We explore how sticking to the shadows put Ubisoft into the spotlight
When it comes to considering the increasingly vast history of classic titles in the games industry, it can be hard to find some sort of conclusive evidence as to which and why certain games have entered into the ethereal hall of fame while others were left nipping at the heels of those greats that stood before them. For the earlier games of the Eighties it’s a little easier to understand: these are often games that ‘did it first’ or, if nothing else, at least did it better than anyone else. The Nineties still offer a little more leeway for evidence, with developers finding their feet in the 16-bit era, but truly discovering innovation with the invention of genuine 3D gaming. It’s in the early 2000s where things start to get a little bit tougher; on paper. As a relevant example, it would be tough to point to Splinter Cell as a surefire, multi-million selling game. Ubisoft certainly believed it would be, but it was hard to say that a shooter based on the more subdued brand of military from Tom Clancy would have found much success, and even with the release of Metal Gear Solid, stealth still seemed less marketable than action equivalents. But Splinter Cell was never meant to be ‘just’ a stealth game. In fact, it started life as something else completely.
“I was working at Ubisoft as a project lead, as the creative director for a project,” says Francois Coulon, the man who would become the key creative vision behind Splinter Cell. “The game was supposed to be a revolutionary title,” he explains, “that was a blend between two types of gameplay. You would have a strategy core layer where you would see something from above – a map like Warcraft II – and then you could go into any unit and play them in third-person or first-person view.”
Despite the inventiveness of it the game was ultimately scrapped, the hardware at the time simply unable to meet the demands of such a concept. However, the original universe – a “shattered world” with a series of islands based on key capital cities – was kept, and it was here with this licence where Coulon would continue his work.
“At some point something happened at Ubisoft Paris,” recalls Coulon, “called Ubi Free. It was a virtual union that had been set up by three people, I believe, and they sent an email to everybody at Ubisoft to say that the Guillemot brothers were dictators, that the work conditions were very bad, and so on. It was pretty weird to be honest, because that was not the case.” Despite that it still caused some pressure for Ubisoft Paris, driving the Guillemot brothers to “sort of overreact”. Gerard Guillemot, in particular, saw it as a bigger problem, and decided to take action. “He said, ‘Okay, there is nothing we can do in this country, we cannot run a creative company here, so I’m leaving France and I’m going to New York
