Case Study for: Prolific Studio | Avalon: Dawn Rises - Lords | Animus Interactive
Prolific Studio partnered with Animus Interactive to produce a high intensity 3D animated trailer for Avalon: Dawn Rises – Lords. Set in a brutal, Viking inspired world, the trailer highlights the game’s themes of rage, conquest, and survival. With cinematic camera work, visceral character moments, and sweeping battlefield sequences, the trailer delivers an immersive experience. One of the most powerful scenes features a battle scarred warlord slamming his fist in fury, symbolizing the raw power and emotion that define the game’s universe.
Project Objective
To create a cinematic 3D trailer that builds excitement and emotional impact around the game’s world, characters, and battle mechanics.
Target Audience
Hardcore strategy gamers, Viking and medieval warfare fans, and players who appreciate story rich, visually intense gaming experiences.
Our Streamlined Approach
We used a cinematic first 3D animation workflow, focusing early on storyboards, character staging, and mood lighting while using real time previews for efficient feedback and iteration.
Challenges Faced
The biggest challenge was animating a realistic but stylized warlord whose expressions had to convey complex emotions without dialogue.
Creating large scale battle scenes with dozens of moving soldiers, environmental effects, and fire simulations was demanding on both render times and system performance.
Maintaining visual consistency between the game’s look and the cinematic feel also required tight coordination with the client’s in game assets and lore.
Solutions
We captured raw motion performance using mocap and enhanced key poses with hand animation to amplify emotion and weight. Redshift was used to achieve cinematic lighting, while procedural crowd systems helped us animate large battlefield scenes without compromising render speed.
Camera movements were mapped using previs to preserve narrative energy. The result was a cohesive 3D trailer that looked and felt like a premium AAA game teaser, aligning perfectly with Animus Interactive’s vision.
Results and Success
The trailer generated buzz among early-access players and was used as the flagship asset during the game’s pre-launch campaign. Animus Interactive reported a notable spike in social engagement and wishlist additions following its release.
The animation was praised for its cinematic quality, helping the studio position Avalon: Dawn Rises – Lords as a visually rich, high-stakes strategy game. It also received strong reactions at industry showcases and boosted investor confidence ahead of the next development phase.
