Video game designer Michel Ancel is primarily known for his work on Rayman, Beyond Good & Evil, and Rabbids, although he also became infamous for two big failed projects attached to his name: Beyond Good & Evil 2 and WiLD.
Ancel retired from the games industry in September 2020, following allegations of toxic management. Since then, he’s been busy with something entirely different: an ecological project for the preservation of nature. However, French website Superpouvoir (which tipped us about the article) managed to score an interview with him to discuss the aforementioned unsuccessful game projects.
When it comes to Beyond Good & Evil 2, Michel Ancel cited issues with the other key figures in the studio at Ubisoft Montpellier. Apparently, they couldn’t agree on a singular vision for the game.
On BGE2, there were too many problems between managers. The artistic director wanted to redo everything constantly, the game director wanted to make a game of generated dungeons and I dreamed of a space adventure. We simply could not agree and the game director took the project in other directions.
In this type of situation, teams find themselves tossed around and don’t even know who’s in charge and making decisions. The producer is supposed to sort things out, but that didn’t happen. Yves Guillemot even had to go down to Montpellier to get things back on track, but that wasn’t enough and the game director continued in his stubbornness. When I read in Libé that I was the one directing the game and asking for changes, I thought I was going to choke. BGE2 is the game on which I don’t think I’ve ever questioned a decision. I’d be happy to discuss this topic with any potential detractors.
In the end, all this is a matter of passionate managers who did not get along. I believe that for some time now, these people have been thanked and the project has found a certain balance with new managers. These management concerns are of course very damaging for the teams. All this shows that indeed, it is not simple: a lot of egos and a lot of issues with clearly improvable human management.
There is a huge difference between developing a BGE2 that requires new technology and a project with known tech and gameplay. I believe that for a long time, the complexity of such a project was beyond many people at Ubisoft… and also in the press that did not hesitate to take shortcuts to sell paper at the time of the Parisian affairs.
There was not a single big bad guy but a sum of key concerns, unresolved at the level of the managers, of which I was one. I have my share of responsibility, and I should have defended the project better, been more present and more conciliatory with the collaborators.
Meanwhile, Michel Ancel had also founded his own studio, Wild Sheep, which was working on the PlayStation exclusive WiLD, a survival game set in a procedurally generated Neolithic world. It was announced at Gamescom 2014 and shown once again at Paris Games Week 2015, but then the studio went silent for a long time. The development reportedly continued after Ancel retired, but a few months ago, creative director Steven ter Heide confirmed that the project is no longer being actively worked on.
In the interview, Ancel explained why this project also had what he described as a ‘very unfortunate fate’:
In 2018, we had a very nice playable version, but we took time to upgrade the game on PS5, which slowed down production. On the Sony side, there were big management changes and the game was stopped. Ubisoft offered to take it back, and shortly after, Sony decided to take it back 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 the Ubisoft editorial department in Paris, itself in full 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 this time, the editorial department was in full explosion following the internal affairs surrounding Tommy François, who was also in charge of WiLD.
Michel Ancel also revealed that he doesn’t really have much time to play anymore. He did not completely shut down the door to a return to the industry, although he clarified the context would have to be ‘optimal’.