Marvel's Wolverine Scanned Japan for Assets

Insomniac Games has detailed a major location-scanning trip to Japan for its upcoming title, Marvel's Wolverine. The PlayStation studio sent a team across multiple regions to gather environmental assets and references for the game.

According to a post on the PlayStation Blog, the trip was part of a broader series of global scanning missions. It was described as the team's most ambitious and satisfying mission to date. The goal was to capture the physical truth of various locations to inform the game's environments.

Planning the ambitious route

Months of virtual scouting and planning preceded the trip, aided by Sony Interactive Entertainment teams in Japan. The environment team for Marvel's Wolverine had blocked out levels and created detailed requests for specific assets and biomes. The challenge was to design a route that maximized variety within a limited timeframe.

Previous scanning trips typically minimized travel between locations to save time. For Japan, the plan was different. The desired environments were spread across several distinct regions, requiring more in-trip travel than the team had ever attempted. This led to long hours on Japanese highways, playing "I spy," debating whether hexagons are truly the best-a-gons, and buying mysterious drinks from roadside vending machines.

The value of on-the-ground research

For a game like Marvel's Wolverine, authenticity is built in layers. High-resolution scans capture the physical details of a place: rock, bark, pavement, moss, metal, signage, soil, and all the small imperfections that make environments feel believable. The value of the trip extended beyond pure scan data, however.

Being in Japan allowed the team to observe how structures are designed and constructed, how materials weather over time, and how local cultural details manifest in the environment. This firsthand research provides artists a stronger foundation, even for fictional locations. The aim is to create worlds that feel grounded and thoughtfully inspired, rather than pieced together from generic library assets.

Capturing multiple biomes

Insomniac's team captured assets across several dramatically different biomes in a single trip. They moved from snow-covered eastern mountains to an underground train station. The route also included bamboo forests, sunbaked city streets, and remote roadside temples.

Each location offered unique challenges. In the mountains, the focus was on natural surfaces and cold-weather details like snow, stone, bark, and ground cover. Bamboo forests provided references for vegetation density, organic layering, and the unique rhythm of the landscape. Urban scans captured pavement, walls, infrastructure, and the subtle wear that makes a city feel lived-in. Underground spaces offered distinct materials and architectural patterns.

Alongside scans, the team took extensive photo references for shape, texture, and scale.

Trip statistics and results

By the end of the Japan trip, the team had captured a massive amount of material. The PlayStation Blog provided the following figures:

The locations ranged from snow-covered mountains and underground stations to bamboo forests and remote side-of-the-road temples.

Insomniac states the trip provided assets and a deeper understanding of materials and cultural details that will shape the game's vision. This work, alongside other global scanning trips, is intended to build Marvel's Wolverine with greater specificity and respect for its real-world inspirations.

The studio calls it a challenging but successful trip. It represents a meaningful step in their research and collaboration process. Insomniac Games says it is excited to show how these inspirations come to life when Marvel's Wolverine releases for PS5.