Announced with a lot of noise at the Ubisoft E3 conference, Avatar: Limits of Pandora will be exclusively next-gen. Commercially surprising decision given the fleet of Xbox One consoles available in the market. But the French publisher wants to set a big blow at the start of a new generation. Make the most of Series X and S to impress the players, just like the James Cameron movie did back in the day. The responsible teams came to the conclusion that their vision had to go through sufficiently powerful machines for several reasons … Statements by Magnus Jansen and Nikolay Stefano, creative director and technical director of the game.
Avatar: Limits of Pandora will be a first person game composed of several flight sequences. The latter had to offer an important level of detail, especially in high-altitude scenes. Ray tracing will be widespread especially in the depiction of shadows over long distances or the leaves, now translucent. Considering the depth of field and, most importantly, the speed at which you can navigate, significant processing power was essential to stream the world in optimal conditions.
The card will also benefit from the new consoles. In the past, detailed areas had to be oversaturated with rather “empty” areas because technology did not allow anything else. This will no longer be the case. Thanks to the computing power of the new consoles, Pandora will be much denser, more organic and therefore more realistic. The speed of hard drives will support streaming, which gives programmers a lot more freedom.
Artificial intelligence will also benefit from this increase in performance. The creatures will react very realistically. Whether it’s predators chasing you or animals frolicking, the difference will be noticeable. In a panic scene, for example, the animals storm straight ahead without worrying about the vegetation they are destroying.
All These details provide the immersion you need to truly believe in Pandora. An achievement that is only possible thanks to the advancement of technology. Either a mine of opportunities for programmers to let go and finally present their full and final vision. A fantasy realized thanks to the Snowdrop engine, obviously at the forefront of the next-gen made in Ubisoft …
