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He gathered a team in Montpellier, France, to start his new project.
Beyond Good & Evil was his first professional experience in the industry.
Thus, variety became Beyond Good & Evil’s main characteristic.
This feature originally appeared inRetro Gamer magazine.
As the game’s development evolved, Florent ended up taking on the role of lead artist.
“Visually speaking, Beyond Good & Evil’s influence is 2000% Miyazaki,” he explains.
“We were fascinated by what was considered exotic at the time.
Hayao Miyazaki wasn’t as popular in the West then as he is now.
Many team members were also sensitive to the French and Belgian bande dessinee production andDisney’s.
But Miyazaki remains the biggest poetic inspiration.”
Christophe Heral was an ideal choice.
“I am a composer who loves musical instruments,” we’re told.
“Wherever I travel I can’t help bringing back an instrument with me.
These can be quite large.
In this case I just buy more airplane tickets.
I joined the team in 1999.
Someone who would come from documentary or linear narrative production.
But Jade herself uses a camera as a documentation tool, not a gun.
I think there might have been some kind of link.”
Christophe Heral was an ideal choice.
“I am a composer who loves musical instruments,” we’re told.
“Wherever I travel I can’t help bringing back an instrument with me.
These can be quite large.
In this case I just buy more airplane tickets.
I joined the team in 1999.
Someone who would come from documentary or linear narrative production.
But Jade herself uses a camera as a documentation tool, not a gun.
I think there might have been some kind of link.”
“There isn’t really any logic.
Except for Mammago Island, obviously, populated by rhinos wearing Rasta hats.
We had to record the echoing sounds created on a neighbour’s anvil,” explains Christophe.
There are Arabic musical extracts when Jade wanders around the city.
I am Mediterranean and I like Arabic and Andalusian music.
On top of this extract I added my voice singing what I believe was Bulgarian or maybe Croatian words.
I have no idea what these words meant but I found it interesting.
Coming from the cinema industry, Christophe had a strong experience with sound effects.
“For the warehouse location in the game, we created a cinematographic atmosphere as much as we could.
It was a way to differentiate Beyond Good & Evil from other productions at the time.
Today, cinematographic methodology is the norm in the industry.
For an anecdote, Medusas' noises were created out of squeezed dog food.
I unfortunately dropped some on my trousers and had to wash them before they would get punctured.
Our techniques came from cinema and animation because it was the sound culture I had.”
While Christophe was tackling the game’s eclectic soundtrack, Florent worked on designing the city.
It took a month to create."
Despite the short timeframe, it wasn’t straightforward.
“There were many constraints on developing the city,” continues Florent.
It was extremely hard to create and we struggled to optimise it.
“Benefits and drawbacks of using such an engine were actually the same,” explains Florent.
“Engineers were always on the alert, especially those who were taking care of the tools.
“These phases are actually designed as puzzles to solve.
Maybe this is why they were so scripted.”
A matter of scale
“The space exploration phase also had to be scaled down.
Michel wanted to develop this aspect for Beyond Good & Evil 2.”
“This was Philippe Vimont’s job,” Florent explains.
“As an engineer on the project, he pushed the boundaries as far as possible.
They had enough skill to perceive all the indicators to know what path to take to satisfy our constraints.
Peter Jackson’s King Kong videogame had actually been developed with the same team.
The forest in [that] game was very impressive at the time as well.”
“My biggest challenge was creating Hillys at the right scale,” he admits.
“My first version was at the hovercraft’s scale; I took into consideration its speed.
I spent some time resizing Hillys to the right scale.
Jade notably changed her appearance.
He believed that [the game] didn’t enter the graphical trend of the games to be released.
Thus, you’re able to’t find them in the released version of the game.
The space exploration phase also had to be scaled down.
Michel wanted to develop this aspect for Beyond Good & Evil 2.”
A real-life flood also played a part in Ubisoft Montpellier’s development as well.
“The city was regularly flooded,” says Florent.
“We were working on the ground floor of an old house located in a depression.
The day after we took a video of us swimming in the courtyard and inside the office!”
A videogame needs to enter people’s hearts, to move them.
I’ve applied this pattern to all the games I’ve worked on later.”
Sadly, this Ubisoft Montpellier production knew little commercial success, though.
“Inside Ubisoft grew competition between the two projects,” he explains.
So what’s the deal with the sequel?
