Assassins Creed: active audience theory examples

Sure, why not? I've got nothing better to do...

In this video, YouTube channel Gameology use professional parkour experts to recrate moves from various Assassin's Creed games. This is clearly very professional stuff, with high production values and high quality editing, and therefore is an excellent example of Shirky's notion of audience members producing professional quality content, in this case clearly for financial gain 

This video is way more an example of fandom, and how fans can focus on one particular aspect of a videogame. Some language/cryptography enthusiast has actually translated the various runic written aspects of Assassin's Creed: Valhalla. And, even more crazily, it actually makes sense! This is a clear example of Ubisoft putting a ridiculous amount of work in to a game, that will be overlooked by 99% of people, simply to appeal to the 1% of hardcore fans that will REALLY get in to this!

Here's some examples of Assassin's Creed fanart, or perhaps it would be better to describe it as concept art. It's really high quality stuff! I hope that the fan is able to become a professional artist!

This fan film clearly took a ridiculous amount of work. While an actual AC game set in Nazi occupied France might be a little offensive to some audiences, it clearly has captured many fans attentions

This video shows off an actual working retractable blade, as seen in the AC franchise. Suffice to say, it's not a good idea to carry one of these around! But for the ultra fan, it provides an excellent way to show allegiance to the series, and to the weapon smith, it probably provides a steady stream of income

This is an example of a fan edit; footage from an existing franchise edited over an existing pop song. Clearly the editing here is very effective, and since it has 4million views, it's also extremely popular!

Finally, this isn't AC related, but since we played Dark Souls III in class, it's a good example to include. While DS3 may seem to be free of story, it actually has a very complicated and in-depth narrative, which is told through environmental storytelling and item descriptions. This 'lore video' goes in to significant depth on the boss none of you could beat so I had to step in and beat for you :)

Why don't Ubisoft clamp down on these fans for copywrite infringement?

While some studios (like Nintendo...) will do everything possible to stop fans using their IP (or 'intellectual property'), Ubisoft clearly realise that there are mutual benefits involved in allowing fans to create derivative work. Not only is it 'free advertising', it also encourages active fanbases, and active and happy fan bases are more likely to buy the next Assassin's Creed game, year after year!

But why do fans do these things?

Let's face it: even if you can edit, draw, act or make props, the media industries are difficult to get in to. So, if you want to make stuff, and make stuff that people want to watch, then basing your art on an existing franchise is often the best way to do this!

Incidentally, lots of commercial products actually started life as fan products. The hugely successful (if slightly dubious) 50 Shades Of Grey started as Twilight fanfic. And the crazy popular indie RPG Undertale started life a long time ago as an Earthbound fan game. And if we stretch things slightly, the Star Wars franchise is a ripoff of the cinema of Akira Kurosawa. And why not?

As somebody said, "good artists copy, great artists steal"! 

Ubisoft: controversies and issues with production

While we have been discussing the Assassin's Creed series, and how it is an example of a AAA, major videogame production, we have so far omitted perhaps the most important and troubling aspect of Ubisoft; the many serious allegations which have been made against the company. It is important to be aware of this, as from Curran and Seaton's perspective, this is a symptom of aggressive and monopolistic media practices. When an organisation are based solely around profit and power, and the establishment of aggressive hierarchies, bullying, sexual assault and exploitation unfortunately become more commonplace.

Despite the severity of these accusations, Ubisoft still are able to exist as a family friendly company. This is testament to the power clout they wield in the videogame industry, and is a depressing reminder that as long as media industries continue to become aggressively conglomerated, we will see those in power exploit those beneath them, to establish power and to maintain profit.

Accusations made against Ubisoft

• Hascoët, head of Ubisoft's editorial team had been accused of misogyny, homophobia, and attempting to drug teammates.
• Many employees have stated the work culture is 'Mafia like'. Key members are protected and employees that try to file complaints are forced out - but Ubisoft say departures are voluntary.
• Apparently, at least five of the top 25-credited people on Far Cry 6 have left the company, with the game only having just been released on October 7, 2021.
• In the anonymous survey of nearly 14,000 employees, one in four respondents said that they had either witnessed or experienced workplace misconduct themselves in the past two years, and one in five said that they didn’t feel “fully respected or safe in the work environment.” 
• The results also noted that women and non-binary employees witnessed or were more likely to experience or witness harassment than men.
• Employees feel like since initial controversies Ubisoft haven't done anything to resolve issues within the company. 
• Ubisoft claim that they are working to create a safer and better workforce, and revising company code of conduct and giving diversity training across the company. 
• In 2020, amidst a worldwide call for racial equality, the company incited controversy for misusing racial symbols. The game's trailer used the raised fist symbol synonymous with the Black Lives Matter movement as the fictional Umbra's emblem. The community's reaction was swift, and Ubisoft apologised on Twitter, admitting that the symbol's inclusion was "insensitive and harmful." Ubisoft removed the content from all versions of the game two days later.

Criticisms of Ubisoft games

• impossible unlocks - one Reddit user discovered that unlocking every cosmetic in 'For Honour' would take a casual player two and a half years — or $800. Ubisoft responded by stating that it was never the intention for players to unlock everything

• misuse of BLM imagery - despite having diverse portfolio and character features, criticism of misusing racial symbols in  promotional materials for Tom Clancy's Elite Squad, admitting that the symbol's inclusion was "insensitive and harmful." Ubisoft removed the content from all versions of the game two days later. When the company first released promotional art for Far Cry 4, the art depicted a light-skinned, blonde-haired man in a throne with his hand on a kneeling character with an Asian appearance. While the developers released more information about the ethnicity of the featured individuals and their relationships, it still shocked consumers.

• assassins creed unity - Bugs and glitches plagued the game at its release, including an unsettling missing face error and rampant collision detection problems. promised female characters available for co-op, with creative director stating that including them was simply too much work.

• yearly releases - fans accused them of publishing unfinished games. While this schedule put a lot of content in fans' hands, it can dilute the franchise. In fact, after Ubisoft took a year off from the Assassin's Creed franchise for the first time in seven years, the next title was praised as one of the series' best. Ubisoft has stated that they intend to back away from annual releases to pursue a games as a service strategy 

• misleading trailers - trailers that seemed to represent gameplay but did not (for 'watch dogs'), featured next-generation lighting, weather effects, and animation however when next trailers were released visual quality was dramatically reduced. When questioned about it, Ubisoft admitted that the trailer, rendered on a high-end PC, showed graphics far beyond what customers would find on consoles - or most PCs. 

• Lack of server support - 'Rainbow Six Siege' when the game launched, its critical multiplayer component suffered from a lack of server support. launched without dedicated servers for some of its most popular modes, instead opting for peer-to-peer connections with player-hosted servers. Players also experienced frequent server outages that kept them from connecting to the game at all. Ubisoft launched Operation: Health to improve server performance. Players of the game since its launch were confused as to why this hadn't been a priority since the beginning.

How to get an 'A' grade in A-level media

A short and straightforward guide

Use media language all the time, at every opportunity

This means having the textual analysis toolkit open every lesson and using it!

Know your case studies

Make sure to click on the case studies tab so you can familiarise yourself with the texts you'll actually be referring to in the exam

Make loads of notes each and every session and make sure your blog looks GOOD

This blog looks great! Pictures will really spruce up your revision!

And make sure that your blog is organised and nice to look at! Revising from something that looks like an utter mess is just depressing...

Use The Blog

This one. Use it every day. Read articles that are not even aimed at your year group (you'll be covering it sooner or later if you're a first year, and for second year, it's critical revision! When students don't know certain things are on the blog, I know you're not using the blog. If you're not using the blog, you're making life harder for yourself. Don't make life harder for yourself!

Wider reading

Watch lots of films, play lots of videogames, read loads of magazines: every industry we explore, you should be engaging with. The best kind of revision is something fun and something that comes naturally to you. If you're keen, ask Michael for access to his wider reading articles

Revise for five minutes every day

Every day. Even Christmas day. Five minutes is nothing. But it all adds up. It's a goal that each and every one of you can hit. If you want to revise more, good!¬ But the minimum is five minutes every day. Don't wait until so-called study leave or cram your revision in before a test. Revise a little bit every day!

Read the revision guide

It's free. Michael wrote it. It's specifically targeting you guys. It has every possible exam question and sample answers and every theory and loads of wider reading and exam technique and everything

Do past paper questions and give them to your teacher to mark

This is maybe the least fun thing to do, and you shouldn't do it all the time, but it's frankly the most useful thing you can do. Revise, swot up, then complete a past paper question under exam conditions

Alternatives to the effects model - how could videogames influence their audiences?

Assassin's Creed: Unity has been given an '18' rating by PEGI. But don't worry, we didn't commit any crimes by playing it, as the PEGI ratings system is purely advisory. In fact, even the BBFC ratings system mainly refers to restriction at the point of sale (which is why we can occasionally watch 18 rated products with no restrictions being breeched). Quite frankly, the regulation of the videogame industry (and EVERY media industry) is totally ineffective!

Assassins Creed franchise: what material does this game include which may cause harm and/or offense?

• Stereotypical representations of countries and cultures. Stereotypes are harmful, and they can be cultivated over time
• Aspects of cultural appropriation
• Graphic bloody violence may be traumatic to audiences
• Certain weapons may be demonstrative, and may encourage acquisition
• Gory sound design: more immersive and more effective
• Parkour: a classic example of imitable behaviour
• Game focuses on assassins, a career criminal who murders for money.
• Game focuses on death and organised murder
• Stereotypical gender representations, including sexualisation of women (representation of prostitutes)
• (Later games however present more detailed representations, including both male and female sex workers, and being able to choose female characters)
• Inaccurate historical representations
• Moderate bad language 
• Themes of anti religion and anti monarchy 

The effects model, and why it sucks

The effects model AKA the hypodermic needle model: videogames have a direct and definite affect on audiences, and can easily transfer the ideology of the producer in to the mind of the audience.

Fortunately, this statement is nonsense, for a number of reasons: 

• Banduras experimented on young children, who are clearly more naïve than adults
• Even children could work out that punching a 'bobo doll' is not the same as committing 'real' violence. Audiences understand this
• All audiences are different! They are not the same and react in different ways. Audiences are active: they are not passive
• Even though newspapers tend to report on any story that presents a link between videogames and violence, these stories are rare. Which is why they are so notable!
• A doll is not a person. It's a toy
• Children viewed an adult roll model violently playing with the doll

A few other, potentially better alternatives

Gerbner's cultivation theory

Being exposed to violent images over and over can normalise these processes, and can even desensitise audiences to violence! Videogames are repetitive, and often we as a player are forced to kill the same characters over and over again, and to witness the death of the player. Additionally, the Assassin's Creed franchise is an exercise in repetition, with consistent reusing of generic conventions

Hall's reception theory - an assumption that there are many ways in which an audience can receive and negotiate the ideology of the producer in a variety of different way

Different audiences will decode the ideology of the producer differently. Not all audiences will see the videogame in the same way, or will accept the messages of the videogame. For example, a classic negotiated reading would be a player who detests violence, but who is able to realise that violence in videogames is fictitious and unrealistic

Assassin's Creed's ideological perspectives

• To be successful and powerful, it is sometime necessary to kill
• To become powerful, one must become the strongest and mist dominant (character's in the franchise can progress and become more powerful)
• That thinking and acting fast should be rewarded
• That violence is in fact essential 
• Violence is sometimes acceptable, and even fun
• Assassination (i.e killing people for money) is an acceptable occupation
• The game sometimes takes an anti-monarchy and anti-establishment ideology
• The story is complicated and involving and audiences can and should concentrate very hard on it to understand it

Oppositional readings:

• Audience members may be frustrated with the lack of historical authenticity or the science fiction subplot
• Audiences may be too disgusted with the concept of violence and bloodshed to even engage!

Negotiated reading 

• May disagree with the extreme violence, but could instead be engrossed by the story. 
• Audience members may even go in to the options to switch off blood and gore effects, in effect altering the game itself to their own preferences
• Audiences may completely ignore the story, playing the game instead to muck around in the sandbox environment

Jenkins' theory of fandom

• Some audiences potentially may take their experience of the game too far. They may become obsessed with the game, and may even attempt to re-enact things...
• However, Jenkins would probably suggest that audiences can use Assassin's Creed as a starting point for a range of less harmful active readings, including cosplay, fanfic, fan films and so on!

Different approaches to layout and aesthetic: examples of Japanese magazines

While you will look at two very different types of magazine in A-level media studies, it is important to note that the minimalist style of many mass market and independent magazines is not shared around the world. Different countries and different cultures have different approaches to design, layout and utilisation of typeface. One particularly ostentatious example would be Japanese magazines, which often work by bombarding the audience with as much information and as many colours as possible! This sensibility is also reflected in Japanese website design, and Japanese architecture, which also takes a more 'maximalist' approach to design.

Perhaps you could incorporate a more maximalist approach when you create your own magazine?