The Ubisoft Mixing Pot

Here’s an interesting fact for you: there’s a team based out of Ubisoft’s French headquarters that manages and oversees all of the publisher’s titles. Rather than directly develop individual games, the Ubisoft editorial team provides creative feedback, consistency checks and generally bridges the gap between the huge number of in-house development studios. Don’t be surprised if you’ve never heard of them before, I certainly hadn’t until I read an excellent article in Edge #266 focused entirely on the team and their role in the company. On the whole, they appear to be doing a great job ensuring a level of consistency across Ubisoft’s games. Yet for all the good they’re doing I can’t help but consider that perhaps this ‘unification’ edges towards a certain degree of homogenisation. There’s a risk here of Ubisoft’s games all becoming a bit too similar.

The thought was triggered while playing Watch Dogs, a game which I’m thoroughly enjoying by the way. It was impossible to ignore, however, that there are a lot of features in-game that can be traced to previous Ubisoft titles. The online invasions are essentially one vs one versions of Assassin’s Creed’s wanted online game mode. With players attempting to hide from their target amongst a world of NPCs. Then there’s the map-revealing towers to climb, reminiscent of the map-revealing towers that need to be climbed in Far Cry 3. The gunplay actually feels a lot like that found in in the more recent Splinter Cell titles and there’s also the whole open-world package which reaches across the entire Ubisoft catalogue. A genre that Ubisoft editorial team head, the legendary Serge Hascoet, noted as a key focus for their editorial guidelines.

These comparisons can be drawn across a large slice of Ubi’s library. While shining examples of creative originality, such as Child of Light or the Rayman series, do exist, one can’t help but notice that there’s a pattern beginning to emerge. To be fair, this issue doesn’t only exist within the Ubisoft line-up. Asset sharing and discussion is a natural part of a publisher's facilitation role and can be seen from essentially all of the big names like EA and Activision. Heck, we’ve even seen literal asset copying from Activision after an animation sequence was taken from CoD: Modern Warfare 2 and placed directly into Ghosts. In fact, the Call of Duty series has practically forced us to accustomise to homogenisation, although the wheels are certainly beginning to fall off of that train.

Asset sharing has always been an important element in the operation of large-scale publishers, particularly for titles that are developed across various teams. Yet this process does appear to have taken a turn for the worse with Ubisoft. Familiar and previously successful design is at risk of trumping creative freedom and originality. I don’t think this is the case just yet, especially considering Ubisoft are arguably one the most popular publishers around specifically because of their developer’s creative chops. The worry comes from looking into the future; will more games feature the same homogenisation found in Watch Dogs? Truth is, the similarities cover more than just individual mechanics, but rather the whole feel of the game. For someone who had never heard of Watch Dogs before, they’d probably guess that it’s published by Ubisoft simply because it looks and feels so similar to other Ubi projects, especially Assassin’s Creed.

What has prevented this becoming a killer issue so far is the capability of the various Ubisoft teams to differentiate their title from the others and provide unique elements that set them apart. The sailing (and, yes, the sea shanties) of Assassin’s Creed IV, the trippy story of Far Cry 3, the hacker world of Watch Dogs. These are all core underlying features of these games that prevent them from feeling too similar to one another. The real question however, is how long can Ubisoft and their developers maintain this feeling of uniqueness? Is there a risk of consumers beginning to question the originality of Ubisoft’s AAA games, as they do with Call of Duty, FIFA and the like? In many ways, this feeling has already begun to creep into the consciousness of the consumer market, as various forum and comment threads will attest.

Of course, Call of Duty, FIFA and the like still make bucketloads of cash, and so do Ubisoft’s AAA titles. In terms of financials, the homogeneity is paying off as players find it easier to sink into games that are ‘sort of a bit like Assassin’s Creed’. So perhaps they’ll stick with their plan and their editorial team will continue to control the overarching direction of their first-party AAA games. If they do, we could be in for a bit of a shock as the experiences become increasingly similar and increasingly uninspired. I don’t think that will last very long as a sales technique, so it’s ultimately down to Ubisoft to ensure that their big name games remain independent. It’s worth noting that this issue only really exists within Ubi’s AAA lineup. The smaller games are generally their more unique options, give or take the occasional South Park: The Stick of Truth.

The irony of all this is that I’m a big, big fan of Ubisoft’s headline games. Assassin’s Creed IV was incredible, so was Far Cry 3 and the Tom Clancy action games, while all rather similar, are some of the best co-op games out there. I’m very worried about the future though, as the primary Ubisoft lineup for 2014-2015 is looking rather familiar. Far Cry 4, two big Assassin’s Creed games, two Tom Clancy games and a driving game that looks anything but original. It is cause for concern as these sequels and spin-offs will only further the homogenised mechanics and overall presentation. There’s little doubt that all of these games will make the publisher plenty of money, but could a French company historically intertwined with creativity be slowly losing their creative spark? They haven’t just yet, but if things continue this way we could be seeing Watch Dogs 7 launching alongside the PS5.