NaturalMotion is a British video game development company with development offices in London, Brighton and

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1. ...

. Founded in November 2001 as a spin-out company from

Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to th ...

, NaturalMotion specialises in creating animation technology for the game and film industries. In January 2014, NaturalMotion was acquired by

Zynga Zynga Inc. () is an American developer running social video game services. It was founded in April 2007, with headquarters in San Mateo, California. The company primarily focuses on mobile and social networking platforms. Zynga states its missio ...

for US$527 million. Their main technology products are

Endorphin Endorphins (contracted from endogenous morphine) are chemical signals in the brain that block the perception of pain and increase feelings of wellbeing. They are produced and stored in an area of the brain known as the pituitary gland. Hist ...

(for the film industry) and Euphoria (for the gaming industry), in addition to videos games such as

Backbreaker Backbreaker refers to a kind of professional wrestling move which sees a wrestler dropping an opponent so that the opponent's back impacts or is bent backwards against a part of the wrestler's body, usually the knee. The standard version of the ...

and CSR Racing.

Technology

NaturalMotion commercialized their procedural animation technology, which they call ''Dynamic Motion Synthesis (DMS)''. DMS is based on a real-time simulation of

biomechanics Biomechanics is the study of the structure, function and motion of the mechanical aspects of biological systems, at any level from whole organisms to organs, cells and cell organelles, using the methods of mechanics. Biomechanics is a branch of ...

and the motor control nervous system. As such, it has roots in

biology Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...

and

robot control Robotic control is the system that contributes to the movement of robots. This involves the mechanical aspects and programmable systems that makes it possible to control robots. Robotics could be controlled in various ways, which includes using ma ...

theory. NaturalMotion states that DMS allows for fully interactive 3D characters, as it is not based on canned animation. DMS is used in two of the company's products:

, a 'tool for creating virtual stuntmen' and Euphoria, a runtime engine. The first commercially released title to use Euphoria was ''

Grand Theft Auto IV ''Grand Theft Auto IV'' is a 2008 action-adventure game developed by Rockstar North and published by Rockstar Games. It is the sixth main entry in the ''Grand Theft Auto'' series, following 2004's '' Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas'', and the e ...

'' by

Rockstar Games Rockstar Games, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in New York City. The company was established in December 1998 as a subsidiary of Take-Two Interactive, using the assets Take-Two had previously acquired from BMG Interactive. Foun ...

. NaturalMotion's other middleware product is Morpheme - an animation engine for

Wii U The Wii U ( ) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo as the successor to the Wii. Released in late 2012, it is the first eighth-generation video game console and competed with Microsoft's Xbox One and Sony's PlayStation 4. Th ...

PlayStation 3 The PlayStation 3 (PS3) is a home video game console developed by Sony Computer Entertainment. The successor to the PlayStation 2, it is part of the PlayStation brand of consoles. It was first released on November 11, 2006, in Japan, November ...

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, PC, PlayStation Vita, Android, and

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also include ...

. Unlike the company's other packages, Morpheme does not use DMS and instead provides tools for blending animations, inverse kinematics and rigid-body simulation. Some of the games that use Morpheme include ''

BioShock Infinite ''BioShock Infinite'' is a first-person shooter video game developed by Irrational Games and published by 2K Games. The third installment in the BioShock (series), ''BioShock'' series, ''Infinite'' was released worldwide for the Microsoft Window ...

'', '' Enslaved: Odyssey to the West'', ''

Eve Online ''Eve Online'' (stylised ''EVE Online'') is a space-based, persistent world massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) developed and published by CCP Games. Players of ''Eve Online'' can participate in a number of in-game profes ...

'', '' Horizon Zero Dawn'', and ''

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''.

Customers

NaturalMotion's technology is in use at many film and games companies, including

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, The Mill,

Electronic Arts Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...

Moving Picture Company The Moving Picture Company (MPC) is a multinational company providing visual effects, CGI, animation, motion design and other services for the film, TV, brand experience and advertising industries. Their artists have produced Academy Award W ...

Konami , is a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company headquartered in Chūō, Tokyo, it also produces and distributes trading cards, anime, tokusatsu, pachinko machines, slot machines, and arcade cabinets. Konami has casino ...

, Capcom, Sega and many more. Movies and games featuring

animation include ''

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'', ''

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'', '' The Getaway'', ''

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'' and ''

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''. In 2006,

LucasArts Lucasfilm Games (known as LucasArts between 1990 and 2021) is an American video game licensor that is part of Lucasfilm. It was founded in May 1982 by George Lucas as a video game development group alongside his film company; as part of a large ...

announced that it would use the Euphoria animation engine in '' Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings'' and '' Star Wars: The Force Unleashed'' games. In 2007,

announced it had licensed this engine for many of their new and upcoming games, with the first announced title being ''

''. Subsequent Rockstar Games titles that use the engine include ''

Red Dead Redemption ''Red Dead Redemption'' is a 2010 action-adventure game developed by Rockstar San Diego and published by Rockstar Games. A spiritual successor to 2004's '' Red Dead Revolver'', it is the second game in the '' Red Dead'' series. ''Red Dead Rede ...

'', ''

Max Payne 3 ''Max Payne 3'' is a 2012 third-person shooter video game developed and published by Rockstar Games. It was released on May 15, 2012 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360; a Microsoft Windows port was released on May 29, 2012, followed by an OS X ...

'' and ''

Red Dead Redemption 2 ''Red Dead Redemption 2'' is a 2018 action-adventure game developed and published by Rockstar Games. The game is the third entry in the ''Red Dead'' series and a prequel to the 2010 game ''Red Dead Redemption''. The story is set in 1899 and f ...

''.

NaturalMotion Games

In 2009, NaturalMotion released its first game, the iPhone title '' Backbreaker Football'', which used Morpheme to simulate movement and tackles. The game was a critical and commercial success, with a Quality Index score of 8.1/10 and 5 million downloads. The company created a new division, NaturalMotion Games, on 18 November 2010. In 2011, NaturalMotion Games released its first Free-To-Play title ''My Horse'' on iPhone and iPad. It has been downloaded over 11 million times. Its second F2P game, ''CSR Racing'', reached number one in Top Grossing and Top Free

App Store An App Store (or app marketplace) is a type of digital distribution platform for computer software called applications, often in a mobile context. Apps provide a specific set of functions which, by definition, do not include the running of the c ...

charts across the world. The game made over $12 million in its first month. In August 2012, NaturalMotion announced that it had acquired the studio, BossAlien, for an undisclosed sum. NaturalMotion's CEO Torsten Reil announced a new 'interactive toy' called ''Clumsy Ninja'' on stage during the Apple iPhone 5 announcement. It is the first mobile title to use the Euphoria animation engine. The game was originally announced for 'holiday season' 2012, however it was delayed by almost a year. It eventually appeared worldwide on the App Store on 21 November 2013. On release, Clumsy Ninja became the first Application to be promoted with a video trailer embedded in the Application Store. In October 2017, Zynga closed NaturalMotion's Oxford office.

Games developed

References

External links

NaturalMotion website
{{Take-Two Interactive British companies established in 2001 Video game companies established in 2001 Video game development companies Video game companies of the United Kingdom Companies associated with the University of Oxford Companies based in London 2001 establishments in England Zynga 2014 mergers and acquisitions British subsidiaries of foreign companies