{"id":6649,"date":"2019-12-17T11:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-12-17T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/?p=6649"},"modified":"2022-06-06T03:02:50","modified_gmt":"2022-06-06T07:02:50","slug":"game-design-as-historical-authorship-interview-with-julien-bazile-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/?p=6649","title":{"rendered":"Game Design as Historical Authorship: Interview with Julien Bazile, part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This interview is the part three of a three-part series on teaching historical game studies at the undergraduate level, and the second half of our interview with Julien Bazile. In this interview, we discuss with Julien his research into Ubisoft’s<\/em> Assassin\u2019s Creed franchise, the use of historical sources in game development, and game design as a form of historical writing, or “authorship”.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Julien Bazile<\/a> is a PhD student, contract researcher (University of Lorraine) and teaching assistant (Universit\u00e9 de Sherbrooke). At the crossroads between historiography and game studies, his doctoral research focuses on the design of video games in terms of historical authorship, and the mobilization of historical sources in the development process in Assassin’s Creed games.<\/em> You will need the best corner tv wall mount<\/a> for your gaming. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

N.B. The interview that follows was conducted in French, then transcribed and translated into English by the interviewer. You can also read part 1 of our interview with Julien by clicking on this link<\/a>.<\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Julien Bazile – Interview, part 2<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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I would now like to take the opportunity to discuss your research … You are currently engaged in your doctoral studies at the Universit\u00e9 de Sherbrooke. Could you tell us about your research on Unisoft’s <\/em><\/strong>Assassin’s Creed franchise? <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As you said, I am a\nresearcher at the doctoral level. I am in my fourth and final year, I am\nenrolled in a “cotutelle” (joint PhD degrees) in history at the\nUniversity of Sherbrooke and in information sciences and communication at the\nUniversity of Lorraine, France. I am writing my thesis, finishing up my\nintroduction, and my plan of sources. My work focuses specifically on two\nrelated Assassin\u2019s Creed<\/em> titles, on the design of historical video\ngames, and the analysis of sources used in the design process at Ubisoft, based\nfrom interviews with game designers, art directors, creative\ndirectors at Ubisoft Montreal. So: interviews, and design documents,\nsource documents that the development team have used during production. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I am working specifically on two games, Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag<\/a><\/em> and Assassin’s Creed: Freedom Cry<\/a><\/em> – the latter being the DLC of the former, before it was made into a stand-alone title. Each of these AC opuses is thought in the thematic and mechanical continuity of the other. It’s more or less the same characters, the same environments, and both games’ themes are historically related. The story of Black Flag<\/em> takes place during the golden age of piracy<\/a>, roughly between 1717 to 1725; Freedom Cry<\/em> around 1735, in (French) colonial Saint-Domingue (Haiti)<\/a>, and is based on the history slavery, and resistance to slavery – which eventually will culminate in the Haitian revolt and political revolution of the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth century<\/a>.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My research\ndirector is a specialist of the golden age of piracy, and\nhistorical slavery in the West Indies. As for me, I am working on sources in\nthe video game design process. Around this issue of sources, I try to\nanalyze the structures of the industry and the dominant identity models in the\nindustry, for example, the iconic characters of entrepreneurs, explorers,\nwarriors, soldiers, etc. in relation to historical narratives of slavery and\npiracy. Basically, what are the sources that the developers mobilize for\ntheir project, and why they mobilize these specific sources.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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