Is this game using animations ripped from Elden Ring and other Souls games?

[WoodenMage]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z3nNLBtCdVI

Seems extremely suspect. Another enemy in the game also has Abyss Watchers from DS3 moveset, there's Uchigatana overhead attack also from Dark Souls used for one of the weapons in here as well, the list goes on. And thats all in the first 30 mins of the game.

Looks like devs have some explaining to do.

[Aristedes]

Originally posted by Reborn:

They arent 1 to 1 you can tell based off the shoulders, besides there is NOTHING wrong with taking inspiration and recreating it. I HIGHLY doubt anything was taken from fromsoftware when they KNEW it would draw attention. nothing needs explaining stop trying for attention

There are easy-to-use modding tools specifically for ripping assets from Souls/ER/Sekiro. You see them used by every major mod for those games. It's perfectly believable that they could've used those same tools to rip anims from ER.

[Pitt viper]

Very, very few animations are custom developed by developers anymore, and are usually reserved for either cutscenes or the signature action of a protagonist or antagonist. There are a slew of default animation packages that developers buy or license that come with literally thousands of animations broken down into categories and sections. Animation departments now are simply reduced to applying the premade animations, weight mapping, skin mapping, etc, to their rigs( which are also 9 times out of 10 not custom built anymore either ).

You are bound to get cross animations from these packages showing up in various games. At most developers may apply a minor tweak, but it's technically still a premade default animation.

I don't know if that is what happened here or not, but the gif/vid that's being used shows an animation that has been represented in multiple games is not accurate evidence of anything outside of the fact that the 3 dev's likely used the same animation package that From Software used.

[Dr. Atrocious]

Originally posted by Pitt viper:

I don't know if that is what happened here or not, but the gif/vid that's being used shows an animation that has been represented in multiple games is not accurate evidence of anything outside of the fact that the 3 dev's likely used the same animation package that From Software used.

I think the best way to prove that in this case is to find that exact same animation from something other than Elden Ring or other Fromsoft games.

[Shade]

Originally posted by Pitt viper:

Very, very few animations are custom developed by developers anymore, and are usually reserved for either cutscenes or the signature action of a protagonist or antagonist. There are a slew of default animation packages that developers buy or license that come with literally thousands of animations broken down into categories and sections. Animation departments now are simply reduced to applying the premade animations, weight mapping, skin mapping, etc, to their rigs( which are also 9 times out of 10 not custom built anymore either ).

You are bound to get cross animations from these packages showing up in various games. At most developers may apply a minor tweak, but it's technically still a premade default animation.

I don't know if that is what happened here or not, but the gif/vid that's being used shows an animation that has been represented in multiple games is not accurate evidence of anything outside of the fact that the 3 dev's likely used the same animation package that From Software used.

There are more animations than this one that match Fromsoftware games.
(Scroll down on the imgur page) https://imgur.io/a/OdsmR4Z
https://i.4cdn.org/v/1678541439926651.webm

[anglerman]

Animator here, these were literally straight up stolen from DS3/ER. These animations are really complicated to get the weight right and this game has 0 weight on their regular non-stolen animations. Not to mention they're timed exactly, precisely the same with no variation.

Obvious theft, they must get sued.

[Pitt viper]

Originally posted by Dr. Atrocious:

Originally posted by Pitt viper:

I don't know if that is what happened here or not, but the gif/vid that's being used shows an animation that has been represented in multiple games is not accurate evidence of anything outside of the fact that the 3 dev's likely used the same animation package that From Software used.

I think the best way to prove that in this case is to find that exact same animation from something other than Elden Ring or other Fromsoft games.

Any similar game would suffice I would assume. I mean you're not going to find those animations in a FPS or GTA style game. And let's be honest no one is looking outside of From Software games simply because this game is heavily inspired by them.

The dev's would have to know this game would be scrutinized and constantly compared to Souls, ER, etc, and would be foolish to think something as blatant as an animation could be ripped off and no one notice.

Again, I don't know what happened here. But I do know if people are only looking in From Software games to validate their point then that's disingenuous.

[WoodenMage]

So, whole day has passed and still zero response from the devs about this? Not the greatest look tbh.

Between the ripped animations, giant "ACTIVATE WINDOWS" text in their official trailer and AI "art" images used in the game I wouldn't be surprised if all those UE market assets they put in game were also just pirated, seems like these are the type of people that would do that.

I already reported the game on Steam, I'm wondering though about reporting this to Kickstarter as well, since the game apparently was funded there, and KS contract is very specific when it comes to legality and using copyrighted materials. These devs could end up in much bigger legal trouble than just getting their game delisted from Steam.

[ecco_]

The game is such a joke lol

[StarryEyes]

Originally posted by Pitt viper:

Originally posted by Dr. Atrocious:

I think the best way to prove that in this case is to find that exact same animation from something other than Elden Ring or other Fromsoft games.

Any similar game would suffice I would assume. I mean you're not going to find those animations in a FPS or GTA style game. And let's be honest no one is looking outside of From Software games simply because this game is heavily inspired by them.

The dev's would have to know this game would be scrutinized and constantly compared to Souls, ER, etc, and would be foolish to think something as blatant as an animation could be ripped off and no one notice.

Again, I don't know what happened here. But I do know if people are only looking in From Software games to validate their point then that's disingenuous.

I agree that the devs of bleak faith would be crazy to steal animations from elden ring and no one would notice. Although some of these animations look pretty much identical. I'm on the fence with this one and I'm just going to wait and see what happens next.

[phosTR]

Wow, this is bad. I'm already contacting Bandai about this.

[Blessed™]

lots of shills mad. wouldn't be surprised if they get hit with a C&D from bandai

[Deehn]

they posted links and explanation on the game discord - there nothing stolen but the point of these thread is to paint the game in a bad light.

People could just get response from the dev directly instead, as extensively answered and posted on their discord.

Dev statement
"@everyone People are also talking about stolen assets a lot so a few things to understand:

1) We're always been transparent about using the Epic Marketplace for animations that are good and fit our theme (the rest I made - we just needed more variety and I'm not an animator by trade, I had to learn for this game) - the link to the main one getting flack I will put at the end, you can buy it yourself, and try making Bleak Faith yourself too!

2) Fromsoftware outsources a lot of their art in all of the games you love, if you look around you will find they BUY hundreds of art assets from other companies as well, and also reuse those assets because a lot of that is not INHOUSE - Meaning they can't wake animations on the fly, they have to work with the many companies they hire to make their work. I'm sorry to burst your bubble if you thought Miyazaki himself makes everything, or the 200-300 employees they have make everything. They have thousands of contracted artists from around the world that they buy things from. So remember that when comparing our own quality to Elden Ring, maybe that puts into context what 3 developers really means.

3) The only other things from the Epic Marketplace that I use is for generic VFX that was a waste of time to make since I'd make things that looked virtually the same anyway, and things that are so generic (like some rocks) that didn't require artistic direction. THE ENTIRE WORLD was built by hand. So about 10% of the art is outsourced, whereas AAA companies outsource about 70% of their art (since they have the budget, we don't have that option and so any idea we have needs to be made in-house). Same goes for our trailers, you guys love them, and they are all made by 2 people. My brother and myself. ALL AAA companies outsource their promotional work to other companies. Keep that in mind as well.

https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/profile/PersiaNinja?count=20&sortBy=effectiveDate&sortDir=DESC&start=0

Another additional thing, Rotoscoping is a technique in animation where you trace other movement (animations, videos, anything). If timings overlap in an animation on completely separate rigs, that's not something you can copyright easily and mostly not worth trying to do. If you find animations that are similar, on completely separate rigs and skeletons, it's more than likely rotoscoping is involved as a method of tracing. You can't just trace a brand logo and use it as your own, but you can trace a lot of things and those things do become your own.

A lot of anime you love rotoscopes famous scenes from film and media to similar effects. I'm posting all of this so that I don't need to repeat myself in general "

[Witch ~]

Originally posted by Deehn:

they posted links and explanation on the game discord - there nothing stolen but the point of these thread is to paint the game in a bad light.

People could just get response from the dev directly instead, as extensively answered and posted on their discord.

Dev statement
"@everyone People are also talking about stolen assets a lot so a few things to understand:

1) We're always been transparent about using the Epic Marketplace for animations that are good and fit our theme (the rest I made - we just needed more variety and I'm not an animator by trade, I had to learn for this game) - the link to the main one getting flack I will put at the end, you can buy it yourself, and try making Bleak Faith yourself too!

2) Fromsoftware outsources a lot of their art in all of the games you love, if you look around you will find they BUY hundreds of art assets from other companies as well, and also reuse those assets because a lot of that is not INHOUSE - Meaning they can't wake animations on the fly, they have to work with the many companies they hire to make their work. I'm sorry to burst your bubble if you thought Miyazaki himself makes everything, or the 200-300 employees they have make everything. They have thousands of contracted artists from around the world that they buy things from. So remember that when comparing our own quality to Elden Ring, maybe that puts into context what 3 developers really means.

3) The only other things from the Epic Marketplace that I use is for generic VFX that was a waste of time to make since I'd make things that looked virtually the same anyway, and things that are so generic (like some rocks) that didn't require artistic direction. THE ENTIRE WORLD was built by hand. So about 10% of the art is outsourced, whereas AAA companies outsource about 70% of their art (since they have the budget, we don't have that option and so any idea we have needs to be made in-house). Same goes for our trailers, you guys love them, and they are all made by 2 people. My brother and myself. ALL AAA companies outsource their promotional work to other companies. Keep that in mind as well.

https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/profile/PersiaNinja?count=20&sortBy=effectiveDate&sortDir=DESC&start=0

Another additional thing, Rotoscoping is a technique in animation where you trace other movement (animations, videos, anything). If timings overlap in an animation on completely separate rigs, that's not something you can copyright easily and mostly not worth trying to do. If you find animations that are similar, on completely separate rigs and skeletons, it's more than likely rotoscoping is involved as a method of tracing. You can't just trace a brand logo and use it as your own, but you can trace a lot of things and those things do become your own.

A lot of anime you love rotoscopes famous scenes from film and media to similar effects. I'm posting all of this so that I don't need to repeat myself in general "

Those are pretty clear From rips. And From wouldnt hire a dozen animators for it.

But honestly I wouldnt care about that.
What I do find odd is why there are so many Elden Ring animations when the game just barely got 1 year old, wtf.

[Aryend]

Originally posted by Deehn:

they posted links and explanation on the game discord - there nothing stolen but the point of these thread is to paint the game in a bad light.

People could just get response from the dev directly instead, as extensively answered and posted on their discord.

Might not be their fault entirely, but from what I could find, the guy they apparently bought the animation from (PersianNinja) has been accused of ripping/stealing Fromsoft's animations, so while they are not directly to blame, it seems the animations themselves are still in a questionable place:
https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/product/pn-axe-animations/reviews

So yeah, it seems the devs didn't outright steal anything (I personally don't think there was any ill intent on their part), but it sure sounds like they should've done a bit more research about the animations they were purchasing.

I can understand where people are coming from pointing this issue out honestly, and wouldn't discard it as people just wanting to put the game in a bad light (of course there's the ocassional troll, but what can you expect? These are the Steam forums...)

[Ay Tone]

Originally posted by Aryend:

Originally posted by Deehn:

they posted links and explanation on the game discord - there nothing stolen but the point of these thread is to paint the game in a bad light.

People could just get response from the dev directly instead, as extensively answered and posted on their discord.

Might not be their fault entirely, but from what I could find, the guy they apparently bought the animation from (PersianNinja) has been accused of ripping/stealing Fromsoft's animations, so while they are not directly to blame, it seems the animations themselves are still in a questionable place:
https://www.unrealengine.com/marketplace/en-US/product/pn-axe-animations/reviews

So yeah, it seems the devs didn't outright steal anything (I personally don't think there was any ill intent on their part), but it sure sounds like they should've done a bit more research about the animations they were purchasing.

I can understand where people are coming from pointing this issue out honestly, and wouldn't discard it as people just wanting to put the game in a bad light (of course there's the ocassional troll, but what can you expect? These are the Steam forums...)

If you believe that I've got this real nice bridge for sale.