The Appeal of The Creed:

How Assassin’s Creed Works as an Interactive

Narrative

Tovya Gibson,

University of California Irvine

2012

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Abstract

Assassin’s Creed is a unique historical game that takes the player not only to

different lands, that they may not have visited, but it also takes the player to different

times in history. The game has a fairly large fan base that have not only created

machinima of the game but have also taken the game out of the virtual world and

implemented it into the real world. As a fan of the Assassin’s Creed series myself, I

wanted to research what aspects of the game caused other fans and players of the series to

enjoy the games as much as they do. There are many games in the series but I will be

focusing on the main games, Assassin’s Creed (2007), Assassin’s Creed II (2009),

Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood (2010), Assassin’s Creed Revelations (2011), and

Assassin’s Creed III (2012).

Introduction

Figure 1. Animus (Assassin’s Creed) Figure 2. Animus 2.0 (Assassin’s Creed II)

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To start off this section, I will first give the back-story for the concept of the

series, which I found in the essay, “Assassin’s Creed: A Multi-Cultural Read” and in

Ismailis in Medieval Muslim Societies. The Assassin’s Creed game is based on the

myth of the Hashashin (El-Nasr et al. 2008) although the game itself is fictitious.

Back Story

In 1090, Hasan1 had seized the mountain fortress of Alamut2 in Northern Persia,

signaling the foundation of what was to become known as the Nizari Ismaili State, with

its territories and networks of mountain fortresses in different parts of Persia and Syria…

the Ismailis of Persia were under the overall leadership of Hasan-i Sabbah. Hasan

designed a strategy to overwhelm the Solijuqs locality by locality and from a multitude of

impregnable strongholds. Hasan’s adoption of assassination as an auxiliary technique for

achieving military and political objectives, too, was a response to the decentralized

pattern of Solijuq power. Hasan assigned limited and measured role within his overall

military strategy to the selective removal of prominent adversaries. Almost every

assassination was attributed to the Nizari Ismailis. The actual missions were carried out

by the fidalis3 and the missions, normally conducted in public places, were daring acts

with intimidating effects. The fida’is often waited for long periods before they could find

a suitable opportunity to accomplish their mission (Daftary 149-150).

The Game

1 Hasan-i Sabbah (d. 1124)- a remarkable Ismaili da’i (scholars and authors of their

community (Daftary 28)) who was already following an independent revolutionary policy

against the Soljuq Turks…(Daftary 149)2 Served as the headquarters of the Nizari Ismaili da’wa state. (Daftary 149)3 Devotees who volunteered for self-sacrificing missions

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Ubisoft Montreal developed the Assassin’s Creed series. The main games in the

series follows the story of Desmond Miles, a local bartender and son of assassins, who

goes back in time and relives his ancestors’ memories. The main antagonist throughout

the series is Templars who are in control of the most powerful corporation, Abstergo. In

the first game, Abstergo kidnapped Desmond to gain information from his ancestor,

Altaïr ibn-La’Ahad, on the location of the Apple of Eden, which was an artifact that has

great power and would allow the Templars to control the world. Desmond is able to relive

his ancestors’ memories by entering into a device called the Animus (Figures 1 & 2). This

game takes place in 1191 A.D. around the time of the Third Crusade. In the game

Assassin’s Creed II, Desmond relives the memories of his ancestor Ezio Auditore and

through what the characters in the game call the bleeding effect, Desmond learns to

become and assassin at the same time as Ezio. This game takes place around 1476 in Italy

during the Italian Renaissance period. You continue to play as Ezio in AC: Brotherhood,

which takes place in Rome, and AC: Revelations, which takes place in Constantinople

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(Istanbul). The most recent game ACIII takes place during the American Revolution

where you play as Connor Kenway.

Method

I began my research by accessing the Ubisoft forums. I specifically went to the

Assassin’s Creed General Discussion forum and asked that whoever was willing to help

me with my research to post why they like the Assassin’s Creed games. I chose to start

my research this way because I felt that the best way to answer the question of why

people like Assassin’s Creed was to ask the players themselves. After I received feedback

from the forum, I started to search for information pertaining to the games. I found the

most resources from the academic essay “Assassin’s Creed: A Multi-Cultural Read.” I

also read a few articles in two Game Informer magazines that had to do with the series

and one article that was also helpful that looked at why we play games. The last thing I

did was spend a little time looking for historical architecture in the game to compare with

images I found online and in both Ching and Willey’s books. I wanted to check how

accurate the renderings in the game were to the real life buildings and landmarks.

Findings

Why do we play video games? Ben Reeves stated in his article that the reason we

play is because games fulfill several real-world human needs. Reeves interviewed Scott

Rigby4 and “according to Rigby, Immersyve’s complex needs-satisfaction metrics narrow

down to three basic categories (Reeves 2012).”

1. A need for competence

4 Ph.D. in clinical and social psychology from university of Rochester, helped found

Immersyve, a research company designed to examine basic human needs and discover

what makes videogames so appealing.

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2. A need for autonomy

3. Relatedness

According to Meadows, “An interactive narrative is a time- based representation

of character and action in which a reader can affect, choose, or change the plot. The first-,

second-, or third-person characters may actually be the reader…interactivity5 fractures

the perspectives of the individual author, places new perspectives in the hands of the

readers, and accommodates a relationship between reading and writing” (Meadows 62).

Meadows stated that interactivity requires rule sets and constraints in order to function

smoothly. Interactivity has three principles of interaction:

1. Input/ Output

2. Inside/ Outside

3. Open/ Closed

Interaction can also be broken down into four steps, which according to Meadows, if the

interaction is done well, generates an increased interest in further information.

1. Observation

2. Exploration

3. Modification

4. Reciprocal Change

Discussion

A Need for Competence6

5 Interactivity is a continuing increase in participation (Meadows 37)6 A need for competence is “a desire to seek out control or to feel mastery over a situation” (Reeves 2012).

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Reeves described this as accomplishing something or in terms of games, leveling

up and gaining achievements.

In the first Assassin’s Creed game, the main goal was to kill the targets to regain

your weapons and rank as an assassin. In a way the point of the first game was to level

up. The killing of the target could be considered an achievement that continues

throughout the series. There was also the option to explore the assassin’s tombs (ACII)

and the hideout of the followers of Romulus (AC: Brotherhood) to gain treasure or

complete main and side missions with 100%. What satisfies this category in regard to

Assassin’s Creed varies from player to player. Of the three categories, the second is one

of the most important reasons as to why this series is so enjoyable.

Need for Autonomy7

7 “The desire to feel independent or have a certain amount of control over our action…”(Reeves 2012)

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(Figure 3 from Ubisoft Official Assassin’s Creed Forum)

The need for autonomy can be satisfied by any game that gives you many

options. Although you do have specific targets in Assassin’s Creed, you do have many

options regarding how you assassinate them, stealthy vs. out in the open, and also when

you want to carry out your assassination. There is not set time for when you have to carry

out these missions. I learned from the forums that the players do have to control over the

development of the game. ProdiGurl stated in the forum that they liked that the game has

“Devs that listen to fan input and act on it.” I did notice that the developers had feedback

sub-topics in the Assassin’s Creed forum and they took polls on what worked in the game

(see Figure 3). Matt Miller also refers to the developers acting on this input in his article

“Assassin’s Creed III: The Assassins rise to the top,” which was the E3 coverage of

Assassin’s Creed III. Miller states “For sheer wow factor, it was a hard game to beat,

making good on promises to improve combat, expand the sandbox of navigation, and

flush out a new protagonist ” (Miller 2012). Players also have the option of how they

choose to get to their destination, be it jumping from rooftop to rooftop, walking on the

streets or riding a horse.

In this sense, players like the freedom you get in the game. Although you do have

a lot of freedom in the game, there are subtle rules. One example is that there are certain

areas that are blocked off because you can not yet access the memory. The main rules are

stated in the first game as the assassin’s creed:

1. Stay your blade from the flesh of an innocent (don’t kill civilians)

2. Hide in plain sight

3. Never compromise the brotherhood

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A friend stated, when asked what she liked about the game, “I like the amount of

options you have in the game and that video game logic. Disappearing and being out of

sight by casually talking with people” (Aliza Le) (Figure 4). Although there are rules, the

only punishment you could suffer would be drawing the attention of the guards or risking

destabilization8. Some tend to ignore the first rule of the creed and get joy from “subtly

shanking passersby” (JK).

(Figure 4 Assassin’s Creed Screenshot)

Relatedness9

“We like to feel like we matter to others, and we like to feel like we are making a

significant contribution to society” (Reeves). This in game world can be considered a

society that we are contributing to. Players could feel as though they are contributing in

Assassin’s Creed through the assassination of supposedly horribly people for the benefit

of society.

8 this is when you lose the memory and start over from your last save point. This is usually a result of dying or entering a space that is not part of the current memory.9 Can be fulfilled through players interacting with friends online and also with in game characters. (Reeves 2012).

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As an Interactive Narrative, Assassin’s Creed follows the principles of

interactivity and steps of interaction in a way that causes the games to “generate an

increased interest in further information” (Meadows 44).

1. Input/ Output10

“Input should create output and output should create input…the response time

between the input and the output should be quick enough for the user to have a clear

sense of what change he is affecting on the system” (Meadows 39). This relates to the

gameplay and a good example would be the counter attacks in the game. The player gets

instant feedback if they successfully completed the counter attack.

2. Inside/ Outside11

3. Open/ Closed12

10 Ability to control the input should be present…the input should facilitate more input. Input should provide the user with a new capability. As this happens the line between stimulus and response thins and the depth of immersion increases (Meadows 39). 11 A dialogue should be created between the internal and external or “inside-the-skull” and “outside-the-skull interactivity.” Inside-the-skull interactivity is a process of extending what the user already knows. Outside-the-skull interactivity is based on what we are experiencing on an empirical, or experiential, level.” (Meadows 40)12 The system should get better the more it’s used (Meadows 43).

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The best way to relate this to the game is that once you learn the basic controls it

becomes easier to play. The controls stay the same throughout the series, depending on

the system you play on. Assassin’s Creed compared to Mirror’s Edge, a game that also

includes free running, has simpler controls.

1. Observation, Exploration13, Modification14, and Reciprocal Change15

The reader (player) makes an assessment… a kind of awareness of first-level

options is necessary, the reader (player) finds out what he or she can and can’t do, leap

from unintentional discovery to conscious change, the system changes the reader’s

actions. These all apply to the game as a whole. The player observes and explores what

they can and cannot climb. After they figure out what they can climb the player figures

out how to climb certain buildings.

Other Factors

13 First-level options might include the identification of things like buttons or levers or stairs. (Meadow 44)14 The reader changes the system. The reader bridges context to decision.15 “The system tries to change the reader…the system changes the reader’s actions” (Meadow 45).

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The other factor that I noticed, based on the response in the forum, is that players

liked the historical aspect of the game and the Assassin concept:

“Love the whole Assassin concept-that it wasn’t done cheaply or cliché, that you can

travel back in time to differnet eras & important/ historic events as your backdrop, Historic

realism, that there’s an assassin lineage, attention to detail, combat/ weaponry revolves around

different time periods (ProdiGurl)”

“I like the History intorgrated into both the fiction and sci-fi…(Scooper121s)”

The other aspects of the game that I think the main reason players liked the game

was the free running and storyline.

“I love the compelling story lines… What other game can you scale buildings (and most

recently trees) what other game introduces ‘free-running’…(Scooper121s)”

“more depth of story-line &plot (ProdiGurl)”

“My favorite thing about Assassin’s Creed is the freedom of movement both on the

horizontal and the vertical…Practically everything is climbable and you’ll probably want to

climb it. This is hugely important part of Assassin’s Creed for me because it made backtracking

and exploring less tedious mainly because it’s fun to just free run. That’s on of the thing I didn’t

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like about GTA or Saint’s Row because you’re kind of limited in the way you move, sure you can

get a helicopter or something but the game was designed more to be on the ground you know?

(R.T-Shanks)”

Conclusion

In conclusion, the reason that Assassin’s Creed is so enjoyable is because the

game works very well as an interactive narrative. Not only does it work as an interactive

narrative and generate an increased interest in further interaction, but also the Assassin’s

Creed series satisfies the three basic human needs: a need for competence, a need for

autonomy, and relatedness. This reason can be applied to all games. The free running and

historical realism are also main reasons.

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Resources

Ching, Francis. Architecture: form, space & order. New York: John Wiley & Sons

Inc., 1996. Print.

Daftary, Farhad. Ismailis in Medieval Muslim Societies. London: I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd,

2005. Print.

El-Nasr, Magy Seif, Al-Saati, Maha, Niedenthal, Simon, Milam, David. “Assassin’s

Creed: A Multi-Cultural Read.” 2008. 1-32. Print. PDF File

Meadows, Mark Stephen. Pause and Effect: The Art of Interactive Narrative.

Indianapolis: New Riders, 2003. Print.

Miller, Matt. “10 Cool Features You Don’t Know About Assassin’s Creed III.” Game

Informer. Nov. 2012: 92-5. Print.

Miller, Matt. “Assassin’s Creed III.” Game Informer. Aug. 2012: 39-40. Print.

Reeves, Ben. “Why We Play: How our desire for games shapes our world.” Game

Informer. Nov. 2012: 92-5. Print.

Willey, Peter. Eagle’s Nest: Ismaili Castles in Iran and Syria. London: I.B. Tauris & Co

Ltd, 2005. Print.

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