Primal Rage

Primal Rage is an arcade fighting game released by Atari Games 1994

Core team: ~40

Time on project: ~12 months

Contributions

  • Processed, composited thousands of multi-layer stop-motion animation stills

  • Contributed to game design, character design, AI, and game tuning

  • Co-authored U.S. Patent 5,519,826: "Stop Motion Animation System"

  • Maintained stop-motion animation scheduling spreadsheets for 5 puppets, dozens of animation sequences, and nearly 10,000 individual images

  • Aided in game design, character design and game tuning

  • Meticulously tested the game, sometimes frame-by-frame, in order to uncover rare interactions between characters

  • Assisted in AI and animation Scripting

LinkedIn Recommendations

"Stephen came on board to the video lab back in the early 90's. He was always highly motivated to take on any task assigned. Stephen was quick to pick-up on the motion capture process along with detailed processing of graphics with heavy scripting on Debabelizer. I watched Stephen develop a number of skills as he worked his way into design with the company. I worked with Atari for over 20 years and see Stephen as a great asset to any development team. He is highly versatile and always strives for excellence." - Rob Rowe

"Steve was an inspiring colleague. He expresses concrete thoughts about gameplay, but also can be very fanciful and creative. He seems virtually waterproof to the rain of oddities that any big project generates; he takes everything in cheerful stride. I would highly recommend him." - Matthew Ford

Stop Motion Animation System

I remember writing a short description (maybe 5 pages) of the Stop Motion Animation System - the various component pieces of equipment, and the process of capturing digital images of the puppets, and then processing them.

I remember that the patent attorney responded about a week later with over 50 pages of diagrams and legalese; maybe 100 instances of the phrase, "preferred embodiment".

I worked with the attorney to double-check the patent for completeness and accuracy, and was awarded a wall plaque and $1 (since the work was owned by Atari Games)

The Tribespeople

We shot blue-screen video of various actors in a handful of different sequences. Developers Haywood Beard, Rob Rowe, and Jason Leong are pictured 1st, 2nd, and 5th from left.

I took on the task of processing all of the video footage into a few tiny frames of animation

My career in the video game industry began on Friday August 13, 1993 working in the stop-motion animation studio at Atari Games with "Sneaky" Pete Kleinow for $8.50/hr.

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