Game Makers: A Ubisoft Podcast

American composer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Sarah Schachner returns to the Assassin’s Creed series as one of the three composers on Assassin’s Creed Valhalla. In this episode, Schachner discusses her process creating the track “Asgard – Hall of the Aesir” in collaboration with British musician John Kenny. Kenny plays an ancient celtic instrument called the carnyx, which is used in this track to evoke the player’s journey to Asgard, the mythical land of the gods in Norse mythology. Listen to the Assassin’s Creed Valhalla Original Game Sountrack wherever you get your music: http://smarturl.it/ACV-OST

Norwegian musician Einar Selvik, known for his band Wardruna and his work on the History Channel series Vikings, is one of three composers who worked on the soundtrack of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, released by Ubisoft in November 2020. Einar focused on the in-game, skaldic music players can hear in the world of Valhalla. In this episode of Game Makers, Einar breaks down the beat, melody, instrumentation, and singing in his track “Hausbrjótr - Skullcrusher”. Assassin’s Creed Valhalla: The Wave of Giants, an album offering a selection of Einar Selvik’s tracks for the game, is available wherever you get your music: https://smarturl.it/ACV-TWOG

As Ubisoft prepares to launch Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, “Echoes of Valhalla” is an immersive historical audio documentary series about Vikings. Comedians, historians, and reconstructed scenes will bring to life the glorious eras of the people of the North, relating the story of the Vikings as you have never heard before. Check out the other episodes, available in 7 languages, on assassinscreed.com/podcast or find them directly on Spotify.

Video games are for everyone, but many players face steep barriers to playing certain games. From a lack of subtitles to overly complicated controls, there are countless examples of ways in which video games inadvertently set up barriers for players, but also countless ways to refine and improve those features and ensure a positive playing experience for everyone. Cherry Thompson, Accessibility Project Manager at Ubisoft Montréal, tells us about their career path in video game accessibility, what video game developers can do to make their games more accessible, and what they consider to be some industry benchmarks at the moment. Follow Cherry Thompson on Twitter: https://twitter.com/cherryrae?s=20 IGDA Game Accessibility Special Interest Group: https://igda.org/sigs/game-accessibility/ Game Accessibility Conference on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ga_conf?lang=en Learning to Design Games for Blind Players: https://news.ubisoft.com/en-us/article/4hE1D1MBWWssYuY7LaMmaS/learning-to-design-games-for-blind-players

What is the truth? Kenyan-Norwegian singer, songwriter, and rapper Stella Mwangi wrote the song "Ma Itu" for Just Dance 2020. Inspired by a pun in her native language, Kikuyu, and an Afro-Futuristic beat provided by her producer Tom Rogstad, Stella wrote a dancing song with a strong, inspiring meaning that explores the concept of truth. “Shukuru means we will accept the truth, we will all praise the truth,” Stella explains. “The truth will be a delight, it won’t be a fight. Like a newborn baby, it will be natural.” You can check out the official music video for “Ma Itu” on the Just Dance YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bqDde7uCOaM “Ma Itu” was written by Stella Mwangi and Tom Rogstad. “Nor Your Ordinary” was written by Stella Mwangi, Joachim Alte, and Tom Rogstad. Courtesy of Recurrent Records/Position Music.

Audio Director Lydia Andrew and the rest of the audio team at Ubisoft Québec talk about how they created the character, naval, environment, and combat sounds for Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, as well as the game’s original music.

From distant church bells and bustling factories to winding rivers and busy zoos, how do the sounds of a city-builder game adapt as you zoom the camera in and out or skip from one part of the map to the other? Members of the audio team at Ubisoft Düsseldorf talk about how they developed a brand-new environment sound system for Anno 1800 to address these challenges. Featuring Audio Director Stefan Randelshofer and Lead Audio Designer Tino Schleinitz.

Have you ever dreamed of hearing your favorite video game music played by an orchestra? Music Director and Conductor Ivan Linn talks about how he rewrote and adapted over a decade of Assassin’s Creed music for an multimedia concert featuring an 80-piece orchestra and choir and footage from Assassin’s Creed games. The Assassin’s Creed Symphony Tour is a co-production of Ubisoft and MGP Live.

Have you ever thought about the person who makes the sounds you hear when you play a video game? Footsteps, swords clanging, armor creaking... Alexis Farand is a foley artist at Ubisoft Montreal who has created sound effects for games like Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, Rainbow Six Siege, and For Honor. In this interview, Alexis shares his passion for foley and talks about some of his favorite tricks from the sound studio. For more information about the studio, visit the Ubisoft Montreal website.

Rock musicians Alain Johannes and Norm block talk about recording the music for Ghost Recon Breakpoint, taking inspiration from the game’s South Pacific island setting and tense atmosphere. This episode was recorded on the Ubisoft booth at the Los Angeles Convention Center during E3, in June 2019. Click here to listen to the Ghost Recon Breakpoint Original Soundtrack. Visit the Ghost Recon website to learn more about the game.