Discover the secrets within the shadows of Assassin’s Creed II, as its Producer Sebastien Puel and Art Director Mohamed Gambouz discuss the game.
What is Assassin's Creed II about?
Sebastien Puel: Once again, Desmond will be exploring his DNA to relive an ancestor's life, however this time it is with a very different goal and it's a very different kind of ancestor. Ezio Auditore Da Firenze; a nobleman who lived at the end of the 15th century in Italy, is our new hero. His family is betrayed and murdered by the ruling families of Italy, and Ezio must uncover the arts of his ancestors in order to avenge their death.
To his allies, he will become a force for change - fighting for freedom and justice. To his enemies, he will become a bogeyman - dedicated to the destruction of the tyrants of Italy. Through Ezio's quest for vengeance, Desmond and the present-day Assassins will uncover the crucial piece of the conspiracy that was hinted at in the first Assassin's Creed game. The Templar/Abstergo plot is bigger than could have been imagined with consequences reaching to every detail of modern life as we know it.
What have you changed in Assassin's Creed II compared to its predecessor?
SP: What we do in Assassin's Creed II is quite simple: take the best of Assassin's Creed and bring it to the next level! Assassin's Creed was an astonishing experience; I believe it brought entirely new elements to the industry, allowing players to fluidly navigate an urban environment while enjoying breathtaking views and full freedom of control. And beyond gameplay innovations in the area of free-running and crowds, the team also pushed for innovation in storytelling.
Assassin's Creed was the first game to immerse players in a believable and mature experience inspired by historical events. Of course we will improve on all those elements with even more gorgeous city landscapes, more animations, a new and even more exciting historical setting, more ways to interact with the crowd... but our main focus is to bring diversity and depth to the gameplay: more variety in missions and objectives, more weapons, more diverse assassinations and a deep character progression. These will make the experience evolve throughout the game. We really want Assassin's Creed II to be unpredictable and have the player wonder after each main assassination: "what's next!?"
Can you go into detail about some of the new mission types?
SP: The game structure and the mission system were the most crucial elements we wanted to improve. We are redefining the overall mission structure to give gamers a more fun, rewarding and unpredictable experience throughout by adding a lot of variety in missions types and changing the way the story and the missions unfold.
There are no more patterns of missions to perform but rather a story that develops through a great amount of characters [offering] missions. Some characters will give you an assassination mission, others an escort/protect mission while some will give you a chase mission and so on. There is no limit to the types of challenges we give players.
We invested most of our development time in ensuring that there is a huge amount of variety and depth in the missions required to finish the story. But we also want the player to have a real freedom and opportunity to explore and use the world we have created at their own pace. Cities are now filled with a ton of missions for the player to choose from. For instance, you can now decide to get rid of witnesses if you feel you are becoming too notorious after a not so stealthy assassination, or help thieves pursued by guards. These tasks are optional but will bring you interesting rewards if you accept them.
Where did the inspiration for Ezio come from?
Mohamed Gambouz: Our main inspiration was, of course, Altair. From there, we got a lot of inspiration from paintings and sculptures from the period as well as movies which are set during the Renaissance like The Merchant of Venice, Elizabeth: The Golden Age, or TV series like The Tudors - the last two are set in England so we adapted them to fit the Renaissance.
Since we are essentially keeping the main visual characteristics of Altair, the best way to change from the medieval look to the Renaissance look is to put more refinement and richness to the cloth and ornaments of our main characters. We also added more elegance to his silhouette, which suggests a bird of prey, and we've taken the hidden blade and given it a more refined look. Since Ezio is from a noble family, these changes in his design work very well.
What were the most challenging parts of creating Assassin's Creed II?
SP: At the conception of Assassin's Creed II, we had the technology created thanks to all the efforts we put into the first Assassin's Creed and could now concentrate much more on the game design for the sequel. We could have fun with the engine we created and therefore really push the game design, give tons of main and side missions, a deep storyline, a more profound combat system and so much more.
What I'm particularly proud of is the new game architecture allowing much more diverse gameplay and missions in our engine. What was quite challenging to develop and that we are very proud of is the new enhanced non-player character navigation showcasing parkour-like acrobatics that spice up the chases and escape missions. We also have the new archetype of guard that is agile and can free-run, climb buildings and choose his own random path every time a new chase begins.
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