did an amazing job creating dinosaurs that looked like they were alive. What a break through film.

[Stogi]

The analogy with the Incredibles sums up my thoughts perfectly.

[weaver19]

The uncanny valley hypothesis holds that when robots and other facsimiles of humans look and act almost like actual humans, it causes a response of revulsion among human observers. The "valley" in question is a dip in a proposed graph of the positivity of human reaction as a function of a robot's lifelikeness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_valley

[Spinnzilla]

The uncanny valley hypothesis holds that when robots and other facsimiles of humans look and act almost like actual humans, it causes a response of revulsion among human observers. The "valley" in question is a dip in a proposed graph of the positivity of human reaction as a function of a robot's lifelikeness.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uncanny_valley

REALLY???

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

Tell me about "Bear with Wide Canyon."

[vudu]

The uncanny valley hypothesis holds that when robots and other facsimiles of humans look and act almost like actual humans, it causes a response of revulsion among human observers. The "valley" in question is a dip in a proposed graph of the positivity of human reaction as a function of a robot's lifelikeness.

You know that was discussed in the video that was linked to in the original post, right?

[Ian Sane]

I think there's an easy way to avoid the uncanny valley but without going to the opposite extreme and using unrealistic proportions and such.  I've noticed that games by EA that have "realistic" visuals look like crap with these weird mannequin figures wandering around.  But when Capcom makes a game in a similar style it looks good.  In fact most Japanese devs are good at this.  Note that the characters in Resident Evil or Metal Gear Solid or Final Fantasy don't look like soulless freaks but they don't look like cartoon characters either.  I think it's because there is the SLIGHTEST anime influence in the character designs.  The characters still have realistic proporations and look somewhat like real people and the it uses a realistic style but this subtle anime influence gives the characters just the most minor stylish design.  So they don't look like freaky inhumans.

So I think that's the solution for avoiding the uncanny valley.  Just add a smidge of style to the character.  That establishes that it is clearly NOT a human being and there is no discomfort.

[broodwars]

Those lectures are all really well-done.  Highly recommended, and thanks for the link.