Interview: Ubisoft on reinventing Assassin’s Creed, punching bears
Yesterday we learned more about the main character and world of our Assassin’s Creed III in part one of our interview with creative director Alex Hutchinson, senior producer Francois Pelland, and associate producer Jean-Francois Boivin. Story and lore are great, but now we’re ready for the really good stuff in part 2: Weapons, mechanics, and the possibility of choking out a bear.
Interview: Ubisoft on Reinventing Assassin’s Creed, High-Fiving George Washington
With the release of last year’s Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, it seemed like Ubisoft’s annual release policy was finally catching up to its favorite fleet-footed franchise. It was hard not to see Ezio’s wispy gray hair and tired, age-darkened eyes as indicators of the state of the entire Assassin’s Creed franchise. Feature bloat had taken its toll on a series that once thrived on elegant simplicity. Desmond’s first-person sections, random tower-defense-esque minigames, and bombs, bombs, and more bombs portrayed a series fumbling around in the darkness, vainly attempting to re-bottle the magic that had once made it so special.
Enter Assassin’s Creed III.
Opinion: The sad state of beta testing
In the beginning, there was the demo. And it was good. It let players take a try-before-you-buy approach to their major purchases, reassuring them that they hadn’t dropped $60 on a steaming heap of digital detritus. The demo, though, was also a pain-in-the-ass to dedicate much-needed development resources to – especially before a full release. As such, it was slowly, quietly assassinated. Its spirit, however, lives on in the not-so-subtle art of the open/closed/slightly ajar beta. And that’s a problem.
Interview—Hard Reset dev on Call of Duty, cyberpunk, Deus Ex, PC exclusivity
In July, we blew the lid off Flying Wild Hog’s cyberpunk-soaked love letter to shooters of yore, Hard Reset. But—after picking the lid shrapnel out of our charred flesh—we realized something: this isn’t a typical game release. Big-budget PC exclusive? No multiplayer? Nothing about crying behind cover 70 percent of the time? We asked, and Flying Wild Hog founder Klaudiusz Zych answered. Read on for Zych’s thoughts about Call of Duty, Deus Ex, phoned-in multiplayer, PC leaving consoles in the dust, and plenty more.
Blizzard defends Diablo III’s auction house, always-online requirement
Diablo’s finally back, but has it sold its soul to a bonafide gaming devil? Not exactly. After the big unveiling of Diablo’s new real money auction house, we sat down with online technologies VP Robert Bridenbecker to hear Blizzard’s side of the story.
Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale review
This quest kicks off with your intrepid hero fleeing from what would, in any other Diablo-style hack ’n’ slasher, be an opportunity for an epic boss battle. Instead, your character very nearly wets his chainmail undergarments and teleports into an opening area chock-full of same-y foes and snooze-worthy fetch quests. It’s an incredibly apt analogy: whenever excitement and intrigue come calling, Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale tucks its tail and runs in the opposite direction.
