One of the greatest advantages of this achievement is that it gives developers the ability to create games that are for the Xbox Series X | S are optimized. This means that they have the unique features of the Xbox Series X | S have made full use of both for new titles that are native to the Xbox Series X | S, as well as for previously published titles that were recreated specifically for the console. In our Inside Xbox Series X | S-optimized series, these developers will take a behind-the-scenes look at their titles for the Xbox Series X | Optimize S and what this means for the future of gaming.
Today we’re talking to Eric Baptizat, Game Director at Ubisoft, about optimization Assassin’s Creed Valhalla for Xbox Series X | S.
Q: What do you find most exciting about developing and producing? Assassin’s Creed Valhalla brought to life on next generation hardware?
ONE: Assassin’s Creed Valhalla takes place in the dark age of England and allows the player to travel from Norway to England and freely enter a gigantic world that takes place on foot, on horseback, on your longship or from the perspective of the raven. Next-gen is an opportunity for us to improve the graphics quality of the game to deliver the best experience possible.
Q: You didn’t just get the power and performance of the Xbox Series X | S for faster loading times, etc. Which features of the Xbox Series X | That’s what you loved most when you were using it in the development of Xbox | Assassin’s Creed Valhalla?
A: The first time you play the game on Xbox Series X, you immediately see the benefit of consistently playing at 60 frames per second. Immediately everything feels smooth and comfortable, the entire experience just feels better, and it is a joy to move around the world and flip the camera around even in the game’s busiest places. From a gameplay perspective, this means that the responsiveness of your action is only instantaneous and everything feels more fluid.
Q: How do these improvements affect a player’s experience? Assassin’s Creed Valhalla?
A: We introduced quality of life improvements for the player. For example, faster load times mean a faster way to teleport from one side of the world to the other, resulting in a change in gamers’ habits. Players who have been deterred from revisiting a location far away will hopefully find this attainable without feeling like a choir.
Q: Why did your development team choose to focus on improved graphics and frame rates as areas of improvement for Assassin’s Creed Valhalla?
A: The quality of the gaming experience is our main focus. It’s a great feeling for us to have more freedom to deliver unparalleled depth and detail in our games. On Xbox Series X, we use advanced variable resolution temporal anti-aliasing to output a 4K HDR image at a consistent frame rate of 60 fps.
Q: How do you expect fans of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla It will be with these improvements to playing on Xbox Series X | S react?
A: Players will feel the difference right away, the experience is just smoother, faster and just better.
Q: How’s the development on Xbox Series X | S?
A: It’s always fun and scary to develop on a new console. What people may not realize is that the next-gen consoles are being built at the same time that we are building our game. The challenge for us during production is to use the full potential of these as long as they do not yet exist in their final form.
Q: What improvement have you been looking forward to the most? Assassin’s Creed Valhalla on Xbox Series X | S?
A: The next-gen console gave us the opportunity to eliminate unwanted in-game friction due to technological limitations. The loading of games and waiting times for other players are drastically reduced. In the end, the game has a more fluid experience of traversing the world, especially when you are navigating at high speed (e.g. raven, boat).
Q: What does Smart Delivery mean for your game and how do you bring it with you? Assassin’s Creed Valhalla to fans?
A: It’s a great idea during this transition to the console generation. For gamers, this means they can continue their experience or their new console and even keep their progress data when they save it to the cloud. It’s a little less to worry about.
Q: What enables the development of the next generation in current or future projects that you could not have achieved with the current generation of consoles?
A: Little by little, next-gen will enable us to take a giant leap forward to realize our creative vision. The ability to deliver gigantic open worlds full of content of the highest quality helps us overcome creative boundaries. We’re excited to see how far we can push these limits of next-gen consoles, and how developers will use this power to define new types of gaming experiences.