Massive Releases 3DS Max-Based Crowd Simulation Tool
July 27, 2016

Massive Releases 3DS Max-Based Crowd Simulation Tool

ANAHEIM, CA — At SIGGRAPH 2016, Massive (www.massivesoftware.com) released Massive for Max, which seamlessly integrates the crowd simulation software into Autodesk’s 3DS Max. Massive features characters controlled by artificial intelligence. These AI-driven characters can make their way through even the most arduous terrain, immediately reacting to changes within their environment. This eliminates the limitations of movement found in most other crowd simulation software using particle motion, where even minor changes in terrain can stop programmed characters and therefore derail the entire simulation. 
“If you know how to use 3DS Max, Massive will feel like second nature,” says Massive creator and CEO Stephen Regelous. “It is purposefully intuitive, so artists can seamlessly start putting our AI-driven agents to work right away.”

Massive’s Ready to Run Agents help artists populate common scenarios like stadiums, streets and battlefields quickly, arriving with skeletons, shaders, an action library and other time-saving elements locked in. Highly editable, each agent can then be rendered at the touch of a button, using most major renderers, including 3-Delight, V-Ray and Mental Ray. 

The Agents ship with a large variety of geometry and texture maps to help customize their looks, as well as Massive’s “fuzzy logic brain,” which grants Agents the ability to react naturally to their environment. All Massive for Max subscribers will also receive an Ambient Ready to Run Agent as part of their subscription. Each of these industry-leading Agents comes with hundreds of motion captured actions preloaded. 

Massive for Max incorporates all the key features of Massive. A “record” and “scrub” button that works alongside Max’s existing time controls has also been added, making the process of scrubbing through scenes with thousands of Agents just as fast as it would be with a single character.