The day is almost here! The free “anniversary update” for Kena: Bridge of Spirits will go live on PS4 and PS5 on Tuesday, September 27. We’re thrilled to see the overwhelming fan response to announced last month and now we can’t wait for everyone to experience the new content!
To celebrate the release, we wanted to share an insight into the creative and technical process behind the creation of Kena’s new skins for the “Anniversary Update”. If you missed our announcement detailing all the other new stuff, remember check it out!
Our approach to cosmetic development for Kena is really centered around three main goals. First, it always feels good when an outfit needs some real expertise to get it right. We wanted to wear them to feel like badges of honor. Next, we felt that each should remind us of the story and the characters we met along the way – constant reminders of who we met and where we were. In the end, we love having a good variety of options that allow for self-expression and the ability to switch things up as we go. With these ideas we have to work!
To make sure all the skins exude a real sense of success, we decided to tie them to the Spirit Guide Experiment, (another specialty) new addition included in “Anniversary Update”). As the player progresses through the main story, new Trials become available at the central Temple of Masks. Only when successful at these challenges can players unlock new costumes. Players who have mastered each Trial will eventually gain access to the full range of skins that showcase their remarkable skills.
Next, we move on to visual designs. During early development, we paid a lot of attention to the design of our characters. We decided these characters provided the perfect inspiration for Kena’s outfit. Each new skin the player unlocks is inspired by a different spirit Kena helps on her journey, but reworked and catered specifically for her. This way, even if the player has moved on to a particular story, they can still keep a memento they can wear.
For example, one of the earliest new skins players can unlock was inspired by the village outfits of twins Beni & Saiya and their brother Taro. Later, other cosmetics became available, like the Archer and Bombmaker outfits inspired by Rusu and Hana. They each take details from their inspirational characters like Hana’s unique bag or Rusu’s owl cape. (We won’t spoil them all.)
These new skins provide a great opportunity for our art team and character artists to shine. Incorporating such a wide variety of new textures, fabrics, and outfits while balancing designs with Kena’s design really made our team pay attention to detail. We are very pleased with the results!
But it’s not just about visual design. Hunter Schmidt, our Animation Director, shares more details on the evolution of Kena cosmetics:
“Of course, another big aspect of the new costumes is how they move… and that was an opportunity for our team to get more hands-on with the fabric and physics. We’ve found the most success with Unreal Engine’s Bone and Anim Dynamics drivers.
But Kena’s early animation presented some challenges when paired with layered clothing as we see in these designs. Sometimes, for an exaggerated, stylized effect, the animations push her pose beyond what’s possible, with some jumping or spinning at unnatural speeds. Even sitting cross-legged when meditating, resting, or some of the new poses we’ve added in Advanced Photo Mode is particularly difficult.
So while Anim Dynamics and the skeleton driver offer a good solution for most cases, we wanted to make sure Kena and the new skin looked good. In these situations, we refine these details by hand, combining physical animation and hand animation as needed. Old habits are difficult to change.”
When we finally started designing our costumes and creating the animations, we still wanted to make sure we were providing a great amount of variety. We decided the best way to keep the quality of all the cosmetics high while also gaining flexibility was to create special color variations for each base game skin.
At first we weren’t sure if this would deliver the variety we were expecting, but by really managing the color variations we ended up with a bunch of different outfits. allowing for a great sense of diversity and expression. Color variations can be unlocked by completing the Bonus Objective in the Mental Guide Trials.
We’ve even created an entire outfit exclusively for Deluxe Edition owners! (featured at the top of this blog).
We hope our existing and new players enjoy all of the new content included in our “Anniversary Update,” including new Kena cosmetics. It’s been a really great first year sharing Kena: Bridge of Spirits with the world.
