Assassin’s Creed Launch Event – Jade on the Scene

I sidled into the Assassin’s Creed launch party about a half-hour early, claiming that I was “somebody.” Shockingly, they let me in! Looking around, I quickly realized they weren’t fully set up, and I returned to the growing line just outside the doors. This trendy location in Toronto’s historic Distillery District may not bring 12^th Century Jerusalem to mind by day, but at night ... Ubisoft had transformed the rough brick building.

Robed and hooded torch bearers lead the way, standing solemnly at the head of the line. The silhouette of a hawk flew across the bricks. Then, all of a sudden, it started. Slowly, the line started moving into the building (the warmth was welcome, it was a chilly night!) and, like magic, guests were transported into Altaïr’s world. Projections of Jerusalem’s skyline, complete with flying birds and fluttering flags, formed the perfect backdrop for this glitzy launch.

After a half-hour mixing and mingling with the other VIPs and media that turned out for the launch, Ubisoft Canada head, Olivier Ernst, took to the stage to greet the crowd and welcomed Ubisoft Montreal’s Patrice Desilets, Creative Director on Assassin’s Creed, up onto the stage. Patrice orchestrated a jaw-dropping demo of the game on the massive wall projections and then invited the assembled crowd to try it out for themselves on one of the Xbox 360 interactive consoles dotting the event.

After his demo, Patrice retreated to a curtained off room where he held demonstrations for journalists, and I was able to steal a few minutes for some quick questions!

Patrice, thank you so much for taking time to chat with me – I’m sure you’d like to get back out to the party! So, can you please give me an overview of Assassin’s Creed ... what’s it all about?

It’s all about Altaïr, a Master Assassin during the Third Crusade in the Holy Land. You play this character in the summer of 1191 A.D., and it’s his quest for redemption. He’s done something bad at the beginning – he didn’t follow the Creed – and his mentor asks him to go and assassinate nine key people to bring an end to the Crusades. You play in three major cities: Acre, the Crusaders’ city, Jerusalem and Damascus. And there’s a big kingdom in the middle with a forest and here you can travel between cities.

Altaïr can interact with a lot of things, people, and buildings. He can climb around everywhere – every architectural element that sticks out of the wall more than 10 cm is an interactive point for the main character. So, every single building in a city is interactive and climbable.

We have a very different control scheme – the buttons are mapped to control different parts of the body. So the “A” Button is all about the legs. This is how you walk slowly, this is how you sprint, and it opens up Free Run. Free Run is all about jumping around – going from building to building.

And it’s easy. It’s easy if you understand that the control scheme is not about tapping buttons. It’s about holding down buttons to enter a mode. So you enter the Free Running mode and then it’s all about direction. You’re in low profile at first, then you hold down the right trigger to go into high profile. That makes the character run.  And when you hold down the “A” Button to sprint, if there’s something to jump on, Altaïr will do it. It may sound weird when you say it like that, but once you’re being chased by 15 guys with swords and you want to escape, it makes perfect sense.

So, either you figure it out, or you’ll die and have to try it again.

Exactly. We’re used to games where you go from metres to metres, seconds to seconds. Here we just wanted to have an experience that was more macro than micro. So, when you’re being chased it’s not about, “can I go on that beam?” It’s “I see a place to hide over there, I want to go there, so I’m using my Free Running” or “I want to approach someone without being detected, I’m using my Blend move so that I’m moving really, really, slowly beside or behind other people.” So then you enter the Blend mode, like you were entering the Free Running mode.

I can imagine that that is much more immersive than doing it as a button masher! In real life you don’t think, “How am I going to take this step?” You just do it.

Exactly. I did a talk at GDC about that –saying that was the vision. The character should be like a human being. When I’m being chased, I don’t think about my legs. I run the hell out of there – not that I’m often really being chased in real life, but you know what I mean. *laughs*

One thing I’ve had a lot of people ask me to ask you is how did you decide on this setting for a game? It’s very original.

It comes from two places.

The Assassins. The clan of the Assassin, where the word comes from. They were a medieval clan. But that’s only the beginning. I really wanted a character with action and excitement, and being an Assassin is cool.

But we also wanted a crowd. But, if we do a crowd in New York City, or here in Toronto, we need 2000 NPCs to feel like a crowd. But ... I lived in Italy for years, and in those old, narrow streets, 35 NPCs feel like a crowd. That’s enough. Eventually we came up with 120, but still. So you have the Assassin, and you need a place to do a crowd, so that’s where you do it, in medieval times. We tried to recreate a period of time. So, this is where it came from.

Another nice benefit is it’s such a unique time period. You don’t see many games set in the Middle Ages.

Well, there is, but it’s all the fantasy medieval stuff.

Before I’d heard anything else about the game, from the very first trailers I saw, the unique setting is what attracted me to the game.

When you first play the game, when you enter Damascus for the first time, it’s kind of like, “Wow.” It’s kind of like – and I strongly believe this – eventually, games will become a real time machine. Because we’re in 2007 ... I started in the industry in ’97, ten years ago. So, in ten more years, if they let me do another historical theme, it will be just like the real thing.

You’re at the point where you’re not going to be limited by much, technology-wise. There’s a lot you can do.

Well, we’re limited a little bit by two things, in my opinion. By the [fact that gamers still have to use the] controller, and we’re also limited by the TV somehow. What I mean by that is the game has to be “readable.” Like, the roof tops – or the roof gardens, as we call them – have to be “readable” by the player so they recognize that that’s a place to hide. In real life, there would be only one like that and everything else would be different. So, in games, you need patterns, and in life, there’re no patterns. Or they’re really, really subtle.

And in a game, we don’t have senses. When you’re being chased by 15 guys in real life, you can feel it. In a game? No. If you’re not seeing it on the screen, it doesn’t exist.

Since you are working in a real, historic time period, what were some things that you felt it was really important to replicate pretty much bang on and realistically, and where did you let your imagination run wild?

For me and for a lot of the team, it’s the characters, and the costumes that we’re building for characters. They’re all human, so they’ll have similar faces, but we need to change the costumes more like it’s a feature movie. And, how we built the city. If, historically, the harbour was west, it has to be on the west side of the screen. So in the game the landmarks will be where they should be.

I remember in one meeting, someone said, “Well, who cares?” I do, it’s important. You’re lucky to work with a licence called history. So let’s use it! However, then we took some liberties.

What’s the most unrealistic part of the game?

*chuckles* The goal of it. I don’t want to spoil it, but we’re going a little bit into ... there’s a sci-fi twist.  Basically, you’re living the life of your ancestor.  You’re actually a guy in the present. It’s a twist. But it’s right from the beginning.

But the goal of the game, what the Templars and the Assassin’s and everybody wants to have ... is the Apple of Eden. So that object is where we went a little bit “out there.”

Very cool. Patrice, let’s find out more about the man behind the blockbuster. What’s your role on the game?

I’m the Creative Director. In a movie you would say I am the Director. So my role is to come up with a vision – kind of the guru, the shaman or whatever. And then I’ll change it depending on what’s doable, and trying to communicate it as much as possible and make sure everybody goes in the same direction ... and calling the shots! Okay, not all the shots – producer, director ... there are a lot of people calling shots.

So, you’re the one that people would come up to you, bounce the ideas off you – does this fit in the vision, does it fit in the world. Have you been at Ubisoft for a long time?

For 10 years. It was my first job out of college.

Wow, and have you tried a bunch of different roles at Ubi?

I was a Game Designer for almost four years, and then they opened up the Creative Director role. Originally, there were only producers. And then someone said, “Maybe there should be a guy in charge of the quality of the content?” So then I applied, and asked to become Creative Director, and my first game as Creative Director was Prince of Persia: Sands of Time.

From your perspective, do you have any tips for someone who is trying to get into the games industry? What are three things that you’d recommend they do today to take steps in the right direction?

I’ll sound like my uncle, but ... stay in school. Not too long, mind you. Because then you’ll become a squarehead. Just to learn. Be curious. And write, draw ... do whatever. Not just game stuff.

Me? I’m good at writing, so I wrote. I don’t know how to draw. *laughs* But stay in school a bit. Because now they have courses in game design. If you went there, that’s a big factor [in getting hired].

And “be curious” is all about ... not only games. Because game design is the one job that you’ll be talking with every single craft. So you need to know how to talk with an artist, how to talk with an engineer, to know how to talk about music.

Looking at Assassin’s Creed, now that it’s finished and you can sit back and look at it, what are you most proud of? That it’s done?

*laugh* Today, yes. That, somehow, the vision I had for the game years ago is there. Not exactly, but the real vision was you play as an assassin in 1191 A.D. and it works. So, that I’m really proud of. And that I still have friends on the team. *laughs*

Mainly that people around the world are playing Assassin’s Creed. They’re playing as assassin during the crusades, and that was the real vision.