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assassin's creed sartor book

The Sartor Classics — A Fan Media Project

With the yuletide upon us I find myself in the company of old friends, many of whom I do not see with any regularity. We exchange embraces and handshakes, express affection, and swap tales of our years. The Question comes more often this time of year: What are you working on these days?

Well, it’s a little difficult to explain. Here’s a tiered attempt, in increasing complexity.

 

Fan fiction.

…of Assassin’s Creed, a videogame

…hidden in a book

…by encrypting it and marking certain letters in the text

…the book being a collection of selections from the various works gathered by Ezio (the game’s protagonist)  in AC: Revelations as a part of the plot

…and put together as if it were actually in publication with the story hidden within by the Assassin Order

…and then sent to somebody at Ubisoft, the game’s developer.

 

 

Get all that? Good. Over the next few posts, I’ll be chronicling the making of my magnum fan opus.

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assassin's creed brilliant ideas

Ubisoft’s Transmedia Coup

The Assassin’s Creed world has the potential to be the broadest and most lasting since X-Men. We’ve got all of history to play with, and we’ve only seen a few times and places since the series started in 2007. Games for handheld, mobile, and social have fleshed out the world, as have comics, novels, and short films. It’s big.

Ubisoft gets the transmedia concept better than most. Their FB game Project Legacy is proof of that, giving the player the ability to earn some florins and level up outside of the main game.  Yes, that’s right – do some FB click-gaming to give your console character better stuff.  Bit characters from the main game received storylines of their own, complete with excellent illustrations. Most importantly, AC became an all-day affair, not just something you played on your TV.

Their most exciting transmedia moment to date is the Discover Your Legacy promo app for Facebook. This little number grabs information from your FB account – friends, birthplace, workplace, religious views – and uses them to tie your life into the AC world with a short video. Even if you’re not into the game, I recommend giving it a try to see a fine use of social data. The potential here is vast.

So, what’s next? Mining social data to create in-game content? Customized missions based on your life?

This is the direction in which our world is headed. Get ready.

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assassin's creed Uncategorized

Occupy Firenze

From the wiks:

“The first disaster to give credibility to Savonarola’s apocalyptic message was the Medici family’s weakening grip on power owing to the French-Italian wars. The flowering of expensive Renaissance art and culture paid for by wealthy Italian families now seemed to mock the growing misery in Italy, creating a backlash of resentment among the people.”

This what happens when Jess has Wikipedia open as I play Assassin’s Creed II.

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assassin's creed

Characters as Old Friends

Played through the new Assassin’s Creed DLC last week.  Yes, yes; I know I should be writing, but a guy’s got to take a break now and then, right?  RIGHT?  And why not go back to Roma?

Allow to confess to you my delight at seeing dear old Leonardo again.  And that’s the thing — for a moment, it felt like I was seeing an old friend for the first time in years.  Not some NPC, not a character in a movie.  Someone I’ve watched grow and change.  Someone with whom I have interacted.

Now, before you get any images in your head of me weeping into my hankie at the sight of polygonally-represented Renaissance artists, let’s move on.  The question is, why was this different?  I’ve seen recurring NPCs before.  Why did I smile when this one came to the screen?

"Of course not.  Just allergies."
*snif*

 

 

The representation of the friendship between Ezio and Leonardo has been very satisfying throughout the series.  In stalks a murderous thug, an armor-padded linebacker.  Up from the ink-stained desk rises the bird-boned polymath.  One man-hug later and you’re in.  These two guys are genuine friends and have been for decades.  Leonardo is more than the Merlin or the Q — he’s an actual part of the main character’s life.  These guys know each other.  The last beat of the DLC (which I will not spoil here) drives this home particularly well.

In a form surfeit with square-jawed white males in their thirties whose entire emotional range starts with a wisecrack and ends with a grunt, taking the time to show an actual friendship between men is a worthy accomplishment.