French news outlet Le Monde recently talked to Ubisoft creative director Serge Hascoët, and he had some interesting things to say regarding narratives in games. After he was asked to speak about Ubisoft’s current philosophy towards games, Hascoët said that creating believable worlds was key. “What interests me is to make the worlds that would be interesting for me, even as a tourist,” revealed the director. He stated that the locations should be fun to explore and that everyone should be able to enjoy seeing the sights, using his own mother as an example.
He went on to state that players can essentially create their own stories while exploring the world, and that in the future Ubisoft could focus less on traditional storytelling. That won’t mean a complete stop, though. “We [will] still have games like that,” explained Serge. He mentioned that internally Ubisoft calls this storytelling an “anecdote factory,” and that they want players to identify a long-term goal and then achieve them using the in-game systems.
This current philosophy can be found in Ubisoft’s most recent release, Watch Dogs 2. As I mentioned in my review of the open-world title, the star of the game is not the characters or the story, but San Francisco itself. Exploring the city was more fun than any of the missions that the company could come up with, and I found myself entertaining myself while playing.
Let us know in the comments if you’re excited about this new direction for Ubisoft storytelling!
(Source: Le Monde via Geek Snack)
