Â
Patrice Desilets, former creative director of the Assassins Creed series and Prince of Persia, releases gameplay footage of his unreleased title 1666 Amsterdam at the Reboot Develop conference this week. The video shows that you play as a mysterious figure using melee combat as well as an even more mysterious means of controlling animals. But, before the developers were even able to release the footage, there was a cloud of controversy that rained over this game for the better part of the decade. A classic tale of butting heads and a developer’s vision being held back.
Desilets had left Ubisoft in 2010 for THQ Montreal. In 2013 when THQ Montreal was dissolved by Ubisoft after being bought out, they absorbed Desilets project as well but had it suspended. After a three-year silence of the games status and whereabouts, Ubisoft purchased a trade mark under the 1666 title earlier last month. Desilets then took it to court to retrieve his baby, and the rights returned to him after the dispute was settled earlier in the week. There have been many times over the decade of developers winning and losing IP’s from their former company. Of the recent, this situation sounds somewhat identical the Kojima-Konami Debacle.
The history of the game may have an answer as to why the game looks as if it’s in early stages of infancy in the footage because at the time the game was being developed for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Which has brought many to question why the developer would have released any footage to begin with. Those many have thought that even though the game is in its early stages, that the release of the footage was possibly a metaphor of triumph for Desilets. Even though the game is back in the rightful hands of Desilets, the indie developer Panache Digital Games, has not announced if they will begin development with 1666. You can only hope that after all the trouble that they will look to rebuild the game after they have finished their first project, Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey. There has not been much released by the developers on either subject.
Desilets founded Panache Digital Games in 2014 after his departure with Ubisoft. Shortly after being founded, Panache began development of their game Ancestors: A Humankind Odyssey, a third person open world historical survival game in which they want “the player to relive the greater moments of mankind.†It says on their website that there is more to be released later this year.
You can check out their teaser for Ancestors here.