She was great, but her game not so much.
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Kotaku: AC Syndicate will feature both male/female protags (brother & sister)
- Thread starter shinobi602
- Start date
She was great, but her game not so much.
Yes, we all agree that 'Victory' was a better sounding sub-title.
The change was needed because Ubi is obviously going for more subtext in their titles and Victory just doesn't cut it.
Assassin's Creed Rogue:
Assassin's Creed Unity:
Victory communicates nothing but perhaps the time period.
Curious coincidence -- I went to watch Avengers AOU and it showed the previews for Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, in which the premise is about the Syndicate, "a near-mythical organization of assassins and rogue operatives who kill to order."
Also glad to hear no multiplayer. Strip the excess fluff.
The change was needed because Ubi is obviously going for more subtext in their titles and Victory just doesn't cut it.
Assassin's Creed Rogue:
rogue assassin turned Templar
the alliance of excommunicated assassin and templar
Curious coincidence -- I went to watch Avengers AOU and it showed the previews for Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation, in which the premise is about the Syndicate, "a near-mythical organization of assassins and rogue operatives who kill to order."
Also glad to hear no multiplayer. Strip the excess fluff.
Target audience? I just spoke to a friend who loves AC just like me and he was not amused for this... he actually skipped Liberation because Aveline and I lend him Tomb Raider since he also loved Uncharted and didn't even opened the box because "I don't want to play as a woman" =/
There are people like him but I'm sure they can compensate those with a new audience =D
The multiplayer was never a "excess fluff", It was really really awesome and I was hoping that they would implement it again =/
NightShift
Member
Please be good, those characters actually look cool.
So the male is still the main character.
Ubisoft Assembly Line already derailing?
Isn't that the case though for the secondary teams?
I think they're using the wrong context for protag,
It's funny that this is the one AAA series that has the highest female fanbase.
Whether or not female enemies makes sense depends on who the enemies are in the game. In Far Cry 4 it made complete sense that none of the enemies were women because of the type of dictatorship you were fighting against. It isn't out of the realm of possibility that women weren't allowed in the army in that setting, but women being part of the freedom fighter movement made complete sense. Unity on the other hand falls into the category of a game that does not have women enemies but probably could have. Since the main Templar associated enemies were extremist Jacobin's there could have absolutely been women involved in that movement, but even there it isn't too surprising that women wouldn't be a part of the out in the street fighting force.
With Syndicate it sounds like the enemies are most likely going to be British military forces or Police forces, and if that is the case it wouldn't make sense at all for women to be among those forces in the early 19th century. Assassin's Creed is a historical series and women weren't part of most countries fighting forces until very recently. Now, if you want to slam something like Watch Dogs for not having women police, that is another thing entirely, but they are pretty safe with AC.
Their target audience is "idiot sexists"? That seems like a bad way to go.
Could be memories taken from two different subjects since the in-fiction person controlling the game isn't someone in an Animus anymore.
Why is pandering inherently a bad thing? Given that the games industry has a dearth of female protagonists, it shouldn't really matter if a character is female for the sake of being female.
Plenty of video game characters (perhaps a majority) are not male for any reason other than that being male is seen as the default.
Ascenion
Member
Actually imo AC used to be one of the most diverse, open-minded series from the beginning. And I stand by that up to Black Flag. 3 had some issues as from what I heard Connor was going to be full Native American but they backed down to half likely for marketing reasons or something like that, and even then he was portrayed really well and respectfully. I mean yeah after the annualized hellish downturn it became shittier but it was still pretty diverse in terms of cast and leads.
I mean I'd take issue with it if it seems like it is suspicious in terms of how it happened. If I'm playing a game and I say this would've worked better with a female lead then yeah I'll have an issue with it. For example a ton of the character interactions in Watch Dogs lead me to believe it would have worked better with a female lead, and I feel that was how it was originally intended. I can't back that up, but that's how it feels to me.
They technically justified the reasoning in Unity for no playable females. From a writing standpoint if I wrote the story with a male in mind, I'd have to change around too much for a female lead and vice versa. Then it isn't the game I wanted it to be, isn't the story I wanted to tell. Now if the female ends up being a palette swap for the male then all of this is moot, but then why even add her with out her being important? It feels very forced given everything surrounding Unity. I'm hoping it isn't though. I wish a Ubi writer would speak up about the creative process, about how leads are chosen and how much Ubisoft interferes. I'm very curious.
CoD has three dedicated 200-250 person teams per game.
They do get additional outsourcing and support studio assistance, but it's more about having less people spend more time to make the game.
With Ubisoft it's more about a much smaller team of people coming up with ideas and then building a gigantic amount of content in a short period of time with the same people you're using on all your products.
Ubisoft's process actually has so many people that they're notably larger than either EA or Activision staff wise despite making significantly less money and thus being a "smaller" publisher.
The Last Wizard
Member
Yea, aveline was great. I don't know if it was just me but she felt more nimble to play as in the ac 4 side story.
The Last Wizard
Member
What the fuck is up with people like this? I don't know why I'm even surprised, look at gaf during the San andreas reveal and GTA v with Franklin...
ab.aeterno
Member
1. Why is it "pandrring" if they decided to respond to consumer feedback? Do we refer to the reversals of policy on The Xbox One as pandering?
2. Dude you're talking about fucking Assassin's Creed, and you're wringing your hands over Ubisoft compromising their artistic integrity? Are you for real?
Riposte
Member
"Artistic" doesn't mean anything. There's no difference between artistic vision and vision, artistic expression and expression, artistic design and design, and so on. "Marketing", which is to say, considering how your audience will react (whom the artist is the first member of), is inseparable for all those so-called "artistic" choices. All the "artistic" label amounts to is an easy, empty way to elevate your uninteresting value judgments beyond their humble origins, at the expense of the "un-artistic" (i.e., what you don't like). What is there to wrestle with? It's "I like this!", "I don't like this!", in a pretty dress.
Warablo
Member
I hope Batman does this also.
Probably not going to happen, or they will have to wait and see how people respond to this female character, for them to even consider it.
The triple A business is fucking terrified of a women being on the boxart, since they think it means low sales. Look at bioshock infinite, or the fact ND had to fight to keep Ellie on the cover of TLOU.
A Link to the Past
Banned
But most games are heavily influenced by marketing to make the main character male, either directly (being told to change the character's gender) or indirectly (changing or choosing the character's gender based on the expectation that the game is being made for men).
But you're really putting the horse before the cart here, assuming that the story was not influenced by the market.
SolicitorPirate
Member
I am constantly amused by people who unironically cite "artistic vision" in an industry as cynical and market driven as AAA gaming.
privitsan02
Member
There are some cases where its difficult for some people to get used to or resist change. For example the folks who feel odd about a potential Black 007. It's a cognitive effect for some people. Liberation was a pretty mediocre AC game while Tomb Raider 2013 felt like a cheap Uncharted to me personally. It had nothing to do with the characters (although Lara's moaning became pretty difficult to stomach halfway through), rather the games weren't as good as to what they were being compared to.
I for one wish it was 50/50 and the game was actually based around the fact that you had two assassins rather than doing a Batman/Catwoman sort of thing. Having the choice is nice I suppose. It appears we are slowly approaching a "build your own" Assassin playground.
Also I'm assuming they stripped the multiplayer because the player count wasn't indicative as to what the resources needed was required. It's rather clear they don't want to try Co-op again and I don't think anyone I personally know ever touched the multiplayer of AC since Revelations. If this means a better and more polished product, I say good riddance.
Best wishes.
NotTheGuyYouKill
Member
Sorry about the other thread. I did a search, but it didn't pop up. Weird.
KefkaPalazzo
Member
Sounds like an interesting dynamic.
I can't say i'm overly excited just because I can play as a female protagonist, I will be excited though if she is a main character done well who happens to be female.
And mark me down as someone who isn't feeling the new subtitle.
I can't say i'm overly excited just because I can play as a female protagonist, I will be excited though if she is a main character done well who happens to be female.
And mark me down as someone who isn't feeling the new subtitle.
Its Quite Toasty
Banned
Skipped unity but if news continues to go well I may jump back in.
I don't like it either but its not just what they "think," they're not just winging it. Tons of market research goes into these decisions.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
What is happening? I am eagerly anticipating both this years Black Ops III and AC Syndicate. BRING IT!
ShockingAlberto
Member
I'm honestly more interested in Syndicate because of this.
But I'm also a terrible person that was going to buy this, anyway, despite hating Unity.
But I'm also a terrible person that was going to buy this, anyway, despite hating Unity.
Man Called Aerodynamics
Member
How can my little assassin be this cute?!
moffattron9000
Member
Was hoping that they'd bring back the competitive multiplayer. That was some great light stealth, and was a great twist on standard multiplayer at the time.
EekumBokum
Member
This is really cool, and I love her design too. And no multiplayer really makes me hope the singleplayer gets a ton of attention, we don't want another unity please
half a moon
Banned
Nice.
I've played some of 1, all of 2, maybe 3, and Freedom Cry made me rage.
Hopefully the cut the bloat.
I've played some of 1, all of 2, maybe 3, and Freedom Cry made me rage.
Hopefully the cut the bloat.
Did anyone else read "Jacob is still the main character" as "We only added her a few months ago after AC:U backlash"? Given their history, I expect her to feel tacked-on, and I wonder how much of the game will simply pretend she's not there because she wasn't part of the original design document.
vxXJordanXxv
Banned
Well to be fair some people actually like to play themselves. I think the problem is when they are basically unwilling to share. I mean me for example I'm white straight male and that is almost always my character but.... I'm not against more diversity in video games. Thinking about it I may have skipped a game because I didn't want to play as a woman. It doesn't mean I boycotted it or was like "ewwww girls anyone who plays that is a pussy. Although 2 of my favorite games are Metroid and mischief makers so I guess the portrayal of the character is important in attracting all audiences as well. Also should add I swear I see females on the covers of games all the time in the store. Japanese games count too right?
I know.
A lot of AAA published games that started a female character were considered failures or under performed.
They can't win can they?
Shouldn't this be a good thing? People complained about unity, it was probably too late to respond to the criticism in that game, so they decided to adress it in this one, and now people are shitting on them because they are tacking it on?
Really?
Everyone acts like they know exactly how the development of these games happen, but they don't. I don't either.
All I know is this is a new dev team leading the development of this game. Who knows how long they were planing this.
AyaisMUsikWhore
Member
She already looks dope. I'm hype to see what she can do.
uncredited male
Member
Multiplayer died so that female animations could live.
Shyakugaun
Banned
Still waiting for a Black Lead Character , in Ancient Egypt, or a Sexy Asian chick in Japan sigh
Cool character design.
Still, Unity was the last straw for me.
It had some really great design ideas, but the fundamental flaws this franchise has, render them completely useless.
One of the most frustrating gaming experiences i've had in a long time.
Even though it wasn't as shitty as AC3, the frustration was greater, because you could see the potential underneath.
Bah.
I'm not buying another Assassin's Creed (unless it's dirt cheap, like <10) until they fix the fundamental gameplay elements, like controls, combat, stealth and such.
Still, Unity was the last straw for me.
It had some really great design ideas, but the fundamental flaws this franchise has, render them completely useless.
One of the most frustrating gaming experiences i've had in a long time.
Even though it wasn't as shitty as AC3, the frustration was greater, because you could see the potential underneath.
Bah.
I'm not buying another Assassin's Creed (unless it's dirt cheap, like <10) until they fix the fundamental gameplay elements, like controls, combat, stealth and such.
And I am constantly amazed by how many arrogant cynics keep acting like developers put no effort or passion into their work simply because their game is a product of the AAA industry.