Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs may have been a massive success but suffice to say that the reception wasn’t stellar. Some fans outright hated the game while others believed it hadn’t lived up to the massive hype surrounding it (especially since it had been delayed from November 2013 to release in May 2014).
Ubisoft Montreal executive Lionel Raynaud spoke to CVG about the game’s flaws and said that the reception mirrored that of the first Assassin’s Creed. Despite the problems, it had established the brand – something which Watch Dogs had done for itself as well.
“The reception has actually been pretty close to Assassin’s Creed [1]. With the first one we didn’t have such a good reception, and it was fair. We had a lot of flaws in the replayability of gameplay loops and you could feel that the game was a first iteration.
“It was difficult to do everything at the right level, which is why we took more time. The time we took was definitely useful–it allowed us to release the game without compromises and do everything that we wanted.
“There are flaws, obviously. We absolutely want to tackle these flaws and surprise players, and the way to tackle some of those flaws is going to be quite radical. There are parts of the game that will need to change.
“We have this ambition to have games that are worlds with systems that offer more agency and freedom for players, that allow them to discover the world in the way they want,” he added. “We want them to be less narrative- or character-driven and more creative, with more choices for the player.” Though this is a “high ambition” mindset which requires the team to “develop technologies that [it] didn’t have for Watch Dogs 1”, this, “combined with fixing and refining what worked well, is probably the way to go for Watch Dogs 2.”
Are you looking forward to Watch Dogs 2 when it’s eventually announced? Let us know in the comments.
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