<\/p>\n
You grip your controller until your thumbs go numb. You\u2019re just gonna go on one more run. Hypnotic waves of colorful bullets fill the screen as you weave through the chaos, locked into an adrenaline-pumped flow state. But beneath that audiovisual and technical excellence, there are narrative reasons to explore the hostile alien world of Carcosa.<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\tPlay Video<\/span><\/p>\n The Soltari Enforcer, Arjun Devraj, played by actor Rahul Kohli, is deployed alongside a rescue crew, to Carcosa to secure a lost mining colony, though he may be harboring ulterior motives. The story of Saros takes Housemarque in a new bold direction, and it\u2019s all propped on the shoulders of the actors behind these performances.<\/p>\n \u200b\u200b<\/p>\n Finding Carcosa: Becoming Arjun is a behind-the-scenes documentary that explores how Arjun came to life. Taking you onto the performance capture stage, the film features exclusive footage and new interviews with Kohli and the development team, detailing exactly what it took for Arjun to find his voice.<\/p>\n \u201cAs both a filmmaker and a lifelong gamer, I\u2019ve always been fascinated by what makes a video game character truly feel authentic. Really pop out of the screen. With this episode, I wanted to not only peel back the curtain to share a glimpse of the technical side of performance capture, but also shine some light on the human process behind it.\u201d says Paul J. Vogel, the director of the three-part Finding Carcosa documentary series.<\/p>\n \u201cI hated it,\u201d laughs Rahul when asked about his first day on the performance capture stage. \u201cIt\u2019s a very strange feeling. You spend most of your time worrying how you look in this lycra wet suit, wishing you\u2019d gone to the gym. It takes an hour or two before you stop feeling silly. That\u2019s the strange thing. It starts tech heavy \u2013 calibrating your fingers. And then once you\u2019ve done that, it felt like an empty stage with actors and a director, and a script. Most actors are comfortable with doing a lot with very little. From day one in a rehearsal space, you are working without props, without stage furniture. Everything else, [the tech], has just gone.\u201d<\/p>\n Rahul references advice he received from Troy Baker. \u201cHe said it was the purest form of acting you\u2019ll ever do. And he was right. I\u2019m not playing to the camera\u2026 it\u2019s just about me and [the other actors].\u201d<\/p>\n The studio made sure to organise the shoot order so the cast could settle into the character\u2019s roles, and find their respective voices. \u201cWe started with a lot more of the dream elements,\u201d explains Louden. \u201cThat way they didn\u2019t need to know exactly who they were. They could be more dreamlike and from there go into the more realistic, naturalistic performance.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s [Rahul Kolhi] a gamer as well, so he knows what he is looking for a videogame character,\u201d reminisces senior narrative designer Khalil Osaimi. \u201cOn set he had so many notes, even with the script. It was really interesting to see him collaborate with Greg, because it was like two kids with action figures [laughs]. They created a fantastic spectacle.<\/p>\n \u201cThat collaboration was how to add these little details for players, and bring this level of authenticity whether players are watching the performance capture or hearing the voice over\u2026 it feels real.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI had to catch a flight, and Housemarque wouldn\u2019t have access to me for six months,\u201d says Kolhi. \u201cAnd they needed the trailer. And in order for me to make my flight I had to record on the other side of town in LA crazy early. And I\u2019m stuck in traffic. And I was so worked up and angry at seven, eight in the morning. We recorded the teaser trailer. And that voice that came out was angrier, more intense than anything we\u2019d done or explored previously. And Greg and I were immediately like\u2026 \u2018wait, that\u2019s him. That\u2019s who we\u2019ve been looking for\u2019\u2026. being angry and not being good enough to hide it\u2026 that was where Arjun was really born.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cRahul\u2019s anecdote about finding the true voice of Arjun is the perfect summary of how sometimes the creative nature of storytelling can be unpredictable. It\u2019s funny because it is so completely unglamorous. Stuck in traffic, already late for a recording session and up against the clock for a departing flight. It shows how a character can come alive from research, rehearsal and collaboration with your director\u2026 but sometimes all it really takes is one very bad commute,\u201d Paul continues<\/p>\n It was not only amazing to see Rahul\u2019s dedication to find Arjun, but also how much it meant to him on a personal level. You can feel how Saros is a milestone in his career that he might have not even dared to dream of some years ago. As both an actor and an avid gamer, he understood the assignment and felt the weight in bringing to life a character that hopefully would resonate with gamers across the world.<\/p>\n Thank you so much Rahul and the whole cast, and a thank you to all our players as well.<\/p>\n Saros is available now on PS5.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" You grip your controller until your thumbs go numb. You\u2019re just gonna go on one more run. Hypnotic waves of colorful bullets fill the screen as you weave through the chaos, locked into an adrenaline-pumped flow state. But beneath that audiovisual and technical excellence, there are narrative reasons to explore the hostile alien world of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7888,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[7671,4943,7670,7669,7672,590,4066,433,5347],"class_list":{"0":"post-7887","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-console-gaming","8":"tag-arjun","9":"tag-bad","10":"tag-brought","11":"tag-commute","12":"tag-devraj","13":"tag-life","14":"tag-performance","15":"tag-playstation-blog","16":"tag-tech"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7888"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/beteja.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The tech and freedom of performance capture<\/h2>\n
Finding the characters\u2019 by focusing on story-driven scenes first<\/h2>\n
Gamer-turned-game protagonist<\/h2>\n
How a traffic jam helped Rahul find Arjun\u2019s voice<\/h2>\n