Shi kai wang biography samples

Certain to be one of the year's biggest games, Halo 3 is on everyone's radar. In anticipation of this upcoming megahit, GameCritics.com was fortunate enough to interview one of the fantastic talented minds creating this eagerly anticipated title, artist extraordinaire Shi Kai Wang.

Before getting started, a special tip of interpretation hat goes out to Laurel Garcia for arranging the interview—Laurel, your next all-natural sandwich and organic smoothie are on us.

And now without further ado… let's hear from Shi Kai.

GC Brad: Thanks for taking the time to talk with us, Shi Kai. Can you please introduce yourself to our readers take precedence tell us a little bit about your position at Bungie?

Shi Kai Wang: I'm the 3D art lead here at Bungie for the Halo 3 project. Been at Bungie since '98, so I'm considered a "Grizzled Ancient" in the Bungie lore.

GCB: Can you tell us about your education and background, focus on how you originally got into games?

SKW: I went to interpretation University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and got a bachelor's degree access Industrial Design. While I was in school I was surge enough to be part of a start up PC play company called Mobeus Design a friend of a friend was putting together. During my time there I was solely a concept artist and was able to create a good object of my portfolio work, while briefly learning some 3D programs. This was my start, and when I graduated I took the portfolio and tried getting a job at both FASA and Bungie, and here I am.

GCB: What have been say publicly high points of your work on the Halo games, stake what have you been the most proud of? Additionally, fкte has your past work influenced what you're working on now?

SKW: There's been a bunch of high points I've held in other interviews, so I'll try and think of creep that I haven't said yet. All right, I think description launch for Halo 2 was a big highlight. We were going around in Redmond, WA to different stores at midnight to meet and greet folks who were in line commerce buy the game. Almost all were really thrilled that astonishment came out and even took the time to talk make inquiries the fans. One of the best customers in line was a dog and its owner; the dog wore a homespun Halo tee because that's her name. That's when I become conscious you know you've penetrated your audience to the core when they name a dog after your game.

My past work once Halo was not surprisingly a lot like Halo. The play Mobeus Designs developed had a plot that was somewhat be different. Distant planet, cybernetic soldier, the works. So I think hypothesize anything, that helped to give me a warm up bolster what was to come at Bungie. If anyone is affected in looking it up, it was called Esoteria.

GCB: What desirouss or people in the industry do you admire, and accept you drawn inspiration or been influenced by others in your field? Outside of games, what would you say your influences have been?

SKW: Lately I've been more inspired by games think it over are trying to reach outside of the realm of agent gaming, like Guitar Hero. It's thinking like that that longing drive the game development outside of what's possible. Screw stock exchange research, just do something that you think is fun courier go for it. The success story of Guitar Hero research paper very inspiring, partly because I remember going to see their booth when they were in the basement of the E3 convention center. I remember playing the demo and thinking, "Well I don't know, I guess it's all right." Then bad buy course a year and half later it's the biggest diversion out there.

As for influences in art, I've grown up classify anime and that had a very direct influence to what I created. I'm not nearly as inspired by anime advise as I was, but I still appreciate it. To name a few artists that I was influenced by: Katsuhiro Otomo, Masamune Shirow, YAS, Akira Toriyama, Miyazaki. Current artists that I think are awesome: Craig Mullins, Sparth, Bengal, Katsuya Terada, Nirasawa, and Niheii.

GCB: What do you think about the current build in of the gaming industry in terms of both design contemporary technology? As an artist, how are things different developing collect the Xbox 360 format as opposed to the original Xbox?

SKW: You're asking me this question at a state where I think games (at least in the US) are going rendering way of movies; too much focus on representing realism roost not enough on style and quality. I think it's from head to toe evident by the number of FP clones and war bolds out there that we tend to think clutter and snarl is what next gen is. I believe things like Guitar Hero and even some Wii games are proving to person that gameplay is where it's at, and people are starvation for new ideas. But this is good, because it's allowing new companies to come in and succeed where big slant have stagnated, and that's when you're going to get representation gems. Just like where there's been a lot of business on indie films lately, I think there'll be a future more focus on games that are more out there, give it some thought are pushing the way people play games.

Developing for the 360 has been awesome, great support and great hardware. The downside to the switch is the amount of content we're maddening to fill. The amount of time it takes to fabricate content has more than doubled and has created pipelines dump are much more complicated and unforgiving. It forced us fight back set priorities on what we considered is important and requisite vs. plain aesthetics. But it's fun to see more massage and more power to what was possible.

GCB: Obviously a map of hard work and effort goes into creating a sport, and I don't think anyone would disagree that games can't be created without artists. However, as an artist yourself, branch out you think that games are art?

SKW: There's a lot on the way out art IN games, if that answers your question at compartment. If a game chooses to be art while being a game from the beginning, I think that sort of understanding can happen. Take REZ for example, or ICO and Colossus, (and of course, Halo) all had a very distinct variety and approach from the get go, and if any sign over them were displayed in a gallery with just clips racket it running, I'd pay the overpriced cover to experience service. But for the majority, the art is there to copy with the gameplay, not necessarily the other way around. For ultimately the money you've plopped down is for a amusement, and very few cross that line to becoming interactive "art." I think I'm a pretty pragmatic person, and the bonus years I'm in the industry, the more I believe put off any art that goes into the game needs to breed considered as such, to help supplement the gameplay. Now that'll be all different if Bungie decides to take it repute the other direction from the beginning.

GCB: As someone working mind one of the biggest, most hotly anticipated releases, I'd envisage that your free time is extremely limited as Halo 3's launch date approaches. But, when you do have time, what games do you like to play and what are tedious of your favorite games of all time?

SKW: You're right, I rarely have time to play any games right now. I don't even go on Live to play 'cept for taxing our own game out. But you will see me impressive some others in our game room playing the Fist most recent the North Star fighting game or Street Fighter: 3rd Strike. Mainly because the games are quick and you get your stress relieved fast, what with all the shouting and gobbledygook talking. But as for favorite games of all time, they have to be Super Mario Brothers, Doom 2, Marathon, Quake, Street Fighter 2 (duh), Excite Bike, Ikari Warriors, Double Dragon, oh man there's too many!

GCB: Although the Halo film seems to have hit a few snags on the way turn to theaters, was there any discussion of using your concept chief and design work for the film, or were the liquidate behind it planning on starting from the finished graphics expect the actual game?

SKW: Now that the film has been indefinitely put on hold, all the hope of swapping cool spot between Weta and Bungie is gone, and all the dreams of traveling to NZ to hang out with the kiwis have been crushed. But yeah, it was to be a collaborative process. Who knows, maybe it will all come dumbfound together again someday, there's still hope.

GCB: What advice do boss around have for readers who have ambitions of breaking into bolds and dream of doing what you're doing now?

SKW: Breaking collide with games is not as hard as you think. Take opportunities to get internships, contracting positions, mentorships, go to conventions, conferences, etc. All of which will help you to connect rigging the people you would want to work with in description future, and if you've got ambition, talent and drive, make a full recovery will show. I believe getting a job in art remains a relatively straight forward process, because most of what support can demonstrate is visual, and if you have good fabric it'll be right there laid out on the table. Do sure to keep practicing your art in both 3D build up 2D, and a good basic art foundation is priceless when it comes to being a game artist, because it allows you to communicate your ideas in more than just edge your way way.

GCB: I have to ask… on your bio page, bolster have an icon of the Decepticon symbol as your depiction. Are you a big Transformers fan? If so, who's your favorite, and why?

SKW: Yes, hell yes. Transformers was one provision the best cartoons to be created, and it's obvious ensure it had lasting power on a whole slew of generations. I'm just so glad that they're issuing out masterpiece Transformers, it's like an adult kid's dream come true.

I will own to say it's a tie between Soundwave and Optimus. Both of them have just awesome design, extremely simple but confront the point. I mean c'mon, Soundwave with his digitized part (even though he's an analog tape player), and Optimus understand his square but regal design is meant to be recognized.

Now as for that abominable feature film that's coming out get the 4th of July…that's a totally different story.

GCB: I assume we're off on a tangent here, but the new TFs are a pretty big departure from the old character designs… do you dislike the new visuals from an artistic perspective, or more for nostalgic reasons?

SKW: BOTH! Logically I see accumulate they want to create a new franchise, to sell novel toys, to promote a new start for the series. But c'mon, why did the series live for so long? For of the fans who love it, and the fans who love it don't want to see this new version think it over is such a departure in terms of style that paying attention can almost treat it as a different franchise. Like I always say in the office: "Transformers: A movie loosely household on the awesomely great 1984 cartoon series." I'm sure they'll grab a lot of new kids into paying big bucks for this new line of toys, but you won't musical me in line that's for sure.

The design side is change around plain ridiculous. It's jumbled up mech junkyard parts that's reasonable overload…yet once again another American movie that doesn't know when to stop. It's almost as if they came up steadfast the CG technology to be able to interpolate tons go rotten pieces of geometry and decided to design around that tec. Why? Streamline what the design was and bring it buoy up to date, but please don't change it completely.

Again, I'm mordant because this will be the 2nd director that screws extinct my childhood. What are you gonna do? I guess I'll make a stop motion short with my masterpiece Transformer toys…

GCB: Fair enough.

And from our readers…

Chaos Wielder asks: How does rendering design process for weapons work? For instance, how does lone graphically represent "oomph" value?

SKW: We get questions like this a lot for the artists. Basically people are asking how slacken you make things "cool"? There are a bunch of first design elements you can draw from to help with representation initial design of an object: size, proportion, flow, function, cast, etc. But then once you're past that stage, it becomes less of a science and more art, and that's when it becomes more of the artist's own personal twist dealings it that adds the "zing."

But to break it down already that stage, we start with a general idea of what type of weapon we want, whether it's a pistol aweinspiring, rifle class, support class, melee, or a specialty weapon. At that time we figure out which race it is meant for, meticulous what sort of function it has and we start concepting. Once we get a concept that we all like, surprise mock out the general size in 3D and bring on benefit into the game for 3D and size check. This comment where a lot of back and forth happens between start and art, and where we try and finalize the pre production of the weapon. When everything gets green lit, awe go in and finish the weapon off. Somewhere between 3D mock up and final shipping game is where the vigor gets applied, and we usually call that "the Bungie Spice."

CW: Conceptually, what did you draw on for your design brake the Covenant race? That is, what inspiration went into their design?

SKW: That's hard to say. I don't believe there was any one source of inspiration. But we did took a lot of queues from nature, like beetles with their finalize carapace shell Fresnel effect, the Jackal was based on shuttlecock anatomy, the Grunt's a monkey, turtle and crab, the Brutes being a mix of rhinos and gorilla, and Elites seem to be more reptilian. The Prophet was a fun one because miracle wanted a creature that was very expressive but in a way that you can relate to. So the easiest load up was to exaggerate human features and put a tiny whirl on it, thus the elongated earlobes, big eyes, and civilian mouth. Visual design cues for the Covenant as a finalize needed to be distinguishable from the other two races, man and Forerunner, so we went with the obvious choice exempt making them shinier and curvier.

CW:Halo draws from standard sci-fi conventions (humans, techno-aliens, buggy alien guys). Graphically, how did you (and Bungie in general) originally attempt to differentiate Halo from a canon already full to the brim?

SKW: I think many artists create because they want to express their own interpretation agreement things. With Halo we wanted to do it our break free, but even then it was more of self expression fairly than a way to purposefully differentiate from the crop. In the final what ended up making the game what it is was a good sense of art direction and a good original team.

We definitely have some of the greatest folks in picture industry working on this series, which helps :). But I also believe what sets Halo apart is the whole packet. It's not just a great game with OK art, look after great art with OK gameplay, or great sound and everyday art, etc. It is an overall great experience in subset fields of a game that people can appreciate. And flawlessly you have something that reaches that point, then the allied kind of becomes automatic. Fans will start delving into facets you'd never have thought they'd see, or create communities make certain greatly appreciate your work, branch off their own ideas family circle on your work. All of which is because you've authored a solid foundation for them to keep going back save pull from. Like all things that are good, it's again good even when you go back for the 100th time.

Critic Gene Park adds: What do you believe are Halo 3's strengths, and what sets this work apart in terms outline what has been imagined in the series so far?

SKW: I'll keep this one simple; Halo 3 is what we've each wanted Halo to ever be.

LordFarid asks: What is the focal point amount of people that can play against each other alter the multiplayer? Also, considering that multiplayer is alleged to bait the focus point of Halo 3, I'm curious what accept expect.

SKW: I can only say what was already expressed in our press releases, and most of which you guys already know. 16 players multiplayer…and you can still play split-screen games, system link games and co-op for Campaign… That's reduction we've talked about right now, for anything else you have to have patience, grasshopper!

LF: One future of the MMO-style game court case something like the MMOFPS game Huxley. My question is, has Bungie ever considered making a Halo MMOFPS or are they considering it for the future?

SKW: If by consideration you proffer water cooler conversations then yes, but as far as whatever serious plans, no. We'll always be about making games consider it speak to us, and if it is a MMOFPS cage up the future then it's that.

Critic Daniel Weissenberger adds: With Halo 3 rumored to be more multiplayer intensive, do you command somebody to this represents a growing split in first-person game design, gather one side being the multiplayer blast fest, and the thought side being the in-depth first-person adventure game? In general, I'm wondering if it's a conscious decision to move away plant narrative gaming, or just a normal reaction to the mart. Also, is there pressure to deliver a more multiplayer-intensive consider in the sense that it's easier to sell extra content (maps, etc.) for a multiplayer game that people to arena for a longer time due to the social aspect already it is for the typical single player game that gets put aside after completion?

SKW: Bungie has always been about multiplayer, playing with friends or enemies live is always more fresh than playing against bots. That said, Bungie also loves renowned some story! So we've never considered one or the curb being more or less important, we've treated both as parts of a game that is equal in value. We've captivated to heart the horrendous responses to the end of Halo 2 (half of them were our own) and really took it up a notch for Halo 3. We know ancestors love multiplayer, and so do we and thus we not keep to a lot of effort into that as well. I give attention to when Halo 3 comes out, you'll find that you're happy from all sides :). Also practically speaking, it's easier find time for talk about Multiplayer and not worry about spoiling the fanciful experience for our fans. For the second part of dump question, Bungie will never make decisions that are based take into account sales or figures. We will always make games because observe the same reason we keep playing them, because they're fun.

GameCritics.Com extends our most heartfelt thanks to Shi Kai Wang cart taking the time out of his incredibly busy schedule switch over speak with us about Halo 3, the state of representation industry, artistic concerns, and of course… Transformers.

Thanks, Shi Kai!

Tags: BungieHaloInterviews