In a rather bizarre story earlier today, some Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag concept art managed to pop up in the latest Uncharted 4: A Thief's End trailer. After it was pointed out by a Ubisoft employee, people began to assume that Naughty Dog may have nicked the picture and been caught red handed.
As it turns out, that assumption might not be far from the truth. The studio has posted an official statement that reads "In our eagerness to get the story trailer out we made a regrettable mistake and didn't thoroughly vet the art work used for an in game painting. We've already updated the trailer. We hold all artistry in high regard and take full responsibility for having allowed this to happen." It concludes: "We want to sincerely apologize to everyone at Ubisoft, the Assassin's Creed team, the original artist, and our fans."
A classy response, then, but we're sure that there'll be blushes in the Naughty Dog office right now. And, as stated, the developer has indeed pushed out a new trailer - one that doesn't feature the now infamous concept art - which we've embedded at the bottom of this article. As if you needed another excuse to watch it.
[source naughtydog.com]
Comments 20
Storm in a teacup as usual
Who cares. At least a part of Ubisoft's mediocre game made it into what I'm sure will be another Naughty Dog masterpiece.
Yeah, this really is a whole lot of nothing. But I reckon Naughty Dog will be feeling quite embarrassed about the entire thing since they take small details so seriously.
Wow they didn't hang about getting that changed! Prefer the Ubisoft painting though! heh
@stevie85 Im not a massive fan of the AC series but, ACBF was not mediocre. It was a pretty good game to be fair.
@WARDIE They all look the same to me at this stage. Ubisoft diluted the whole series by making it an annual thing.
This isn't the first time. Didn't they copy a Boston metro map for the last of us?
Go & copy some concept art out of a well know video game & put it into a small budget game, I dare you. I can guarantee you'll not get some remark about it on a social media site, you'll have a law suit around your neck from the publisher the company that owns the IP. This seems more like a publicity stunt, they just so happen to have another trailer convenient.
@ztpayne7 They did. An unofficial, yet copyrighted map.
My million dollar question is how a thing like this would slip by. Did ND just randomly nab an artwork and not look at who did it? I don't see why they would feel the need to steal art from another studio, as it just results in a story like this which would be easily avoided.
@DerMeister
Exactly. Why create a situation where there doesn't need to be one? Especially when I'd argue ND has some of, maybe the best artists, in the industry. Couldn't have used some old concept art from one of its own games? Not surprising to see some people here say it's no big deal though. Let somebody take ND's work, however, and they are scum.
@Gamer83
I'm with you. Naughty Dog gets a free pass to the biggest fanboys because it's their favorite and one of the best if not the best (I give them that) PS developer.
Anyway, this is a great publicity stunt to me. Either intentionally or accidentally. Not only it gets more views from Xbox fanboys and more coverage from the media, but everybody get to see the trailer at least twice.
A minor thing? Well, if you'd create artworks to pay your bills and rent and someone else makes money with your job I bet you won't consider that a minor thing. However...
I wonder got often this happens in the game industry as a whole.
@DerMeister I see two possibilities: 1) they hired a freelance artist who recicled an artwork he already used with Ubi or 2) they photoshopped an artwork found in internet.
@Gamer83 They definitely have some talented artists, at least talented enough to sell artbooks, which is why this is so baffling to me. Including their own art would be a nice studio shout too. This just got some bad publicity, which is always bad in the long term. The fact that this is the third time they've gotten stealing accusations (Ellen Page's likeness and the aforementioned map) really raises an eyebrow.
So either this was an honest mistake or Naughty Dog's IQ points really dropped during this game's development.
@andreoni79 I can those happening too, in the context of this story. It still feels like an odd route for ND to take though, again due to the studio's own talent.
@WARDIE I think that AC: Black Flag, was a damn good game, but a terrible AC game. The only thing it shared with AC is some game engine mechanics, and a small glimpse into the AC world/story every once in awhile.
With all the issues of piracy and copyright infringement across the industry its suprising a big company has done this send a bad message out.
@DerMeister
Yeah, this isn't a one off, that's why like others I'm calling it like I see it and saying it's a scummy move. I don't like it even if it's the first time but at least in that situation there isn't a history. I think there are some bloated egos at the company.
@Gamer83 To me, this isn't so much scummy, but outright stupid. There's nothing to gain from including Ubi's concept art in a cutscene, a position that could have easily been filled by any of their own art. All they have now is another accusation of theft that was completely pointless. This obviously won't "taint" the game, but come on, son. Again, their IQ probably dropped or something.
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