That day is just around the corner! Kena: Bridge of Spirits’ free ‘Anniversary Update’ will be live on his PS4 and PS5 on Tuesday, September 27th. We were very excited to see the positive reaction from fans to our announcement last month. Experience new content!
In honor of the release, we wanted to share an inside look at the creative and technical process behind creating Kena’s new outfit for the ‘Anniversary Update’. In case you missed the announcement detailing all the other new content, be sure to check it out.
Our approach to Kena cosmetics development can be summarized in three main goals. First of all, it always feels good when it takes real expertise to get an outfit. We wanted them to feel like badges of honor when worn. Lastly, we love that we have a variety of options that allow for self-expression and the ability to switch things up. With these ideas in mind, we set to work.
To make sure that all the outfits represent a true sense of success, we decided to tie them to the Spirit Guide Trials (another major new addition in the “Anniversary Update”). As the player progresses through the main story, new trials become available at the central masked shrine. Only by successfully completing these challenges can the player unlock new outfits. Players who master each Trial will eventually gain access to all outfits, demonstrating their notable skills.
Then I moved on to visual design. During the early development stages, we paid a lot of attention to designing the cast of characters. We decided these characters would be the perfect inspiration for Kena’s outfit. Each new outfit the player unlocks is inspired by the different spirits Kena helps on her journey, but has been reworked and serves her in her own unique way. This way, even after the player has moved on from a particular story, they can still keep the memorabilia they can wear.
For example, one of the earliest new costumes players can unlock is inspired by the village costumes worn by twins Beni and Saiya and their older brother Taro. After that, other cosmetics will be available, including Luz and Hana-inspired Archer and Bomb Maker costumes. I am incorporating details. (It doesn’t spoil everything.)
These new outfits provided a great opportunity for our art team and character artists to shine. Incorporating such a variety of new textures, fabrics and upholstery while balancing Kena design and design really brought out our team’s attention to detail. I’m satisfied!
But it’s not just about visual design. Animation His director Hunter Schmidt details the development of Kena’s cosmetics.
“Of course, another big aspect of the new outfit is the way it moves…and it gave our team a chance to practice more with cloth and physics. Succeeded.
However, Kena’s original animation presented some challenges when combined with the layered clothing seen in these designs. At times, for an exaggerated stylized effect, the animation pushes her posture beyond what is normally possible, jumping and spinning at unnatural speeds. Or even some of the new poses added in the enhanced photo mode, sitting cross-legged was especially hard.
So while Anim Dynamics and Bone Driver provided a good blanket solution most of the time, we wanted to make sure Kena and the new outfit always looked great. In these scenarios, we selectively animated these details by hand, blending physics and manual animation where appropriate. Old habits don’t go away easily. ”
Finally, after creating the costume designs and animations, we still wanted to be able to offer enough variety. We decided that the best way to keep all cosmetics high quality and still be versatile was to create a special color variation for each base game outfit.
At first, I wasn’t sure if this would give me the variations I wanted, but curating the color variations actually resulted in an exciting array of different outfits that feel diverse and expressive. I was. Color variations can be unlocked by completing bonus objectives within the Spirit Guide Trial.
We’ve also created a complete outfit exclusively for Deluxe Edition owners! (shown at the top of this blog).
We hope that both existing and new players enjoy all the new content included in the Anniversary Update, including Kena’s new cosmetics. Kena: It’s been an amazing first year sharing Bridge of Spirits with the world.
