作者：Yassine Arif

育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室（Ubisoft Casablanca）是于1998年诞生于摩洛哥的卡萨布兰卡。该工作室开发了像《Donald Quack Attack》等著名的游戏，也联合制作了《超越善与恶》，并在开发《波斯王子：王者无双》时达到顶峰，虽然该项目最终因为其内部问题被蒙特利尔工作室所终止了。

Ubisoft(pcgames)

自2006年以来，育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室便面向Nintendo DS开发了《疯狂的兔子》和《波斯王子》等游戏。在2008年育碧和摩洛哥政府更是合作开办了一家针对于游戏开发教育的学校Campus Ubisoft，而我便是从那里毕业的关卡设计师，但不幸的是因为2009年和2010年的经济危机这间学校最终被关闭了。在那之后我加入了育碧并成为了一名游戏设计师，并参与了面向主机的《雷曼：起源》和《传奇》以及面向手机的《丛林探险》和《嘉年华》的制作。

在这家工作室待了6年后，我在1年前选择离开了这里，而在1年后育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室便关闭了。所以我想在这里和你们分享一些造成该工作室关闭的内部和外部问题（当然这是基于我自己的观点以及在这里工作时的经验所得出的结论）。

内部问题

缺少激情

在育碧卡萨布兰卡有许多开发者都缺少开发电子游戏的激情。他们中的大多数人甚至不关心那些在当地举办或全球性的电子游戏活动，如GDC大会。他们也没有创造自己游戏的计划。往往那些最有激情和才能的人都选择了离开公司去加入其它国家的工作室或创建自己的独立团队。

缺少领导力

管理一家工作室或一支团队并不等同于领导，在育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室，最高管理层的领导精神太弱了所以很难去带领整支团队。在育碧，大多数工作室都拥有非常强大的领导技能去执行最佳项目，但是育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室却处于一种被动状态，即比起去表达自己的观点，他们反倒是在等待着来自总部的项目分配与指导。

缺少愿景

育碧总是主张去创造能够丰富玩家体验的有趣游戏，这也是我们在每一家成功的工作室中所感受到的强大但却简单的愿景。但是在卡萨布兰卡工作室中，他们却未能有效传达这样的愿景去引导整支团队。甚至有个制作人曾经告诉我，我们并不与愿景，因为游戏产业每天都在发生着变化而我们只需要去遵循潮流便可。所以为了在游戏产业中获得竞争力，该工作室最终未设立任何目标或愿景。

抱着舒适区心态

就像育碧阿布扎比工作室的Yannick Theler曾经在会议上说过：“现在的我们正处于舒适区中，而为了继续创新我们就必须走出这一舒适区。”但是在卡萨布兰卡工作室中，舒适区心态却始终萦绕着这家工作室，即大多数成员都是处于等待退休的状态。每一次当全新人才尝试着一些全新创意或想要发挥创造性的时候都会遭到来自老一辈的保守心态的阻扰，因为任何改变都会破坏这种舒适区。

缺少价值

育碧是一家基于合作，分享和透明度等核心价值的家庭导向型公司，而这里所提到的每个价值都需要以具体行动去付诸实践，如每年的透明度评估，让成员能够就国际资源，团队和项目等进行交流与分享的内部平台（他们会与其它团队一起合作开发项目从而获得进一步发展的机会）。但是在卡萨布兰卡工作室，他们却从未去分享并执行公司的价值。

缺少职业发展

我是作为一名关卡设计师加入育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室，最开始我所扮演的角色是初级游戏设计师，但是从那以后到我结束合同时，我的头衔从未发生变化。或许是因为作为游戏设计师的我还不够优秀？但是如果是这样的话，换在其它公司里我早就被开除了不是吗。育碧拥有非常明确的职业发展标准。但是在卡萨布兰卡工作室，这种发展却太不合理了，在每一年的评估中我们甚至没有任何明确的目标。我觉得这里的职业发展判断标准更多地是基于高层管理的经济状况而缺少公司愿景的影响。所以很多成员因为这种止步不前的职业发展最终选择了离开这家工作室。

创造性过程中的官僚主义

在卡萨布兰卡工作室，大多数情况下各种繁文缛节手续都比项目的质量还重要。尽管在育碧，比起保持整个过程的灵活性，他们更倾向于初创企业管理方式，并且玩家的满意度也总是处于决策制定中间位置。

独裁超越了参与式管理

曾经有个制作人跟我说：“我不相信参与式管理，资源管理应该如军队管理一般。”自从过去两年以来，这里的决策制定便不再咨询团队成员意见，所以便导致许多资源因为缺少反馈而未能真正落实行动。其实在育碧，真正的成功是基于来自世界各地工作室中所有成员的强大参与式管理。

外部问题

教育薄弱且缺少人才资源

摩洛哥教育系统非常薄弱且仍处于改革中。因为这一不利因素，卡萨布兰卡工作室的的科学和工程水平便远落后于国际竞争标准，而在游戏开发领域，如果要创造出真正优秀的游戏和引擎，工程与科学标准便需要很高。同时育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室很难去吸引全新的人才，而从外国引进资源又非常昂贵。

缺少产业竞争

18年来，摩洛哥唯一的官方电子游戏公司就只有育碧。有些人可能会认为这便是很好的垄断市场的机会，但其实这更多地会导致它们的停滞不前。就像育碧蒙特利尔工作室的成功便与其和艺电与华纳兄弟等工作室的强大竞争相关，因为创造性破坏环境，每家公司都不得不去吸收最优秀的人才并努力创造出最出色的游戏。

缺少政府支持

对于中东亚区域来说，像1998年育碧进入摩洛哥，或者在2008年开办了面向游戏开发的专业学校等等都是非常大的创举。但是仅凭产业初创性是不足以推动发展的，这还需要策略性支持。

结论

作为摩洛哥唯一一家官方电子游戏工作室却倒闭了，这真的是一大悲剧，但是育碧卡萨布兰卡在存在期间却做出了许多具有创造性的尝试。

2012年我们创建了当地社区Moroccan Game Developers，即希望能在摩洛哥创造一个电子游戏产业，并希望能够因此带动那些想要加入游戏产业的当地游戏开发者们，即激励他们走上独立开发道路并去开发自己的游戏，而不再只是将加入育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室作为职业规划。

那些来自育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室的前成员们都纷纷创建了自己的独立游戏工作室，例如Palm Grove Software或Rym Games（游戏邦注：正面向Steam和主机平台开发恐怖游戏《凶宅惊魂》）。还有其他前成员所筹备的独立工作室也即将问世了。

在我离开该公司后，我和前同事共同创建了TheWallGames，即旨在创造具有意义的游戏体验的独立游戏工作室。

在10月15日和16日，我们将在卡萨布兰卡举办名为Maghreb Game Conference的首次游戏开发者峰会，希望能够将更多来自北非的开发者社区组合在一起，并从那些来自北欧社区旨在创造强大的区域游戏产业的Nordic Game Conf中获取灵感。

最后但并非最不重要的，从整体看来育碧是一家专注于为所有玩家创造丰富电子游戏体验的优秀电子游戏公司，而育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室能够为许多当地开发者进入专业电子游戏开发领域提供机会。我非常庆幸自己在育碧中学到了许多，而育碧卡萨布兰卡工作室也将始终存在于摩洛哥的电子游戏产业发展史中。

（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，拒绝任何不保留版权的转发，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）
How Ubisoft Casablanca failed after 18 years experience

by Yassine Arif

Ubisoft Casablanca started in 1998 in the city of Casablanca, Morocco. The studio developed famous titles as Donald Quack Attack, co-produced Beyond Good and Evil, and was on its pick when they took the development of Prince of Persia: Two thrones, but the project was taken back by Montreal for internal issues.

Since 2006 Ubisoft Casablanca developed titles in Nintendo DS as Raving Rabbids, and both Prince of Persia. In 2008, Ubisoft and the Moroccan government joined to open Campus Ubisoft a specialised school for Game Development, which i graduated from as a Level designer, but unfortunately, the campus was shut down because of the economic crisis in 2009/10. After that, i joined Ubisoft as a Game Designer where we co-developed Rayman Origins, Legends in consoles, Jungle and Fiesta run on Mobile.

After working in the studio for 6 years, i’ve left a year ago because the smell of fire was on the air, one year later Ubisoft Casablanca was closed. I would like to share here some of the internal and external issues that contributed to the closure, which is based on my personal view and experience while working there.

Internal issues

Lack of passion

Many of the developers in Ubisoft Casablanca weren’t really passionate about making video games. Mostly were not even aware of about local or global video game events as the GDC. Neither plan to make their own game. The most passionate and talented resources left the company to join other international studios, or starting an indie journey.

Lack of leadership

Managing a studio or a team is not leading, in Ubisoft Casablanca the leadership spirit on the top management was too weak to guide the resources and impose itself in the group. Most of the studios of Ubisoft were showing high leadership skills to get the best project, while Ubi casa was in a passive position, waiting to receive projects and guidance from the headquarter than imposing their vision and autonomy.

Lack of vision

Ubisoft vision is to create fun games that enrich the player experience, it is a powerful simple vision that we feel in every other successful studio of the corporate, but in Casablanca the vision wasn’t even communicated clearly to guide the team. One of the producers even told me once that we don’t need a vision, because the game industry is changing every day and we should just follow the wave. Well… the studio was turning around without any goal or vision to follow in order to be competitive in the game industry.

Comfort zone mindset

As Yannick Theler Manager of Ubisoft Abu Dhabi once said in a meeting: “We are now in the comfort zone and we have to get out of it in order to innovate”. But in Casablanca, Comfort zone mindset was all over the studio, most of the resources were waiting for retirement or an event that will end their routine days. Every time the young recruited talents tried something new or wanted to push the creative boundaries, they had a reactionary behavior from the old generation, because change was destructive for their Comfort zone.

Lack of values

Ubisoft is a familial oriented company based on core values as Collaboration, Sharing and Transparency, each of the values mentioned are well executed by concrete actions as yearly transparent evaluation, internal platforms that allow exchange and sharing between international resources and teams, projects were mostly developed in collaboration with other team to give them opportunities to evolve. But in Casablanca, the corporate values weren’t even shared neither executed.

Lack of career evolution

I joined Ubisoft Casablanca as a level designer, I was proposed a game designer junior role which i accepted, but since then my title never changed until i ended my contract 6 years later. Maybe because i was too bad as a game designer? Logically as any other company, i should have being fired then, but still I was sent into missions to other studios… Ubisoft has very clear career evolution criteria. But in Casablanca studio, the evolution was too irrational and we didn’t have concrete objectives to follow on each year evaluation. I felt that the criteria to judge was more based on top management financial and lack of vision constraint. Many left the studio to other companies because of this career stagnation.

Bureaucratic over Creative process

Most of the time in Casablanca studio, protocols and bureaucratic process was more important than the quality of the project. While in Ubisoft generally, there is a preference for a startup management approach rather than corporate to keep flexibility in the process, and player satisfaction is always on the middle of decision making.

Dictatorship over Participative management

A producer once told me, ? I don’t believe in Participative management, the resources should be managed as in the Military… ?. Since the last two years, decisions are taken without any consultation with the teams, which discouraged many resources to take initiatives by fear and lack of feedback. While at Ubisoft group, the actual success is based on a very strong participative management that includes everyone from the worldwide studios.

External Issues

Educational weakness, and lack of talented resources

Moroccan educational system is weak and actually under reform. But because of this handicap, Academicals level of science and engineering is low compared to international competitive standard, while in game development, a high level of engineering and Science is still required to build good games and engines. And it was hard for Ubisoft Casablanca to recruit new talents, and bringing resources from foreign country was very costly.

No Industrial competition

For 18 years, the only official video game company in Morocco was Ubisoft. Some may think it’s a good opportunity for monopole, but it was more a statu quo context, as an ex-manager of the studio explained to us. Ubisoft Montreal success is related to the high competition from studios as EA and Warner Bros, and because of the creative destruction environment, each studio was obliged to recruit the best talent and make the best games in order to keep in track.

Weak governmental follow up

Inviting a big company as Ubisoft to open a filial in Morocco in 1998, or starting a specialized school for game development in 2008 were an avant-garde initiative for MEA region. But starting an industrial initiative are not enough for growth, and it should be followed by strategical checkup.

Conclusion

The closure of the only official video game studio in a country, is a tragedy, but many initiatives were built during Ubisoft Casablanca period.

In 2012, we started Moroccan Game Developers, a local community which envision to Develop a video game industry in Morocco, we built this initiative with the intention to give a new reference for local game developers who are willing to join the game industry, by inspiring them to go indie and to develop their own games, rather than to focus only on joining Ubisoft Casablanca as a career fatality.

Formers from Ubisoft Casablanca started their own indie game studio as Palm Grove Software, or Rym Games who are developing The Conjuring House a promising horror game for steam and console. Other indie game studios from former of Ubisoft are coming soon.

After i left the company, I co-founded TheWallGames with formers of Ubi casa, an indie game studio that aim to build meaningful gaming experience

In next 15 and 16 October, we will organize the first summit for game developers in Casablanca called Maghreb Game Conference that aim to join together communities of game developers from the north african region, we took inspiration from the Nordic Game Conf who focuses on the Nordic communities to build a strong regional game industry.

Last but not least, Ubisoft as a group is a great video game company that focus on making rich video game experience for all the players, and Ubisoft Casablanca was an opportunity for many local developers to get into professional video game development. I am very thankful for everything I have learned while working for Ubisoft, which will always stay on the core history of shaping the video game industry in Morocco.（source：Gamasutra）