- Shadows of Assassin’s Creed will allow more freedom for players
- The game’s associate director, Simon Lemay-Comtois, says exploration is “a much freer form”
- The development team wanted to find “the right balance between discovery and wonder”.
Ubisoft Quebec has reworked exploration in Shadows of Assassin’s Creed to allow more freedom to players in its open world.
This is what Simon Lemay-Comtois, associate game director for Shadows of Assassin’s Creedwho told TechRadar Gaming during a special preview event that the team has opted for a more guided experience for the upcoming game compared to previous entries in the series.
“It used to be ‘the exact point we want players to go,’ and that’s changed across the industry,” Lemay-Comtois said. “For us, we have already started with Odyssey some time ago we had a default mode, which is [the] classic “go here” and then we had, I think we called it exploration mode if I remember correctly, and it was less guided.
“Now for ShadowsThis is where we start from. The default mode is much freer and you have to replenish it. »
Lemay-Comtois also noted that if players want, they can re-enable the default mode if they want, which will provide a more direct experience that helps you know where you need to go.
“It’s best to use the information you find and the goals you gather,” he added. “Is it some form of reward? I think that’s what the industry has shown us over the last five or six years is that finding things on your own is rewarding, so why not just put this in the foreground?
The game director also explained how the team tried to ensure that Shadows‘the Japan setting is a less overwhelming place to explore, compared to games such as Valhalla And Odyssey.
“It’s always tricky, because we know that we want to represent a much more precise landscape scale for Japan than before, for example for OdysseyGreece was very compacted compared to [the] real world,” he said.
“With Japan we don’t do that, but we try to get closer to a one-to-one scale, especially for castles and that sort of thing. So we start with ‘How big should the map be?’ . to adapt to the different important places where the story will take place? and “How much space do we need between these things?” And then when we have that, “How much content do we need to make it feel good between these things, for you to be pulled aside and find things?” »
The development team did various playtests to achieve this, Lemay-Comtois said, to “make sure we’re finding what feels like the right balance between discovery and wonder,” as well as other things in the world that players might notice. in the distance they can find for themselves.
“[The] “The landscape of Japan is flat terrain with very sharp, steep mountains that are not very tall, but completely block the line of sight from a distance,” Lemay-Comtois added. “So it’s a little difficult to… you have to be able to climb one mountain to see what’s on the top of the other mountain.
“It’s been a fun challenge to take on, but there’s no formula. You do it, you repeat, you try again, you try again until enough people say it feels good, and I ‘Hope you can do it.’
Shadows of Assassin’s Creed will launch on March 20 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S and PC.
