Las ciudades y entornos de Assassin´s Creed III

Interview in English

Revogamers: In Assasin´s Creed III The new naval levels and the forest environment look awesome. Are they an important part of the total game? Are they exploring scenarios or they'll be only available in certain moments of the story?

Answered by Alex Hutchinson, Creative Director of Assassin´s Creed III

In terms of Naval missions, we have some that you´ll need to complete to get through the main path of the game as well as extra missions that are part of the side narrative and the Privateer contracts. The side narrative is focused around a very specific Templar who has spent his life at sea, while the privateer contracts connect to the economy and allow the player to trade more easily via sea routes.

There is also the Frontier, a slightly shrunk version of the American North East. Within it we have historical locations like Valley Forge, small towns like Lexington and Concord, Connor’s village and more: it´s a location as dense as cities were in previous AC games, with many of our core story missions taking place in it.

Then, we also have what we call the Homestead, which includes more than 35 missions and is closely linked to the development of Connor as a character. Throughout his quest, he will meet and help oppressed people who will eventually take up residence in the Homestead and start their specific business. Connor will then be able to buy their goods and craft more powerful weapons. Depending on how you play, it takes around 4h to complete the Homestead, in parallel with the main path.

Revogamers: Damasco, Florence and Rome are important cities with centuries of history and something special. How have you translated this magic to a modern and just build city like the XVIII century Boston?

Answered by Maxime Durand, Team Historian

In that way, building the cities of Boston and New York was a big part of the project.  Those two are very different today than what they use to be in the past, except for couple streets and some landmarks.  We used dozens of maps for each one to have the proper plans, but our research went way deeper.

Creating boroughs with different social/artistic/economic feelings needed both good knowledge in architecture/anthropology, but also required a lot of paintings, drawings and engravings from the period to have the best accuracy.  We desired to create a sandbox where AI crowds would live and have real activities to do on their own.  Colonists had various different occupations in the 18th Century than we do today.  We wanted to avoid cities feeling like an 18th Century playground filled with 21st century people.

That´s why we have NPCs with various occupations related to the colonies; selling (fish, rum, wares, and tea), working in the dockyards (or ropeyards), or preaching, etc.  Back then, the space for privacy was very little and life on the streets was very more vivid than it is today.  Streets were smaller and walking was definitely the most common way of transportation.

It creates both an interesting place for players to wander around simply and enjoy the simulation, or a deadly playground for an assassin to be on the lookout for his prey.