"Beyond Good and Evil's influence is 2000% Miyazaki": 21 years on, the developers behind Ubisoft's cult classic reflect on how it came to be

GamesActionBeyond Good and Evil"Beyond Good and Evil’s influence is 2000% Miyazaki": 21 years on, the developers behind Ubisoft’s cult classic reflect on how it came to beWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. GamesActionBeyond Good and Evil"Beyond Good and Evil’s influence is 2000% Miyazaki": 21 years on, the developers behind Ubisoft’s cult classic reflect on how it came to beWhen you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.Here’s how it works. (Image credit: Ubisoft) After Rayman 2’s launch in 1999, its creator Michel Ancel deeply wanted some change from the series that made him one of the most acclaimed game designers in the industry. He gathered a team in Montpellier, France, to start his new project. Jean-François Le Quéré joined this team in July 2000 as a level designer after passing a few tests and an interview with Michel. Beyond Good & Evil was his first professional experience in the industry. “Videogames schools didn’t exist at the time, so the team was made of passionate people coming from diverse environments,” he tells us. “Each of them could bring their own background and references to enrich the game, making it a very varied experience.” Thus, variety became Beyond Good & Evil’s main characteristic. Variety in terms of gameplay mechanics, considering that stealth and fighting phases alternate with hovercraft races and animal shooting sessions thanks to Jade’s handy camera. There’s also variety in terms of level design, with Beyond Good & Evil offering open-world features you can access with air or land vehicles, while memorable puzzle-solving moments are found in its dungeons. The latter provide a distinct Legend Of Zelda flavour, which is not surprising, considering, “Everyone in the studio was very fond of Shigeru Miyamoto’s productions, starting with me,” admits Jean-François. “Also, Jacques Exertier, who wrote Beyond Good & Evil’s story with Michel Ancel, loved to organise live treasure hunts with the team, sometimes lasting several days. You can find this mix of exploration, observation and puzzles to solve in the game.” TheBeyond Good & Evildevelopment team also counts Hayao Miyazaki, cofounder of Studio Ghibli, among its other influences and inspirations. Florent Sacré joined the team at the beginning of 2001 as a 2D/3D graphic designer, when the team consisted of between 20 to 30 people. He mostly designed vehicles, settings and materials for the game, while Alexandra Ancel, Michel’s wife, was handling character design. (Image credit: Ubisoft) Retro Gamer: Subscribe!(Image credit: Future)This feature originally appeared inRetro Gamer magazine. For more in-depth features and interviews on classic games delivered to your door or digital device,subscribe to Retro Gamerorbuy an issue! Retro Gamer: Subscribe! (Image credit: Future)This feature originally appeared inRetro Gamer magazine. For more in-depth features and interviews on classic games delivered to your door or digital device,subscribe to Retro Gamerorbuy an issue! (Image credit: Future) This feature originally appeared inRetro Gamer magazine. For more in-depth features and interviews on classic games delivered to your door or digital device,subscribe to Retro Gamerorbuy an issue! Being clearly considered as an invitation to dream and travel,UbisoftMontpellier’s game needed a music composer with very eclectic, international tastes. Christophe Héral 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. Michel Ancel was looking for someone who didn’t come from the videogame industry, without particular knowledge about game mechanics. Someone who would come from documentary or linear narrative production. Beyond Good & Evil was meant to be a game for adults, dealing with topics like genetic manipulation to become immortal, which was what the DomZ were trying to achieve. But Jade herself uses a camera as a documentation tool, not a gun. I think there might have been some kind of link.” Being clearly considered as an invitation to dream and travel, Ubisoft Montpellier’s game needed a music composer with very eclectic, international tastes. Christophe Héral 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. Michel Ancel was looking for someone who didn’t come from the videogame industry, without particular knowledge about game mechanics. Someone who would come from documentary or linear narrative production. Beyond Good & Evil was meant to be a game for adults, dealing with topics like genetic manipulation to become immortal, which was what the DomZ were trying to achieve. But Jade herself uses a camera as a documentation tool, not a gun. I think there might have been some kind of link.” Beyond beats (Image credit: Ubisoft) Sign up to the GamesRadar+ Newsletter Weekly digests, tales from the communities you love, and more Coming from the cinema industry, Christophe had a strong experience with sound effects. He even worked on the sound of an animated short film that won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes festival. “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. “Michel gave me guidelines to follow but I couldn’t understand them so I went beyond these guidelines, keeping Michel’s wishes and level design constraints in mind,” he explains. “I then started creating a rush with a little bit of Italy, a little bit of everything I liked. It took a month to create.” Despite the short timeframe, it wasn’t straightforward. “There were many constraints on developing the city,” continues Florent. “We wanted it to be epic and majestic but we could hardly use anything to do so; we only had tiny textures, for instance. It was extremely hard to create and we struggled to optimise it. I think moving around in the city required several loading times, because there were so many things to display on the screen. When you’re on your PC and your work doesn’t fit because there is new gameplay added or the main character has to cross another zone from the city, so you have to add another exit, another part of the city, initial constraints end up breaking. So everything has to be re-optimised, you need to get rid of some textures, rationalise what has already been done to find new ways or discard entire zones because it was too wide.” (Image credit: Ubisoft) A matter of scale (Image credit: Ubisoft) “The space exploration phase also had to be scaled down. Michel wanted to develop this aspect for Beyond Good & Evil 2.” “The space exploration phase also had to be scaled down. Michel wanted to develop this aspect for Beyond Good & Evil 2.” If the stealth sections divided opinion, the same couldn’t be said for the ambitious overworld which featured some impressive effects, particularly the final rendering of Hillys' ocean. “This was Philippe Vimont’s job,” Florent explains. “As an engineer on the project, he pushed the boundaries as far as possible. There was good communication with the art team, and we were lucky enough to have engineers in the team with a great artistic sensitivity. 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.” For all the critical acclaim it would receive, Jean-François admits there were many hardships to overcome during development of Beyond Good & Evil. “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. One day, Michel asked to put Jade ‘on’ the hovercraft to check on the scale ratio and we realised Hillys was huge. I spent some time resizing Hillys to the right scale. We also had to stop developing entire parts of the game: the satellite, for instance, was supposed to be a full dungeon originally. Coming back from E3, Michel took the decision to modify the entire graphics part of Beyond Good & Evil, including the characters. Jade notably changed her appearance. He believed that [the game] didn’t enter the graphical trend of the games to be released. This decision had been taken six months before launch, and it impacted all the work done on dungeons that had been created but not designed graphically. Thus, you can’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.” (Image credit: Ubisoft) 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. One night, at two o’clock in the morning, the water level started to rise and we had to rush to the office to put the computers on the desks in the best-case scenario, otherwise all PCs would have drowned under water. The day after we took a video of us swimming in the courtyard and inside the office!” One aspect of Jade’s adventure that feels particularly relevant today is the strong message of peace and anti-totalitarianism it conveys. Using her camera, she has to prove the collusion of the supposedly local defending militia with the DomZ, the bellicose aliens. The more successful her job as a reporter is, the more evidence she gathers, the more the population demonstrates against the corrupted authorities. “We’ve always tried to spotlight values in our games without moralising, because moralising is even more annoying when you go through a videogame,” explains Florent. “But dealing with a subject in an open manner, in a way people can form their own opinions is a necessary thing. 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.” So what’s the deal with the sequel? “Yes, Beyond Good and Evil 2 is still in development,” Ubisoft confirms after 4 years of silence. Want to revisit the Prince instead?Here’s how to play the original Prince of Persia games in 2024. 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REVIEWSTV REVIEWS1Nemesis review: “A magical sense of tension"2Arcs review: “A whole lot of game in a small package"3Path of Exile 2 review: “A stellar start to a thrilling and brutal dark adventure"4Indiana Jones and the Great Circle review: “The best adventure Indy has embarked on in over 30 years"5Marvel Rivals review: “So preoccupied with trying to be like Overwatch that it forgets to play to its own strengths"1Sonic the Hedgehog 3 review: “Keanu Reeves as Shadow is wasted whilst Jim Carrey steals the show"2Mufasa: The Lion King review – “It’s no Hakuna Matata but this Disney origin story is a class above the 2019 movie"3Kraven the Hunter review: “The insistence on an R-rating helps save this, with a decent helping of bloodthirsty action"4The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim review – “An uninspired expansion of the most iconic screen take on Tolkien"5Nightbitch review: “Amy Adams' disappointing dark comedy is all bark and no bite"1Squid Game season 2 review: “Secures its place as one of the best shows on television right now"2Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat"3Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses"4Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist"5Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands” GAME REVIEWSMOVIE REVIEWSTV REVIEWS1Nemesis review: “A magical sense of tension"2Arcs review: “A whole lot of game in a small package"3Path of Exile 2 review: “A stellar start to a thrilling and brutal dark adventure"4Indiana Jones and the Great Circle review: “The best adventure Indy has embarked on in over 30 years"5Marvel Rivals review: “So preoccupied with trying to be like Overwatch that it forgets to play to its own strengths"1Sonic the Hedgehog 3 review: “Keanu Reeves as Shadow is wasted whilst Jim Carrey steals the show"2Mufasa: The Lion King review – “It’s no Hakuna Matata but this Disney origin story is a class above the 2019 movie"3Kraven the Hunter review: “The insistence on an R-rating helps save this, with a decent helping of bloodthirsty action"4The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim review – “An uninspired expansion of the most iconic screen take on Tolkien"5Nightbitch review: “Amy Adams' disappointing dark comedy is all bark and no bite"1Squid Game season 2 review: “Secures its place as one of the best shows on television right now"2Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat"3Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses"4Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist"5Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands” GAME REVIEWSMOVIE REVIEWSTV REVIEWS 1Nemesis review: “A magical sense of tension” 1Nemesis review: “A magical sense of tension” 1 Nemesis review: “A magical sense of tension” 2Arcs review: “A whole lot of game in a small package” 2Arcs review: “A whole lot of game in a small package” 2 Arcs review: “A whole lot of game in a small package” 3Path of Exile 2 review: “A stellar start to a thrilling and brutal dark adventure” 3Path of Exile 2 review: “A stellar start to a thrilling and brutal dark adventure” 3 Path of Exile 2 review: “A stellar start to a thrilling and brutal dark adventure” 4Indiana Jones and the Great Circle review: “The best adventure Indy has embarked on in over 30 years” 4Indiana Jones and the Great Circle review: “The best adventure Indy has embarked on in over 30 years” 4 Indiana Jones and the Great Circle review: “The best adventure Indy has embarked on in over 30 years” 5Marvel Rivals review: “So preoccupied with trying to be like Overwatch that it forgets to play to its own strengths” 5Marvel Rivals review: “So preoccupied with trying to be like Overwatch that it forgets to play to its own strengths” 5 Marvel Rivals review: “So preoccupied with trying to be like Overwatch that it forgets to play to its own strengths” 1Sonic the Hedgehog 3 review: “Keanu Reeves as Shadow is wasted whilst Jim Carrey steals the show” 1Sonic the Hedgehog 3 review: “Keanu Reeves as Shadow is wasted whilst Jim Carrey steals the show” 1 Sonic the Hedgehog 3 review: “Keanu Reeves as Shadow is wasted whilst Jim Carrey steals the show” 2Mufasa: The Lion King review – “It’s no Hakuna Matata but this Disney origin story is a class above the 2019 movie” 2Mufasa: The Lion King review – “It’s no Hakuna Matata but this Disney origin story is a class above the 2019 movie” 2 Mufasa: The Lion King review – “It’s no Hakuna Matata but this Disney origin story is a class above the 2019 movie” 3Kraven the Hunter review: “The insistence on an R-rating helps save this, with a decent helping of bloodthirsty action” 3Kraven the Hunter review: “The insistence on an R-rating helps save this, with a decent helping of bloodthirsty action” 3 Kraven the Hunter review: “The insistence on an R-rating helps save this, with a decent helping of bloodthirsty action” 4The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim review – “An uninspired expansion of the most iconic screen take on Tolkien” 4The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim review – “An uninspired expansion of the most iconic screen take on Tolkien” 4 The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim review – “An uninspired expansion of the most iconic screen take on Tolkien” 5Nightbitch review: “Amy Adams' disappointing dark comedy is all bark and no bite” 5Nightbitch review: “Amy Adams' disappointing dark comedy is all bark and no bite” 5 Nightbitch review: “Amy Adams' disappointing dark comedy is all bark and no bite” 1Squid Game season 2 review: “Secures its place as one of the best shows on television right now” 1Squid Game season 2 review: “Secures its place as one of the best shows on television right now” 1 Squid Game season 2 review: “Secures its place as one of the best shows on television right now” 2Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat” 2Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat” 2 Doctor Who 2024 Christmas special review: “Ncuti Gatwa is as magnetic as ever in this delightful festive treat” 3Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses” 3Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses” 3 Secret Level review: “An uneven experience with serious highlights that ultimately make up for the misses” 4Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist” 4Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist” 4 Skeleton Crew review: “Perfectly captures the vibes of classic Star Wars with a swashbuckling twist” 5Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands” 5Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands” 5 Creature Commandos review: “James Gunn’s heartwarming, R-rated tale about super-monsters proves that the DCU is in good hands”