Jade Raymond's Ubisoft Toronto Studio Looking For "Meaning"
See Full ImageThe future of the industry is a hot topic of conversation, especially when it comes to maturing, progressing, and different ways of telling a story.
Ubisoft Toronto boss (and new mom) Jade Raymond feels that it's long past time for this industry to "grow up," and we can do it without simulating a brainless blockbuster in order to sell millions of copies. During a recent CVG interview, the former Assassin's Creed director spoke about how her studio plans to look into "meaning":
"I really do feel it's time for our medium to grow up. I think we don't need to make the equivalent to a Michael Bay flick in order to sell five million copies. I think things can be exciting, have meaning and hit important topics, and I'm not the only one that thinks that. There are major franchises trying to have more meaning and be something more interesting. We obviously tried a bit - and I hope it was obvious - to make a story with more meaning and mature themes in Assassin's Creed.
It's definitely something that we're pushing for at Ubisoft Toronto. I think every other entertainment medium or art form does manage to have commercial success and have the viewers or audience think or be inspired. Games, I think, have even more potential than that given that on top of the narrative side we do have all of the gameplay mechanics and we create rule sets from scratch which can have any kind of meaning embedded in them. It's not easy to do that, because it requires breaking our recipe and trying to find new recipes, but I think it's an important thing for us to strive for."
For a while now, we've been discussing the direction games should take; we've often referred to the likes of Heavy Rain as an example of storytelling progression. But there's a whole lot farther we can go, and it's all about exploring new ideas and how to implement those ideas. What we need are more people like Raymond who really do believe gaming needs to "grow up." Only then will it receive more respect.
...how long have I been saying that?
Tags: ubisoft, ubisoft toronto, jade raymond, gaming, video games
4/16/2012 9:00:34 PM Ben Dutka
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Comments (16 posts)
WorldEndsWithMe
Monday, April 16, 2012 @ 11:03:14 PM
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Heavy Rain was a big one, and I have the feeling The Last of Us will be another step so the bar will be set high. And it's sort of hard to make your mark on meaning with an annual release. If they make the next grown up game, it won't be as effective coming out every year.
3 up, 4 down
Lotusflow3r
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 12:10:30 AM
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We need mindless fun games too. No, not CoD's, i'm talking your Just Cause, Duke Nukem, Borderlands, Worms, Mario, Sonic etc. I know she isn't saying "end them!", but too much maturity, realism or seriousness is unhealthy.
What we need more of is a level up from what she's talking about, and that's your Journey, Flower, Ico, Demons Souls, Lbp, Deus Ex, early Silent Hill's, etc. It's incredibly rare to come by a game like the above this generation.
4 up, 1 down
Palpatations911
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 12:37:41 AM
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8 up, 4 down
homura
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 3:11:31 AM
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0 up, 0 down
Lawless SXE
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 3:16:24 AM
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The end of her quote pertains to creating new recipes. That's all good and well, and they proved it possible with AC, among a number of fantastic titles this gen, but word on the street is that Ubi Toronto is working on Splinter Cell: Retribution. Unless they're changing up the series even more than Conviction, I just don't really see this as being something new. It'll be mature, sure, and it could well have a meaning or message within it, but I somehow doubt that it will be very different to what's come before.
Not that that is necessarily a bad thing.
0 up, 0 down
WorldEndsWithMe
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 12:31:41 PM
1 up, 1 down
___________
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 5:52:49 AM
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A F*CKING MEN SISTER!!!!!!!!!!
exactly my problem with allot of games these days, too much like typical hollywood!
which is exactly why i enjoyed uncharted 3 allot more then uncharted 2.
ones a game, the other is a michael bay film!
this is what ive been saying for years, the industry needs to break of from trying to copy hollywood!
we dont need flashy graphics and big explosions to make a big selling game, we need a deep complex storyline concerning some big real world issues, characters people care about in a realistic setting.
AC was a brilliant step towards that, but we can go oh so much further!
we need more games that take a serious approach to the industry and try tell a story, try and be about something.
not just hey look at this pretty fireball, cough uncharted 2.......
1 up, 1 down
homura
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 6:30:53 AM
2 up, 2 down
___________
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 10:38:57 AM
you can swim.
in fact its one of the easiest ways to loose the guards!
0 up, 1 down
homura
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 11:14:45 AM
1 up, 1 down
Teddie9
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 2:54:09 PM
1 up, 0 down
kokoro
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 7:59:08 AM
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0 up, 0 down
wackazoa
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 12:21:34 PM
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By the way... Jade Raymond is an very attractive female at that. So now we can stop writing about woman like Jo Garcia just because she's very pretty. ( At least it seems that she's only covered becauses she's pretty.)
Last edited by wackazoa on 4/17/2012 12:22:18 PM
4 up, 0 down
karneli lll
Tuesday, April 17, 2012 @ 2:26:02 PM
2 up, 0 down
karneli lll
Reply
Monday, April 16, 2012 @ 9:41:51 PM