Ubisoft Interview: WATCH_DOGS

[PUBLISHED TO FNP.COM ON / ABOUT 07/02/13]

>>FIRST INTRODUCTION TO NEXT-GEN

“Give me four seconds and a clear signal. I’ll get in and you’ll never know.”

Near the end of the Ubisoft E3 2012 press conference, there was a moment when the crowd went silent. It wasn’t because they were told to do so, it was because of the video that, introduced by Jonathan Morin, was in front of them.

From the moment the pre-rendered video starting playing, no one knew what to think. Was this the introduction of a new game? Yes.

Was this a next generation title? At that time no one knew (outside of Ubisoft, Sony and Microsoft) because it would be almost a year later when PlayStation 4 and Xbox One would be unveiled to the masses.

But what was known, after a few seconds of watching the shady character walk down the street with his brown leather trench coat and hat masking his body and his intentions, was that the transition from pre-rendered video to actual gameplay was seamless and utterly staggering.

‘This has to be a next generation video game’, I remember thinking. But what is it? Can the man actually tap into any digital device anywhere around him in order to get past the obstacles before him? ‘This is unreal’, I thought.

As I and many others watched as the demo continue the little voice inside all of our heads screamed “next generation”. The gameplay, the highly-detailed environments, not to mention, the realistic voice acting and motion capture – it all pointed to the introduction of the game that we soon learned was entitled WATCH_DOGS.

>>EVERYONE INVOLVED…SHOULD MATTER

“I see the digital shadow you cast…I’m going to…expose you to the world.”

Hacking is the act of seeking out and exploiting weaknesses in a computer network for reasons known only to the Hacker. It could be for profit, for (a sick version of) fun or even to help to identify weaknesses in a network to enable those that maintain the network to improve its infrastructure.

In the case of Weave to the Write and Ubisoft, hacking is not what I had to do to acquire the information you are about to read. But at times it felt like it, respectively.

What follows is the interview that I conducted, through the cooperation of the select staff at Ubisoft and those names that follow, with three key members of the WATCH_DOGS team: Jonathan Morin - Creative Director, Dominic Guay - Senior Producer and Frédéric Blais - Technical Lead.

This is the Weave to the Write interview of Ubisoft’s WATCH_DOGS!

[W2W] What is WATCH_DOGS?

[JM] WATCH_DOGS is a contemporary action-adventure game that explores the impact of technology on our society. The game is set in Chicago, where everyone and everything is connected. You will embark on a personal mission, using the city as your main weapon to inflict your own brand of justice.

[W2W] What would be a short introduction to the game story and its main character?

[JM] You are Aiden Pearce, a man shaped by violence and obsessed with surveillance, who monitors his family 24/7 in secret to protect them from something that happened in the past. Unfortunately, his family will get endangered once again. Pushed to his limits, he will take justice into his own hands and confront a corrupt system using every weapon available to him. Aiden will become a modern Vigilante Hero – not a hero from the 70’s with a cape, but a real human being that will deal with all the repercussions of his actions.

[W2W] Why call the game WATCH_DOGS?

[JM] The name refers directly to protection, surveillance and monitoring. It hints at our main character’s overprotective nature, as well as, the cosmogony of our hyper connected world. The ‘S’ at the end is also crucial since everyone is watching or being watched. It even explains key online elements of our experience but these will not be revealed just yet.

[W2W] What makes WATCH_DOGS different from other games in the genre?

[JM] WATCH_DOGS will redefine how you interact with an open world. For the very first time, the city will become your weapon and to support that, our simulation of Chicago will offer unprecedented dynamism. This will have real impact on your experience.

First, you will have real-time control over the city’s infrastructure: traffic lights, drawbridges, communications, L-Train and more. Using these will create ripples throughout the city that will impact the people around you and how you reach your goal. The media will talk about your actions affecting your relationship with the game world. It will bring city simulation to an all new level.

Secondly, you will have access to every mobile device, laptop and computer. Invading everyone’s privacy will organically lead you to all sorts of stories and gameplay experiences. Players are used to following the icons in open world games because they define where the action takes place. In our game, the action will shape itself as you discover it. This system gives us brand new ways to deliver content to the player. It feels far more real and offers way more possibilities. In the end, the world will be full of surprises which will bring improvisational play to the next level.

For example in our open world demo, if Aiden had chosen to focus on another person, the gameplay experience would have been completely different. Aiden Pearce is a man who lives by his wits. So the player will have to use his wits too, not only to choose the best approach to a challenge, but also to improvise when he faces the unexpected. I think what sets us apart is the level of control the player will have on his surroundings and how it will help him face an unprecedented amount of emergent gameplay situations.

>>WHAT MATTERS IS REALISM

"Some medical devices, like defibrillators or pacemakers, can be connected to networks that are vulnerable to hackers."

[W2W] How important is realism in the game?

[JM] Realism is core to our game experience. Many games have car accidents, gunplay and explosions, but most of time I feel that the essential part is missing. For me, every real life incident comes with real human drama. So in WATCH_DOGS, you will feel the gravity of each situation you play. This goes beyond realistic graphics, weather and mood. It means everyone involved in any event should matter. Everything you do as a player will have consequences on people’s lives. The media will talk about your approach to these events and it will have gameplay consequences. So when you play the game, you will have to consider people around you before you make a choice.

In the end, it all depends on how you see things and why you play games. You won’t be judged, but your actions will not be ignored. So for all of this to be right, we are working really hard to make sure our game feels real in its graphics, mood, AI, sound, animation, simulation and story. What matters to us is to deliver the serious tone we are aiming for because we believe it is part of what makes our game relevant.

[W2W] Will Aiden be driven only by personal purposes or will he be fighting for a greater cause?

[JM] Aiden Pearce has his own reasons to be over-protective towards his family. But when he will push his obsession to monitor an entire city, he might confuse his own drama with those of everyone around him. This is the narrative canvas the player will explore all through the gameplay experience.

[W2W] What do you mean by there will be real consequences to your actions?

[JM] In WATCH_DOGS, every open world moment needs to be treated seriously. Every action the player takes will have a direct consequence. When you cause chaos, people will be endangered. The media will talk about it. They will influence how the population perceives your actions and it will alter your relationship with the world.

In the game, there will be a Reputation System that will focus on the player’s attitude towards collateral damages:

Is he causing a lot of havoc that injures or kills citizens?

Is he acting heroically or like a criminal?

Each action will have Positive and Negative effects. The player will choose how he / she wants to play and the game will not judge the player. Our system will simply recognize the shades of greys our society is made of and reflect it back on the player. We are not building one of those yin and yang systems that always end up feeling gamey and out of place. Our Reputation System will focus more on how people in our society tend to forge their opinion and this is yet another fascinating subject in relation with our main theme: “the influence of technology within our society.”

[W2W] Will Aiden be able to climb buildings?

[JM] Yes. Aiden will be able to climb buildings and navigate through the city of Chicago. He will also be able to use this skill on dynamic objects such as cars, which offers great opportunities during foot chases and combat.

[W2W] In the open world demo, we see Aiden chase his target through the interior of a pharmacy. In the game, will players be able to access buildings?

[DG] In the game, players will have many opportunities to access interiors. Actually, the way we are building the city, we consider its various dimensions: the street level, interiors, but also how Aiden can explore remote areas, back alleys, even the building’s rooftops. Also, Chicago has a large under city that we are leveraging. Finally, remember: players can explore the physical side of the city of Chicago, but also all of its digital layers, invading the privacy of its citizens. As such, Aiden can get into interiors physically, but also by tapping into his ability to access and control any computer in the city.

[W2W] We’ve seen Aiden grab the phone off a man in the street and throw it on the ground. Why does he do that?

[DG] While Aiden crosses the café, a newsflash airs and talks directly about him. One of the clients recognizes him and walks out to call 911. The player has many tools to prevent this call from happening. Grabbing the phone and intimidating the caller is the most direct one.

>>ONLINE, OFFLINE...HACKING.

"Street lights, security systems, and power grids can all be accessed and manipulated remotely."

[W2W] This “seamless multiplayer” brings an interesting freshness to the usual multiplayer modes. How does this work exactly?

[JM] When your console is connected online you are automatically in a “session”. There could be millions of these occurring at once. What we are able to do is to dynamically merge and unmerge those sessions seamlessly.

Players can free roam normally, going about their game and at some point they can either accept a contract or provoke a monitoring scan so that the next thing they know their objective seamlessly involves another player. Once the situation is resolved, we are then able to unmerge both players, and they’re able to go about their game to pursue their objectives as they were.

The beauty behind this is that we can control the pacing at which this occurs and we can give you tools to also control its flow. It is such a natural online extension of what WATCH_DOGS is all about in the end. If we say that everything is connected, we have to consider that everyone is connected too.

[W2W] What is the point in invading and hacking other players? What do you win? What do you lose?

[JM] In WATCH_DOGS, there is what we call “notoriety”. Part of it works like any notoriety you could think of in an online game, but there is a special aspect to it that is quite unique to WATCH_DOGS.

Part of it works more like a virus. When you hack another player, you are installing a worm in his system and then you leverage part of his strength for yourself and he knows about it. So from that point, if this person grows in power, you do as well.

Think about it for a second: if you work hard for your notoriety and you know that out there one guy is more powerful than you because he leverages some of what you worked so hard to get, how hard will you want to retaliate to break that link? In a way, when you hack a player, you don’t remove anything from him aside from his pride. He doesn’t lose anything, but he knows you are more powerful because of his effort. So in a way, your hacking network the virus structure creates is similar to the notoriety you are used to on social networks, which again is a nice and elegant way to remember what WATCH_DOGS is all about: hyper connectivity.

[W2W] Is it still possible to play WATCH_DOGS alone, without being invaded by other online players? Do you need an online connection to play WATCH_DOGS alone?

[DG] WATCH_DOGS does not require you to be online to play; it can absolutely be played offline. But if you are online, we wanted to give you strong benefits: (a) Online allows great multiplayer and we have that in WATCH_DOGS, taking advantage of our entire open world and (b) online can also create new types of gameplay experiences in single player.

When you play an action-adventure game, you typically want to embark on a quest, to go through a journey with a hero. We think we can do this while having you cross paths with other players. This is what we showed you during E3 2013 with our seamless multiplayer; an open door to innovate and offer unique gameplay moments. Also, we wanted to connect players through their mobile devices and play directly with other players who are on their consoles. Not only sharing a couch, but literally being able to connect remotely with friends who are on their consoles. Playing online sounds eventually more exciting, isn’t it?

>>ctOS MOBILE: PLAY ANYWHERE, ANYTIME

"By 2025, there will be one trillion connected devices worldwide."

[W2W] How does WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile work?

[FB] “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” is above all a new game experience in the universe of WATCH_DOGS. This app allows connecting players using mobile devices and consoles to play live together and share a mutual game experience, whether they share the same couch or they are a thousand miles away from each other.

[W2W] What are the different game modes available in WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile?

[FB] Two modes are available in “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile”: Coop and Versus.

Coop mode places a console player (1P) and a “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” player (2P) together against the police. 2P’s goal is to facilitate 1P’s work so he or she can evade from the police more easily.

Versus mode places a console player (1P) against a “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” player (2P) where 2P can control the police forces (ex: the helicopter) and some infrastructures of the city (ex: bridges, traffic lights, etc). 2P’s goal is to stop 1P to reach his or her objectives within the time limits.

[W2W] What platforms will WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile be available on?

[FB] “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” will be available on Android and iOS; both for phones and tablets.

[W2W] Do players need to buy the console game to play WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile?

[FB] No. “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” players don’t need to own the console game or even a console to play. But they sure need a friend playing on a console to have a partner.

[W2W] Will there be a cost for WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile? Will there be monetization?

[FB] “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” is a free app, with its own progression skills; the more you play on “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile”, the better you will get and the better the experience will become. And yes, it will support monetization, but it will really be upon players’ choice! You can do everything and play as much as you want without paying if you chose too.

[W2W] What can you tell us about the development of this app (team working on it, for how long, major breakthroughs, etc)?

[FB] The “WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” team is based in two locations, Montreal and Quebec, and has been working on this project for over a year and half.

“WATCH_DOGS - CTOS Mobile” features major breakthroughs: (a) Linking in real time a console game with a mobile device, and vice versa, (b) the possibility to play anywhere and anytime (over WiFi or 3G network) and (c) offering news ways to interact with a console player and share a mutual game experience as never seen before.

>>END TRANSMISSION...FOR NOW