Media Values and Ideology

As with institutions, it is difficult to examine the values and ideaologies present in the text because it is a game. Because there is interaction with the player, his/her choices can shape the narrative and thereby the ideologies of the text.

Assuming the player was as good/neutral as the game allowed, the values and ideologies would be heavily centred around war and religion. Because the organisation that are portrayed as evil are Christian extremists, the idealogy of religion leading to conflict is present. The theme of 'neccessary evil' is also present because the protaganist must still kill but only does so for the 'greater good'.


However, if the player chooses to be malicious and kill guards and bystanders in cold blood, the ideaologies could extend to 'the evil in all of us' and insinuate that our protaganist is just as bad as the people hunting him. Having said that however, the game will be 'desyncronised' if you murder too many innocent people, inidicated that the developers wanted to enforce the first set of values rather than the second.

Media Institutions

It is slighty more difficult to examine the instituation of this text is it isn't a film, but rather a game. Therefore, the instituations differ from the usual 'Dreamworks' or 'Warner Bros'. In this case, the institution responsible for this media text is 'Ubisoft Entertainment', a French games developer based in Montreal, Canada.

The text is fairly standard from this company as they have several third-person action games, such as Prince of Persia, Ghost Recon and Splinter Cell.

As for distribution, the text was published in CD-DVD format, with seperate versions available for Playstation 3, Xbox 360 and PC. Short demos were also distributed digitally on all three platforms, and later a full version was available through the digital-distribution service 'Steam' for a lower-than-retail price. It is still currently avaible on said service and has had 3 price-cuts to date.

Genre

Because the media text is a video-game, it comes under several genres depending on if you examine is as a narrative or a game.

If we look at the genre of the game, then we could say that both Assassin's Creed and the sequel come under:

• Third-Person
• Action
• Adventure
• Stealth
• Sandbox

However, if we are focusing on the narrative, then Assassin's Creed would be classified as:

• Murder Mystery
• Science Fiction
• Action
• Drama
• Tradegy
• Revenge
• Historical

Media Representations

Assassin's Creed I + II

There are several groups of people who are represented in Assassin's Creed I and II.

The most obvious would be religious groups, who appear in the games as the antaganists 'The Templars,' who are Christian fanatics who use violence to seize power.

Another group who are respresented within the games are the Assassin's Guild, who are to put it simply an extremist cult. However, as the player-controlled player is a prominant member of this group, we are naturally inclined to side with them. There is also a bias in the narrative; as we see events through the eyes of the Assassins, the Tempars are demonised and made to appear immoral, while the Assassins are respresented as morally-grey killers who have a warped sense of justice.

Yet another representation is that of historical societies; at several points within the games we see a rather negative portrayal of Arabian and then Renaissance society in which everyone reacts to violence with submission and are essentially 'sheeps' to oppression.

And finally, we see a brief respresentation of mobs and gangs as in the opening of Assassin's Creed II we see our protaganist hunted and see his entire family murdered as a result of mob violence.

As for who is representing these groups, it can be difficult to tell as this media text is interactive. Some would argue that the designers of the game are the ones who represent the various groups of people within the text, however one could also say that because we control the protaginist throughout events, we are the ones who represent the groups. This is also an example of self-representation, as the player can make moral choices and influence the outcome of the narrative based on their choices.

Because of the historical settings, and with the element of science-fiction, it can be difficult to tell whether these representations are accurate or justified, but the text succeeds in making a bold statement about how religion can be used with malign intent.