SOE Announces SOEmote

PCGamer has video of the new facial animation system that will debut in EQ2.

The awesome folks at SOE are bringing the "role" back into "roleplaying" with an exciting new feature that will debut in EverQuest II. SOEmote uses a webcam and and voice features to let the game track your movement and facial expressions and replicate them on your avatar in real-time.

See the entire demo video (it's worth watching!) and read the interview over at PCGamer.

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Limitless possiblilites
# Jun 11 2012 at 12:18 PM Rating: Decent
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Now that they can sync the opening of mouths, it raises the whole question of what's in those mouths?

We could have a whole new range of options at the character build steps, maybe, someday, of different kinds of teeth, tongues, etc., to emote with.

A Freeblood smiling would have a whole different meaning! Nom nom nom!

An Iksar could truly speak with forked tongue.

And ....well, use your own imagination.

I've never bothered to go on a test server before, but for this, I just might.

Seriously can't wait for this.....
Limitless possiblilites
# Jun 11 2012 at 12:08 PM Rating: Decent
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87 posts
Now, if I can just figure out how to do the Cadbury Easter Egg Eyebrow Dance in front of my webcam.....

Let the games begin!
Interesting
# Jun 07 2012 at 6:30 AM Rating: Decent
19 posts
If the live stream said sometime in July, then it might be rolling out with the Qeynos update as that was originally due sometime this or next month.
Obvious databasing failure
# Jun 06 2012 at 8:48 AM Rating: Decent
27 posts
This has got to be as dumb as the pizza delivery button was...

A very obvious and blatant attempt by our intelligence gathering agencies to collect more data on us, only something this stupid could be pushed to get peoples face expresions databased.
Okay, now a silly question
# Jun 04 2012 at 3:36 PM Rating: Decent
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Since we're going to see inside so many Frogloks mouths.....
......will they finally get tongues?

Not trying to stir the pot (well, maybe a little), adding tongues to the faces opens up almost *infinite* possiblilities......

After all, what's a froglok without his tongue?

"If the Creator had not intended for us to catch bugs, then He had not given us tongues."
Kermdan the Fury
Also for NPCs?
# Jun 04 2012 at 3:33 PM Rating: Decent
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Giving proper credit where its due, Keydet96 over on the PCGamer forum suggested they also use this for NPC characters. I strongly concur. I enjoy a total immersion experience (which is why I play EQ2 and not WoW, the graphics aid immersion).


Edited, Jun 4th 2012 6:20pm by Maccabee4
When cometh lively visages?
# Jun 04 2012 at 3:25 PM Rating: Decent
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87 posts
Soooooooooo.........
Maybe I missed it in the video or in the article, .....
Ummm.
When do they hope ( dare I ask "expect"?) to roll this out?
(Fiddling with web cam....)
When cometh lively visages?
# Jun 05 2012 at 9:51 AM Rating: Excellent
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Maccabee4 wrote:
Soooooooooo.........
Maybe I missed it in the video or in the article, .....
Ummm.
When do they hope ( dare I ask "expect"?) to roll this out?
(Fiddling with web cam....)

I haven't seen any info stating when it's planning on rolling out.
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When cometh lively visages?
# Jun 05 2012 at 5:31 PM Rating: Excellent
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Cyliena wrote:
Maccabee4 wrote:
Soooooooooo.........
Maybe I missed it in the video or in the article, .....
Ummm.
When do they hope ( dare I ask "expect"?) to roll this out?
(Fiddling with web cam....)

I haven't seen any info stating when it's planning on rolling out.

In the live stream today they showed it briefly and SJ said "sometime in June"... no idea if he meant on Test or Live, though.
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Sooooo
# Jun 04 2012 at 5:56 AM Rating: Excellent
Nuked all the posts made here, because this isn't the place to argue and bicker over proper grammar.
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My boys are going to love this....
# Jun 02 2012 at 7:37 PM Rating: Decent
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Both of my sons will love this...
This has the potential to get my older son excited about the game all over again.
My older son has moderate myotonic dystrophy. Because it reduces the responsiveness of his facial muscles, he has to exaggerate his facial expressions to emote in RL. Also, it gives him a greater appreciation for comedy that involves great faces, like all the old Harold Lloyd and Buster Keaton movies, Three Stoooges, etc. He absolutely cracks up over facial expressions...
He is absolutely going to love this......
Can't wait until they start it...
I've already pulled out that webcam we never used.
(Exercising my eyebrows....1...2...3...4...)

Edited, Jun 2nd 2012 9:39pm by Maccabee4
My personal opinion...
# Jun 02 2012 at 7:29 AM Rating: Decent
22 posts
Am I going to be forced to use this thing? Is it going to be up there on my screen in my way all the time? I PERSONALLY don't see a use or need for something like this. I'd love to see them "waste" time on other things, like glitches, story lines, more solo events, easier to understand armor for non-nerds like me, etc...

But that's just one opinion from an old woman who likes to play to relax, not reach 300 AAs and level 92 in 24 hours or less.

Have a good one...Smiley: lol
Amazing Stuff
# Jun 01 2012 at 6:06 PM Rating: Decent
29 posts
It's pretty amazing what they can do with technology these days. While I'm one of the few that doesn't own a webcam and have no intention of getting one, I like the part with the voice distortion. I enjoy roleplay and can see where that would enhance that experience. Perhaps at some point it will be made available to other games such as EQ1 and Vanguard. It would be fun to hear my grouchy ogre or whiney gnome. Maybe not for others tho! Smiley: wink

P.S. I too at first wondered why this was posted on EQ1 site. I play the other games, but when I'm in EQ1 mode, I don't often check out the news for the other games so I'm glad it was posted here.
EQ1
# Jun 01 2012 at 12:58 PM Rating: Decent
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Does this have anything at all to do with EQ1? If not, should it be posted on the EQ1 Zam page? Just wondering.
EQ1
# Jun 01 2012 at 5:35 PM Rating: Excellent
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Baeddon wrote:
Does this have anything at all to do with EQ1? If not, should it be posted on the EQ1 Zam page? Just wondering.


The way it reads it's debuting in EQ2. I thought all SOE game players might like to see it, so I tagged it for all the SOE games.
EQ1
# Jun 02 2012 at 6:46 AM Rating: Decent
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Valid point, and I meant the original post NOT in a disrespectful way. But I still disagree with you that it belongs here. In a similar way, I don't want to read WoW news here. Granted, EQ1 and EQ2 are the same company, but to me, they have nothing to do with each other. In my world, EQ2 is the same thing as WoW or any other mmo. And as I said, I say this respectfually and am not foolish enough to think EVERYBODY shares my opinion.

That said, I'm afraid that EQ1 is too antiquated to support such a technology every being deployed beyond the alpha stage behind a closed door at Sony. Proove me wrong (and I won't be using it, it seems silly to me) and I'll eat these words with a side of humble pie, no problem.

But my original point is not even SOE is talking about this around EQ 1 at this point; check out eqplayers.com, no mention of it. If SOE doesn't even toot their own horn over this... just my 2cp.
EQ1
# Jun 03 2012 at 10:59 PM Rating: Excellent
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Baeddon wrote:
But my original point is not even SOE is talking about this around EQ 1 at this point; check out eqplayers.com, no mention of it. If SOE doesn't even toot their own horn over this... just my 2cp.


I hear your points and respect them. I played EQ from Velious through GoD and I do know what you mean when you say EQ is kind of in a class by itself.

IMO EQ2 is Smed's favorite experiment playground for SOE games: look at Station Exchange, Vivox, Station Cash and F2P, for example. He likes to roll stuff out there and then spread it around if it succeeds. I also think that Smokejumper has his own agenda and we'll all end up with it like we did F2P. Wanna bet that it's tech they're working on for EQNext that they decided to beta test on EQ2 Live?

You might have a point about the age of EQ's tech not supporting it. S'pose only time will tell.


Edited, Jun 4th 2012 1:02am by Calthine
EQ1
# Jun 04 2012 at 4:11 PM Rating: Good
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Calthine wrote:


You might have a point about the age of EQ's tech not supporting it. S'pose only time will tell.


Edited, Jun 4th 2012 1:02am by Calthine


Dont need to wait to know this. They would have no choice but to overhaul that character models to make this possible. While i would personally welcome a character model overhaul in EQ i just dont see it happening.
Meh
# Jun 01 2012 at 11:57 AM Rating: Decent
Its cool and all I suppose, but it isn't going to be winning the game of the year award.
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