I was fortunate to have the rare chance to pose some tough question's to Ubisoft about Assassin's Creed Revelations. I spoke to the Art, Game Design, Transmedia Production and Scriptwriting teams. They shared their thoughts on the background history, the narrative design, the community collaboration and more on this legendary franchise upcoming November 15th.
GeekDad: Assassin's Creed Brotherhood and Assassin's Creed Revelations have such a rich historical and architectural context. What kind of research do you do to maintain an "authentic period" game environment?
Raphael Lacoste, Art Director: We've always tried to reproduce the feeling of the cities we bring to life in the Assassin's Creed games as faithfully as possible. Obviously, this can be quite challenging when the task is to realistically recreate environments from the 12 century (Assassin's Creed 1), Renaissance Italy (Assassin's Creed 2 and Brotherhood) and finally 16th century Turkey.
To do so, we have neither photos nor contemporary references to start with when we enter the conception of a project. To achieve our goals, we engage in long and intense periods of research using historical documents, maps from the era, illustrations, paintings, travelogues, etc. We've also had the good fortune of being able to travel to these locations and get a real sense of the sights, sounds and smells of these amazing cities.
Naturally, it's impossible to create an exact replica of these locations, but we have always managed to construct immersive environments that allow the player the total freedom to explore historically accurate and immense settings.
GD: Is there hands-on experience the dev team engages in with the actual historical locations of the game (Rome, Venice, Florence, Istanbul) to make this authentic narrative credible to the player?
RL: Our goal is always to make an experience for players that is as credible as possible, and we take great care in visiting the cities that we translate into the game.
One of the most important aspects for us is to make sure that the overall impression that the cities leave on the player are as true to life as possible, especially if said players have had the good fortune of visiting these locations themselves in real life. Given the feedback we've gotten thus far on the series, I think this is a goal we're accomplishing quite well!
To be certain that we understand the cities we'll be bringing to life in the game, we spent a considerable amount of time visiting Rome, Florence, Venice and now Istanbul for Assassin's Creed Revelations. We visited the real-life monuments that players will visit in the game, such as the magnificent Hagia Sofia and the amazing view from the Galata tower over the Bosphorus river. We also visited many museums to see the weapons of the era, and took in the magnificent opulence of Topkapi palace.
We are only truly satisfied when we feel that we have created an in-game rendition of these cities that truly conveys the beauty and history that we felt when we visited them ourselves.
GD: In Assassin's Creed Brotherhood you can upgrade and send your assassins on missions. Is this feature of the game being incorporated and upgraded in Assassin's Creed Revelations?
Alexandre Breault, Game Design Director: Yes, you are still able to call on your brotherhood for assistance during a fight or to assassinate a target. Assassin recruits were an appreciated addition the game, but players provided us feedback that they didn't feel a particular attachment to them and would have preferred a deeper character development of sorts. In Assassin's Creed Revelations, we are giving your assassin recruits more personality, making them more meaningful to the player. There are more options to customize the assassins by selecting their weapons and their class. We also added more missions related to the assassins: new recruitment missions, as well as missions when they reach specific levels in their progression.
That brings me to the second main change that we made to the Assassin's guild. Since Ezio is more mature in our game, he needs to prepare new master assassins. He won't be there forever, so he wants to make sure he has followers ready to pass the torch to them. The player will be able to promote his preferred Assassins enabling them to reach the Master Assassins' level.
We also improved the Guild Contract Assignments. The Assassins you send away are not just completing missions: they can now take control of foreign cities. This will provide the player a steady stream of rewards, but will also attract the attention of the Templars who will try to regain control of those cities.
Related to your brotherhood is the Assassin's Den a new feature, built from the ground up for Assassin's Creed Revelations, where you gain (and lose) control of Constantinople's districts. It best represents the battle that is fought in the streets between the Assassins and the Templars. It's very organic, so a district that is controlled by the assassins can be attacked by the Templars and then taken back and vice-versa.
As for Altaïr, the full scope of his involvement is something that I'll have to keep mysterious for the time being.
GD: What new MP features can we look forward to in AC Revelations?
Andreane Meunier, Online Producer: On the multiplayer side, what we really wanted to add an element that is a core part of Assassin's Creed that wasn't really pushed in Brotherhood, namely a strong story. In Revelations, players will assume the role of a Templar in training. As you progress in the multiplayer, Abstergo management will contact you and give you insider's information on the company and explanations on their operations. It is the first time we will get to see the Templar's side of the story and our fans are in for a treat!
There will be many improvements in Assassin's Creed Revelations. The main changes you will notice first are the new setting, cast and maps. We spend a lot of time observing and talking about the favourite characters and maps with the community, and we have learned a lot. We have improved access to the game and matchmaking. We also wanted to add tons of new elements, so along with the new modes, abilities and streaks, you will discover a brand new customization features. There is also a new animation system with custom kills and taunts that you can combine together. Put that on top of new mechanics that will allow you to go for a rapid stealth kill or a long brutal and spectacular assassination and you will start to get an idea of the new Assassin's Creed Multiplayer experience.
GD: With the Assassin's Creed Encyclopedia, is your main goal to integrate the branding of the in-game storyline, general historical background of the game and the franchise's characters? Would you say that the Assassin's Creed franchise is defined most by the in-game characters, the in-game environment or an interplay of both?
Louis-Pierre Pharand, Transmedia producer: The Assassin's Creed Universe is made of different narrative arcs, spread over many different media. The main goal of the encyclopedia is to take all the pieces of the puzzle and gather them in one single source. Of course there is also a purely creative aspect to it: as any true transmedia project, the Encyclopedia contains exclusive content. It was the perfect place to allow the game writers to develop subjects that were important to them but not well fitted to the video game medium.
We also kept another goal in mind while working on the Encyclopedia: making a book we would buy ourselves.
Darby McDevitt, Scriptwriter of Assassin's Creed Revelations: It is typically an interplay of both. When we choose a new setting for our assassin, it needs to be a location that accommodates our unique style of gameplay, but must also provide us with a trove of historical material to weave into our fictional narrative. We relish the idea of our Assassins and Templars sitting at the fringes of actual history, and do everything we can to incorporate as much true history into our fictional narrative as possible. But we also have our own story to tell... so we try to be careful about HOW we use this history; we don't want actual historical events to dictate how our tale unfolds... this would simply be painting by numbers, so to speak. So our story comes first, and if we can find a way to naturally, plausibly weave actual events into it, all the better. Lucky for us, this is often easier than it sounds.
GD: Tapping writers for content for the Assassin's Creed Encyclopedia is a great Ubisoft and game community collaboration. Is this the beginning of a trend towards more community developed special edition content in the future?
L-PP: We take our community seriously (the community writers were paid as any other writers), especially after going through this experience. We were thoroughly impressed by the quality of their contributions. Some of the elements they wrote are now “canon” in the Assassin's Creed Universe.
It is not for us to guess if it's going to become a trend, but working with the community is certainly something we (Ubiworkshop) are going to keep doing in the future.
Check out the Assassin's Creed Revelations site for more information on the game. Be sure to visit the Ubiworkshop that has short movies, comics, art books and limited editions of artworks for sale by the Assassin's Creed community of creative and artistic contributors. If you want the Ezio look, they even have Desmond hoodies for sale.
Non temete l'oscurità - accettate il suo abbraccio. Requiescat in pace. –Ezio Auditore da Firenze
