Over the past month, Ubisoft has been embroiled in one of the biggest scandals in the history of the industry, with more than a dozen former employees alleging that the video game publisher is a haven of misogyny and sexual harassment. Now Bloomberg News has released a lengthy report revealing new details about the entrenched culture of toxicity in many of the Ubisoft studies, purportedly empowered by executives who prioritized family connections over complaints of misconduct.
One of the most annoying anecdotes comes early in the piece. At the company’s headquarters in Paris, during a presentation of a major game directed by a woman, who was out of the room at the time, creative director Serge Hascoët released a YouTube video of a French song describing sexually explicit acts. with a woman by the same name as the presenter, stopping when she returned to the room. (Hascoët has been removed from office.) A racist anecdote from the Bulgarian publisher’s office describes several staff members calling Black Star Wars actor John Boyega a “monkey.”
This culture of sexism was leaked in the publisher’s games. The report focuses on how it affected the Assassin’s Creed series, claiming that the scripts were changed in development to focus more on male characters, particularly Syndicate and Origins. According to the piece, Syndicate was supposed to feature twins Jacob and Evie alike, through Jacob finally ending up with much more screen time. Origins’ male hero Bayek was going to be injured or killed early in the game, and players would take over his wife Aya, but that changed over the course of development. The last game in the series, Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, originally only allowed players to control Kassandra, a woman. However, when members of the publisher’s male-dominated editorial team said a female lead would not sell, the players were finally given the choice of Kassandra or her brother Alexios.
In recent weeks, several employees have left Ubisoft following similar allegations, including a marketing manager and several executives named in the report. The creative director of the upcoming Assassin’s Creed Valhalla has also resigned after allegations of infidelity.
GameSpot may earn a commission from retail offers.
