I en intressant intervju med Lionel Raynaud, executive VP of creative hos Ubisoft, berättar han mer om hur företaget tänker sig framtide och hur de ska närma sig "games as a service"-konceptet. Det mest iögonfallande är Raynauds tankar om hur detta kan komma att påverka serier som Assassin's Creed och Watch Dogs, i synnerhet när nästa generation tar vid med ny teknologi:.
"We would be able to - in the same world - have several historical periods, for instance, in Assassin's Creed, and use the Animus to travel from one to the other. Or have different areas of the world linked by travel systems, so that a Far Cry game or a Watch Dogs game could happen in different countries in the same experience, seamlessly."
I takt med att allt fler spel fortsätter byggas ut efter att de släppts med både gratis innehåll och DLC som kostar samt event och säsonger, verkar det såklart logiskt att utvecklare och utgivare vill maximera intäkterna från extremt dyr spelutveckling:
"Creatively, how does Ubisoft decide how long to keep creating new content for a live game after launch, as opposed to moving on to a sequel? Where does that line get drawn?
This line gets fuzzier every year. We have bigger post-launch periods, longer lives for each of our games. Even the ones that used to be solo-oriented games, like action adventures, they now have a very strong post-launch, and people are staying in our worlds for a long time. So this line is absolutely fuzzier and fuzzier.
We all see a future where a game will stay [post-launch], and new experiences will come in the games. But we will have technology that will break the [current] limits of memory, for instance, because of new technologies that are arriving."
Raynaud förklarade även att tankegångarna att fortsätta spelen efter att de tagit slut är en motreaktion på gamla tider där spelarna ofta lade ner spel de gillade efter att ha klarat huvuduppdraget. Det här vill Ubisoft komma bort från och Raynaud fortsätter
"If you get rid of a dictator or an oppressor, something else is going to happen in the world, and you will have a new goal.
This is why I talk about having several fantasies; not only being the hero who's going to free a region, but maybe also the fantasy of having an economic impact, of being the best at business in this freed country, or even having a say in how it should be governed, now that you've gotten rid of the dictator. And I think we can have several different experiences with different game systems in the same world, if the world is rich enough and the systems are robust enough."
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