When you create a world…the most important thing in the fight for player immersion is first-hand experience. It needs to start with our own immersion. How do we do this? We go smell the grass. We have to get out from behind our computers.
Whether it’s traveling to Nepal to help the fictional country of Kyrat in Far Cry 4 feel real or visiting Manhattan to get a sense of New York culture while making The Division Ubisoft is no stranger to sending its devs around the world in the name of research. Ubisoft’s upcoming Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon: Wildlands is no different.
One of the philosophies with authenticity in the Tom Clancy games is to learn what is real and then extrapolate from that to make the best game experience possible.
– Travis Getz
Authenticity Coordinator Tom Clancy Games
Ubisoft enlisted the help of the Bolivian army, CIA agents in Southern America, smugglers, and drug enforcement officers to help the next Tom Clancy game feel as real as possible. IGN reports, according to Ubisoft’s VP of Editorial Tommy Francois during his speech at DICE, not only did a team spend a week in a jungle where they “burned cocaine labs” to get a better understanding of how the cocoa leaf influence the culture of Bolivia, but they also “trained with an elite unit in the Bolivian army”.
Ubisoft’s demand for authenticity makes sense for Assassin’s Creed where part of the appeal is the historical tour that the games provide, but for titles like Far Cry and The Division and Wildlands it’s uncertain if the average person would even recognize, or care, about the effort. Still it’s really cool to see what a company is willing to do make a game feel real.
While there isn’t a release date for Ghost Recon: Wildlands yet Ubisoft’s other Tom Clancy title The Division will be out next month on March 8th for Xbox One, PS4, and PC. Check it out to see if their research paid off.