The birth of the Creed - Part 1

'Celebrating 15 years of Assassin's Creed.'

Assassin's Creed, Ubisoft's biggest franchise yet, is set in multiple historical timelines with the conflict of two Orders and their take on freedom and justice. A fire that sparked in ancient times and still burns bright in the present day. The franchise has also introduced us to multiple protagonists throughout its course, though not all of them were memorable.

The year is 2003, Prince of Persia: The Sands of time is completed and Ubisoft shifts its focus onto a revolutionary sequel that would expand the acrobatic system of the Prince of Persia franchise and follow the same linear approach as its predecessor. The initial development of the game began in 2004 and was aimed as a Playstation 2 title, although considering the new-generation of consoles was close, Patrice Desilets wanted the games' already existing features to be feasible on the newest platforms and switch it into an open world game.

Prince of Persia: Assassins (Assassin's Creed Prototype)

Eventually, the project was named Prince of Persia: Assassins , and the idea of dropping the protagonist's prince title was born when he came upon one of his university books related to secret societies, and its first material related to the Assassins. An assassin that would strive to become king instead of waiting to become one. Everything was inspired by the life of Hassan-i Sabbah and Bartol's novel Alamut, even the character's white robe and red belt. The birth of Altair's name came from the bird of prey concept that animator Khai Nguyen's suggested early in development. But the newest consoles brought many challenges to the team, considering the hardware limitations restricted them from rendering long flowing robes until they decided to shorten it to resonate more with the concept.

The protagonist was created to be a heroic character with a bit of a "badass" edge as the artists were inspired by G.I. Joe character Storm Shadow, a similarly skilled hero. Patrice and his team sought to move away from the 'tranditional' Prince of Persia parkour system and create something believable, but they sacrificed realism to bring more fun into its gameplay. However, they implimented a less realistic feature called the 'leap of faith' where the player had to climb up a tower in order to unlock a sub-area and points of view. Luckily for the team, it was also mentioned in Alamut's novel and an action that the Assassins used to undertake.

While the protagonist's concept was settled, the team at Ubisoft Montreal was also building up the story of the game. They needed something that would start a conflict between the Assassins and Templars, something that would make sense. The idea of the Apple of Eden being at the core of the storyline's structure found many of the team members laughing until they researched the concept more. The developers found that many medieval paintings of royalty and other leaders were holding spherical objects similar to globus cruciger that represented power and control, and recognized that an artifact named the Apple of Eden would fit well into this concept.

But what if the human DNA had a bigger role in the story? How could they go back to the Assassins' time and use the idea of the apple? Well, the animus, a machine that is using genetic memories of the human DNA to experience lives lost in time, was built upon the idea of focusing more on the Assassins. They wanted to make sense of the fact that the player would have to travel to numerous cities and commit assassinations to targets such as John F. Kennedy and Alexander The Great. Ubisoft's marketing was not keen on the Animus idea, believing players would be confused and be disappointed that the game was not a true medieval experience. They also avoided using the word Animus and show anything from the sci-fi elements of the game at E3 2006.

Still, they weren't happy developing a Prince of Persia game without a prince as its protagonist and the marketing team suggested the name Assassin's Creed with the renowned moto, 'Nothing is true, everything is permitted'. The use of the genetic memory also helped the game step away from the transitional 'game over' screen by bringing the desynchronization idea on the table. The Assassin was no longer able to die, but to desynchronize when failing a mission or going against the character's moral like killing random innocent NPCs... or swimming which turned out to be an Animus glitch.

In part 2, i will talk about the game's design and the impact it had in my life when i first played it back in 2008.

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