Seeing The Light: Ubisoft's secret weapon

With two creative power houses such as Patrick Plourde and Jeffery Yohalem, you would be forgiven for expecting a mega-budget game with incredible landscapes and exciting action sequences. Yet after being at the helm of triple-A titles such as Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry 3, it’s surprising to find that director Patrick and writer Jeffery decided to take their next project in a somewhat different direction. Instead of creating another blockbuster, they have chosen to pursue a very personal creation in the form of a fairy tale. What has emerged is Child of Light [reviewed here], a download-only game with a very indie and artistic streak. Released earlier this week by Ubisoft Montreal, we spoke to them both about their intriguing change of tact.

What inspired the concept for Child of Light's fantasy story?

Patrick Plourde: I knew I wanted to make a RPG with a painterly art style. So while I was searching for artwork that inspired me, I fell in love with the artists of the Golden Age of Illustration. A lot of their artwork contained illustrations from fairy tale books, so I became interested in fairy tales and their use of symbolism to tell a story.

Jeffrey Yohalem: When Pat approached me with the painterly art style and fairy tale direction I was immediately drawn to stories from my childhood that I loved. Such as the stories of children who wandered into their attic or into a pool behind their house and emerged in another world. I wanted to create a modern fairy tale about someone from our world who stumbled onto a world of magical creatures. That world became Lemuria.

The game is very dark yet appears child-like, what kind of mood did you aim for with Child of Light?

PP: The tagline I used at the start of the project was to make a playable poem. I wanted a game that was soft, feminine and nostalgic.

JY: I wanted to aim for something adult, something that tries to express the bittersweet truth of life.

The story is told in the style of rhymes. Where did this idea come from?

PP: We were working on the game’s vertical slice and we had a bit of difficulty finding a style that fit. At the time I was saying that I want the game to feel like a poem. I love the movie Cyrano de Bergerac and in that movie the dialog is all in verse. So I proposed we test it for the game. It worked great and we decided to do it all in rhymes.

JY: I wanted to find a style of rhyme that wouldn't become annoying over the fifteen-hour playtime of the game. Every line rhyming sounded too childish, too much like Dr. Seuss. Then it hit me; the Rime of the Ancient Mariner, which is told in ballad form. That poem uses an ABCB rhyme scheme in iambs that roll like the sea, deals with adult themes and is built for long poems. I adapted it to Child of Light. The entire script is in ballad form, including the menu objectives, except for a handful of sonnets you can find hidden in the game.

The game plays like a western RPG, except during the battles that are more of a JRPG system. What inspired the battle system most?

PP - The main inspiration comes from Grandia 2, especially the notion of assigning a casting time to actions and the possibility to interrupt attacks. We also allow all the characters in the party to be available in fights like Final Fantasy X.

From demos and advertisement we don’t see much on the levelling system. How much depth will the levelling system and skill trees have?

PP: Each character in the party has 3 branches to choose from. So while that’s really simple, every character has a unique set of skills. You can unlock about half the skills in a walkthrough. In addition, you can assign Oculi to each character’s weapon, armour and talisman. Depending on where you put the Oculi, the effect is different. There are 10 types of Oculi, in 4 sizes. That’s where the depth comes from.

How much is there to do outside of battles?

PP: Outside of fighting you can fly around to explore every nook and cranny of the world, there are optional side-quests to do, optional boss fights, treasures and collectibles to find.

Local co-op seems to be a major idea for this game. What will the other player do while not in control of the main character?

PP: The second player takes control of Igniculus. In navigation he is used as a light in pitch-black areas and he can blind enemies to allow you to pass without triggering a fight. In combat, he can slow down enemies, which can be the difference between winning and losing a fight.

Finally the art style is beautiful. Where did the inspiration for this come from?

PP: John Bauer, Arthur Rackham, Edmund Dulac and Kay Nielsen were all major influences. Yoshitaka Amano’s Fairies book was really important for me in getting interested in fairy tales and finally the various watercolour sketches made by Hayao Miyazaki for his movies.