Rayman remake rumor - confirmed by Ubisoft!

[Greengoop]

I hope all this drama doesn’t lead to it getting cancelled, this is insane!

[Droolie]

It would probably have been better not to post at all...

That said, nothing in this post seems to have been said with ill will - this guy's just really tired of the witch hunts that have been going on against him ever since the initial Libération article. The way I understand it, he isn't threatening people to go to court, but asking to seek justice properly instead of through the internet mob.

Yes, these witch hunts are still going on:

• In Frandroid's recent article, which it seems Ancel is directly replying to ("Le redoutable Michel Ancel" is a direct reply to the title of the article)
• In Gautoz' videos, he's still painting Ancel as a toxic boss
• Here in the Rayman fandom, with various people stating they do not want him back because they were convinced he is indeed a toxic boss

It's hard to understand that people still don't get that this whole thing was a personal attack against him. So many people are convinced this guy was a "toxic boss", but let me bring up this post from a few years back where Ancel explained he explained he is not a manager or even a boss of any kind: he brings a vision and other people at Ubisoft, such as the producers and various managers, are/were responsible for acting on this. We also thought BGE2's development hell was his fault, but it continued long after he left - do we really need any more proof that Ancel was not the issue?

However, there are clearly people who hate him at Ubisoft, either from being jealous of his success or yes, of him being hard to work with - but in a different sense. There is a thread in the comments of one of the Gautoz videos, between two ex-Ubi Montpellier devs who talk about their experiences working with Ancel. He's described as a big kid who isn't a toxic boss but gets lost in the creative process and who doesn't really have a full grasp on how to make games these days. He needs people who can understand him well and as a result, he doesn't work well in large teams, which as I've detailed before he's tried to avoid several times over his career.
These testimonies are quite a bit more nuanced than the Libération article. That one really felt like it was written with ill intent, and in fact it was, as Ancel tried to explain. At the time he even provided the receipts (unlike the article!), but people didn't even read them properly. It clearly accomplished its main goal of setting up the whole internet against him, and here we are now, with this internet drama still going on after years.

Dogpiling like this - especially without knowing the full story - is fucking stupid, you know.

----

By the way, he's made another post. I dunno it seems pretty obvious to me that he is in fact the victim in this whole case...

[Hunchman801]

That comment on the YouTube video is quite interesting indeed, I'll quote it for posterity:

Pour avoir travaillé avec Michel, je tiens à préciser que, s'il est difficile de bosser avec lui pour plusieurs raisons que je vais détailler, on est loin du patron toxique (que j'ai connu par ailleurs).

Oui, c'est créativement compliqué de bosser avec lui, pour plein de raisons. Déjà, il s'attend toujours à un niveau de qualité hyper élevé, même en phase de prototype. Il a souvent une idée très précise de ce qu'il veut à un moment T, mais sans le talent pour bien le communiquer, à part via des gribouillis peu clairs qui rendent le tout encore plus confus. Donc il s'attend à un travail de haut niveau qualitatif, respectant très précisément ses specs techniques (alors que bien souvent, l’idée de base est bancale, et on peut le voir avant de l’implémenter), sans vrai talent pour communiquer son idée. C’est une méthodo qui marchait sans doute mieux dans les années 90-2000, mais aujourd’hui beaucoup moins. Michel, c’est quelqu’un qui fonctionne sans doute mieux avec une petite équipe qu’il connait bien et avec qui la communication est presque intuitive (un talent précieux, clairement pas mon cas). Il n’est jamais toxique dans sa communication : il est cool, il met à l’aise, c’est un peu un golden retriever qui parfois te regarde avec cet air confus, ne comprenant pas ton propre manque de compréhension, mais sans malice. Michel est sympathique, et pourtant tout le monde est d’accord pour dire que c’est en partie à cause de lui que le(s) projet(s) n’avance(nt) pas. En un mot, c’est flou. Il ne sait sans doute plus faire du jeu vidéo, en tout cas à l'échelle moderne.

J’ai parlé avec un tas d’anciens d’Ubi à diverses occasions et certes, on était contents quand il n’était pas là, car alors on pouvait "avancer et bosser tranquillement". Dans ce sens, ce que j'ai lu dans les papiers de Libé sur lui à l'époque était crédible. Michel n'est pas un méchant, rien à voir avec ce que le reste de la direction d'Ubi a pu faire, mais c'est de ce genre d'esprit créatif qui se perd dans l'acte créatif et la production sans fin ni but, et si je ne l'appréciais pas particulièrement professionnellement, je n'avais rien à dire de lui humainement. Michel, c'est un grand enfant fait pour une autre époque.

Donc, consultant, sur une petite équipe, sur un Rayman... ça me semble parfait pour lui.

Translation:

Having worked with Michel, I would like to point out that, while it is difficult to work with him for several reasons that I will detail, we are far from the toxic boss (that I have known elsewhere).

Yes, it is creatively complicated to work with him, for many reasons. First, he always expects a very high level of quality, even in the prototype phase. He often has a very precise idea of ​​what he wants at a given time, but without the talent to communicate it well, except via unclear scribbles that make everything even more confusing. So he expects high-quality work, respecting his technical specifications very precisely (while very often, the basic idea is shaky, and we can see it before implementing it), without any real talent for communicating his idea. This is a method that probably worked better in the 90s-2000s, but much less today. Michel is someone who probably works better with a small team that he knows well and with whom communication is almost intuitive (a precious talent, clearly not my case). He is never toxic in his communication: he is cool, he puts you at ease, he is a bit of a golden retriever who sometimes looks at you with this confused look, not understanding your own lack of understanding, but without malice. Michel is likeable, and yet everyone agrees that it is partly because of him that the project(s) are not moving forward. In a word, it is vague. He probably no longer knows how to make video games, at least on a modern scale.

I have spoken with a lot of former Ubi employees on various occasions and of course, we were happy when he was not there, because then we could "move forward and work quietly". In this sense, what I read in the Libé articles about him at the time was credible. Michel is not a bad guy, nothing like what the rest of Ubi's management has done, but it's this kind of creative spirit that gets lost in the creative act and production without end or goal, and if I didn't particularly like him professionally, I had nothing to say about him humanly. Michel is a big kid made for another time.

So, consultant, on a small team, on a Rayman... it seems perfect for him.

It's just one person's opinion, but it certainly contrast with some of the rather acrimonious depictions that can be found elsewhere.

[PluMGMK]

Ah yes… I've worked with at least one each of the categories "horrible bosses" and "guys who drive people crazy with their mad but sometimes brilliant ideas" so I think I know what that person's on about. It makes sense that Michel would be in the latter category. I also know from experience that there are people who mistake one for the other, so I can see where that came from too

[Sabertooth]

This is fascinating me to my core. I love stuff like this. I wish Michel Ancel would do an in-depth interview about his creative process and experience working on games.

[Greengoop]

Has michel ancel actually done one of those for years?

[RayCarrot]

I don't think the whole discussion around Michel Ancel's behavior is that cut and dry. From the various devs we've talked to I think it's clear that he's a complicated person and is someone people either love or hate. He's been described by multiple people as being "very demanding" and someone with very strong opinions. As one person says, "you have to know how to behave" when being around him. Another person described how he could be harsh and cruel, firing an an employee he didn't like in front of everyone without warning, but also very friendly and polite, even taking people out to eat after work and giving them gifts.

He's also been described as being much like a kid when working on these games and liked having fun with the tools they created. He's someone who prefers working in smaller teams, which is why the development history of Rayman Origins is so fascinating. The team that started this left Ubisoft's building after development issues with the then BG&E2 project to work in a small villa. They were just a small group of friends brainstorming ideas and building a new engine from scratch, not reusing any existing tools from before. They wanted to create something new that they could open source and share with the community. However Ubisoft had other plans. The engine changed from ITF (Interractive Framework) to UBI Art and became another closed source internal tool at Ubisoft. Anyway, I think this shows the way Ancel likes to work and I think he attempted something similar again with the Space Monkey program in BG&E2, where they wanted to work closely with the community on the game. But this way of working seems very much at odds with how a big company like Ubisoft likes to do things. I think this can partially explain some of the frictions that have occurred. He even left Ubisoft several times in the past, albeit for very short times as he was always convinced to return.

As for his Instagram posts, one of my main problems with the way he's refuted these claims is that he's immediately jumping on everything being fake. I don't like how he used BG&E characters in his posts to make his points and how he would start arguing in the comments. I think the situation is too nuanced for that sort of reaction to do any good. But I'm glad in his latest comment that he actually admitted that he didn't always act exemplary. To me that does a lot to add trust, as he can also admit some of his faults. Cause at the end of the day we're all human, and when you have someone as important as him in a company there are bound to be people who don't like you or disagree with your methods.

So yeah, it really does suck that there are people who hold a grudge against him and have caused this all to blow out of proportion. I think one thing which has made is especially bad is that the articles about him came out around the same time as actual harassers at Ubisoft were being exposed. It sadly made people confuse the two and think Ancel was involved in that, which obviously was never the case.

[Pirez]

People react differently to other people. Some people gel with others and some don't. The antics coming from Ancel, some people can vibe with, some can tolerate and some cannot. The article from Libération reads as the most disgruntled people speaking. Some must exist.

What is aggravating in Ancel's case is that the upper management has covered abusive behavior for years and Ancel was well regarded by the same upper management, poisoning him by association. That being said, some of his defense ring a bit insincere : you don't need to be directly involved in a team to be toxic towards it. He says himself that people are accusing him of changing his mind, his defense is that people changed stuff despite of his advice not to. I've been around many managers and this is usually the part where they leave off the fact that they expressed frustration. As RayCarrot said, somehow every accusation directed at Ancel is fake and there is no room for reflection of Michel's part. Different personalities in different people lead to different relationships. Acknowledging that his antics may not be perceived favorably to everyone may have given him the credibility of a sensible person, but all we get is a "this is fake news" rebuttal.

As for the shtick of "come at me through the means of the law if you're serious", that is forgetting that lower class employees that put their name on a lawsuit potentially face the risk of being blacklisted in an industry that is very volatile (see : AAA companies closing studios and laying off people to engineer market growth, seemingly on a whim). He's coming from a place of privilege, being a name nobody can ignore, but I can guarantee that the intern from QA can not open his mouth if he'd like to get/keep his job at the end of the month. AAA studios have used this to justify crunch and abusive behavior for decades, even the supposed good ones (Bioware, CDPR).

There's evidently bitterness in Ancel's latest comments and I can understand why. Even if the "I did nothing wrong" comments are an act, he left in 2019 to turn the page and get quietness but he now learns that, whether what we know is real or fake, the internet doesn't forget. Infortunately, his responses, while he feels them to be necessary, only fuel the fire of a project whose doubts cannot stop growing.

[hoodlumsworld]

Anyway, I think this shows the way Ancel likes to work and I think he attempted something similar again with the Space Monkey program in BG&E2, where they wanted to work closely with the community on the game.

I'm a bit surprised to read this, because in almost three decades of Rayman, Ancel has never engaged with the fans a single time. Even this place is like, what, 21 years old, and without a doubt the most recognizable landmark in the community, having seen the likes of figures such as Rémi Gazel, and yet I don't think there ever was a single acknowledgement from the creator of the series. Not that Ancel is publicity-shy, he's been in all the newspapers and made plenty of public appearances. Yet a small fan interview was too much?

I'm not judging or questioning his decisions (that would be bold without more context), just highlighting the contrast between the apparent goal of the Space Monkey program and his approach to the Rayman series.

[Hunchman801]

I'm a bit surprised to read this, because in almost three decades of Rayman, Ancel has never engaged with the fans a single time. Even this place is like, what, 21 years old, and without a doubt the most recognizable landmark in the community, having seen the likes of figures such as Rémi Gazel, and yet I don't think there ever was a single acknowledgement from the creator of the series. Not that Ancel is publicity-shy, he's been in all the newspapers and made plenty of public appearances. Yet a small fan interview was too much?

I'm not judging or questioning his decisions (that would be bold without more context), just highlighting the contrast between the apparent goal of the Space Monkey program and his approach to the Rayman series.

Yeah, I voiced similar thoughts a few years ago:

Well, there aren't exactly many Rayman communities around, let alone ones over seventeen years old, so it's safe to assume he's well aware of our existence. More often than not, game creators prefer not to get involved with fans too much, whether it's company policy or they just don't want to be influenced by what they read. And let's be honest, a lot of them don't really care either.

An interview of Michel Ancel by the community was planned in 2011, but the project eventually died down due to a lack of progress on Ubisoft's side. The community managers I was in touch with did their best to get Ancel and the rest of the development team to participate, and they initially agreed, but they couldn't find the time to answer twenty curated questions over the course of many, many months, which in my humble opinion speaks volumes about their interest in the project, the fans, and this community.

One reason might be that, in all likelihood, Ancel got tired of Rayman more than 15 or even 20 years ago, and has since channeled all of his energy into other projects such as Beyond Good and Evil. Yes, there was Rayman Origins too, but that game is so different from anything else in the series before it that shows a clear intent to try something completely new, reusing Rayman's name but not his spirit.

But hey, maybe that changed and Rayman is back for good in his creator's mind? It's never too late to engage with the community.

[RayCarrot]

One reason might be that, in all likelihood, Ancel got tired of Rayman more than 15 or even 20 years ago, and has since channeled all of his energy into other projects such as Beyond Good and Evil. Yes, there was Rayman Origins too, but that game is so different from anything else in the series before it that shows a clear intent to try something completely new, reusing Rayman's name but not his spirit.

Yeah to clarify, when I said community I didn't specifically mean the Rayman, or even a gaming, community, but more to have his work be more open and not confined to how a big company like Ubisoft usually works. You might also be right about Rayman, cause Rayman Origins didn't actually start as a Rayman game. When these developers were creating the engine by themselves they created multiple different game prototypes and brainstormed a lot of ideas. Rayman Origins didn't come until later. And I think the initial ideas with Origins was for it to be a very small scale game that you could download in episodes, but due to pressure from Ubisoft they ended up making it a fully fleshed out game instead, with a now bigger team than originally planned.

[Pirez]

But hey, maybe that changed and Rayman is back for good in his creator's mind? It's never too late to engage with the community.

Again, let's be careful if yes. Take it from someone who had a gigantic faith in Mighty N°9 during its announcement.

[Droolie]

I have to agree that Michel Ancel wanting to work closely with the community is probably "fake news". He has almost never engaged with the fans, aside from a few livestreams and the rare personal contacts like sending a gift to congratulate for Rayman Advance speedrun. I suspect we have been more a bother to him these past few decades than anything else. Even now on Instagram he still gets more comments about "Rayman 4???" than anything else, while he left Ubisoft years ago.

As for Michel Ancel's defense, he's stated in previous comments before that he's not entirely blameless. This nuance has been there from the start. Ancel has been insisting that not everything, but a large majority of the points brought up in the Libération article were fake. Yes, of course, like every good lie, this article is obviously based on some degree of truth. (Think about fake videogame leakers for example: their classic tactic is to post some good guesses and some wild dreams. If some of the good guesses turn out to be true, then people will believe the wild dreams as well)
However, unlike the article which had only anonymous testimony, he provided proof for his defense as best as possible. Of course the internet is not a court of law, so this actually does not matter a bit, and his use of the term "fake news" with its negative connotation apparently stood out more than the points he was trying to make.

Hypothetically, if the article was indeed almost entirely fake, what do you do in his position? How do you defend yourself against this kind of defamation?
Personally, I would shut up about it and take it to court. And I think he would try if he could, too - the issue is that the source of the article is entirely anonymous, so it's impossible to do so. The only way to make any progress for either side is if the people behind these accusations come out in the open - that is I think why he has been bringing this up so much in his latest comments.
Until then, all he can do is either take it in silence and disappear, or try to defend himself on Instagram and fail, because people on the internet have the mindset to believe accusations by default and to doubt anything the "offender" tries to say to his defense. As Pirez said, the internet doesn't forget, and these accusations keep getting brought up again and again even when nothing new has actually happened, so he has no chance of returning with a clean slate.
Regardless of which side you take, you have to admit this is a far too easy (anonymous) and very effective way to ruin a person's life.

[Pirez]

Hypothetically, if the article was indeed almost entirely fake, what do you do in his position? How do you defend yourself against this kind of defamation?
Personally, I would shut up about it and take it to court.

Here in France defamation lawsuit have been won even if there was partial truth to the claims if it is determined that the libel really outweighs the correctness. It's about protecting the honor or integrity of the victim. In fact, politicians are usually very trigger happy with defamation lawsuit, even when they know they lose them : the cycle of news tends to amplify the announcement of a defamation lawsuit, but not the verdict which can take years to come.

This is a thing that I'd see Yves Guillemot do, but not Ancel. Just because you're (alledgedly/potentially) toxic doesn't mean you're evil or even have evil designs. I can see how a creative becomes a bad manager and ends up being a nuisance to his team, but I can't see a creative really passionate about creating video games being an ass to people on purpose. I just don't get that vibe from Ancel.

[TeensieKing]

They did add some extra quests to the BG&E remaster… Rayman 3 is way more linear though so I'm not sure how they'd manage that… Maybe restoring some of the missing secret rooms that have been speculated to exist?

I'd be fine if they added some achievements related to scoring, to give the system some kind of purpose.

I know the game looks acceptable, it's just that throwing R3 basically as is on modern consoles with no effort feels so... lazy. A fan is remaking Rayman 3 on Unreal Engine 5 in his free time, why can't they do something like that with a proper professional team?

Smh, what gives me hope is that if they ever want to scan the Internet for fan reactions this is the number 1 place , and they'd read that we think they should do something more interesting.

[Retrofuge]

I'd be fine if they added some achievements related to scoring, to give the system some kind of purpose.

I know the game looks acceptable, it's just that throwing R3 basically as is on modern consoles with no effort feels so... lazy. A fan is remaking Rayman 3 on Unreal Engine 5 in his free time, why can't they do something like that with a proper professional team?

Smh, what gives me hope is that if they ever want to scan the Internet for fan reactions this is the number 1 place , and they'd read that we think they should do something more interesting.

Honestly, after Rayman 3 HD disaster, I really doubt Ubisoft would try to do the same mistake again. That was pretty much what you described for the most part. It's not really something I should be expecting. Also, judging by the BG&E1 remaster, Ubisoft would put more effort this time. Who knows, it might explain why these HD remasters were never re-released or delisted silently. But, I'm going to be honest, probably keep myself cautiously optimistic towards the ordeal. If a fan can do very high quality remaster, Ubisoft should be achieving the same quality if not better.

[Droolie]

No new news about the Rayman remake, but I figured I would share this new Michel Ancel interview here since there has been some discussion around him here recently:
https://www.superpouvoir.com/entretien- ... velle-vie/

It's a good read and quite nuanced, I'd advise just running the whole thing through Google Translate.
For me, the most interesting part was probably what happened to WiLD. There had been a rumor at some point that Ubisoft had taken over the project. It turns out that this was true, and that this was what ultimately killed the project:

WiLD had a very unfortunate fate. In 2018, we had a very beautiful playable version, but we took time to upgrade the game on PS5, which slowed down production. On the Sony side, there were major management changes and the game was stopped. Ubisoft offered to take it over, and shortly after, Sony decided to take it over by even offering to double the budgets! Unfortunately, the contracts with Ubisoft were well advanced and we refused Sony's proposal. What a shame!

It was during this period that I had my burnout and, unfortunately, the game fell into the hands of Ubisoft's editorial department in Paris, itself in chaos. I was no longer there to defend the game, which was literally crushed by people from this department who asked for all sorts of changes without really playing the game. A real scandal. After two years of wandering, the game was abandoned on the pretext that it no longer corresponded to the initial game... You have to understand that at that time, the editorial department was in full explosion following the internal affairs around Tommy François, who was also in charge of WiLD.

WiLD, another cursed project? Certainly. I will have a lot of pleasure in sharing the playable demo video from 2018 which, like that of BGE2 at the same time, was more than promising. 2018: the beginning of the end...

Yeah I think this company has some big problems.

Anyway, from his wording throughout the article, it seems he still wants to come back to games one day, but now's not yet the time.

[Sabertooth]

If I worked for years on a creative passion project only for it to get canceled, I don't think I'd get out of bed for a week. Glad I'm not a game developer.

[Hunchman801]

An interesting part is that it kinda sounds like his consulting mission on Rayman has already ended:

- You recently did some consulting for Ubisoft on the Rayman license. Do you feel ready to fully return to video games today?

- I love video games and it's a field in which I'm comfortable if the context is good. I had a lot of fun working on Rayman again. However, I decided to take a step back until the context is optimal.

[RayCarrot]

An interesting part is that it kinda sounds like his consulting mission on Rayman has already ended:

Yep, he confirmed that on Instagram as well. It does make me wonder how long he was there and what exactly he helped with. The project did start development earlier this year, so it's still very early.