GameCentral speaks with the creative director behind the original Assassin’s Creed about the origins of 1666: Amsterdam, using generative AI, and the decision to do early access.
Patrice Désilets is best known for being the creative director on the first two Assassin’s Creed titles and Prince Of Persia: The Sands Of Time, but for his latest game, he’s debuting an IP he’s been trying to get off the ground for 16 years.
1666: Amsterdam began life at THQ Montreal in 2010, but development was suspended after Ubisoft bought the studio and unceremoniously fired Désilets. This led to a lawsuit over the rights to the IP, which was eventually settled in 2016.
Désilets won the rights, but it’s still been a long road to making 1666: Amsterdam a reality – with its development prolonged by the pandemic. It now represents the second title from his studio, Panache Digital Games, after the 2019 survival game Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey.
Although it’s not an easy game to describe, 1666: Amsterdam definitely has the bones of Désilets’ previous work – where you volley between stealth and action in a sandbox environment. This time, however, it comes with roguelike elements, witches, and playable cats.
Ahead of the game’s early access launch on August 25, we sat down with Désilets to talk about his relationship with the Assassin’s Creed franchise today, why he keeps coming back to multiple timelines, and the cancelled Prince Of Persia remake.
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GC: 1666: Amsterdam has existed in some form since 2010. How different is the game we see today versus what you started at THQ?
PD: Oh it’s totally different. The only thing between the two that remains is 1999 and 1666, and Amsterdam. But it wasn’t a witch. It was [originally] my game after Assassin’s Creed. Now it’s my game after Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey.
GC: So when did the witch element come into it?
PD: When I went back to it in 2020. After I shipped Ancestors, I went back and said, ‘OK now is the time to do it’. [The game] is about the devil but I didn’t want to *be* the devil. But what would represent a cool character in the devil universe? Ah, the witches. Quickly [I said], ‘let’s do to the witches what I did to the assassins’; to have a witch as a main character that’s badass in the style of games that I make. So it started in January 2020 with the witches.
GC: This project has existed for a long time and has been caught between legal battles – what has been your driving motivator to get this over the finish line? Is there a sense of unfinished business?
PD: I guess so. Maybe it’s because when it all went down at the beginning, I said I’m going to fight to get it back. And then I did get it back, so I was like, ‘OK so, I guess now I need to do it.’ As soon as I finished Ancestors and I had a team, I kinda [thought], OK my team can do open world, let’s do it. Let’s have fun with it. Let’s work on this and make it a success, I hope. But I guess… I committed myself.
I got the rights to a game that people know about. Even though it’s not that big yet, people knew about the game. So I have the rights to a thing people know about, that’s big in our day and age. The proof is when I went on stage at Summer Game Fest and I said, ‘It’s there!’ And people were like, ‘Holy cow he’s doing it! He’s crazy!’ But this is also why… I’ve got a business to run at the end of the day. So I have an IP, and having an IP creates a jumpstart. So I had to do it.
GC: You’re juggling multiple timelines here, just like Assassin’s Creed, is there a reason you keep coming back to that motif? Is it just a fun storytelling device?
