Every E3 brings a fresh crop of video game trailers, each with more impressive visuals than the last. A new tech demo from Square Enix however may have blown them all out of the water in terms of graphics, and even give the KARA demo from a few months back some competition. The demo, titled Agni's Philosophy, was created with a new engine from Luminous Studios that depicts real-time graphics on par with pre-rendered CGI and will likely be used in a future installment of the acclaimed Final Fantasy series.
The video's quick storyline follows a group of wizards who are performing a ritual to summon an otherworldly creature when they are attacked by terrorists. Sparks and lightning bolts fly as one girl, Agni, escapes with a magical artifact and must fight off pursuing terrorists and mutated hyenas. It's definitely bizarre, but right in sync with the off-kilter stories in Final Fantasy games, which often blend advanced science with magic.
The focus though is clearly on the visuals, which are not very unusual for a Hollywood blockbuster, but just astounding for a real-time rendering in a video game. Aside from the flashy spells and gruesome monsters, the demo shows a remarkable amount of realism in the way human characters are portrayed in terms of their facial expressions and general animation. Square Enix enlisted Luminous Studio to build the game engine and is developing it further internally for use in future titles. The engine is planned for use in almost any platform, from consoles to PC to smartphones and the web.
Be sure to watch Agni's Philosophy below to see the incredible level of graphics that Square Enix hopes to achieve in the next generation of video games.
Source: Agni's Philosophy via Square Enix / PRNewswire
