Clint Hocking returns to Ubisoft
"I realized I had not shipped a game in 7 years, I started to become anxious"
Just last week reported Clint Hocking had left Amazon Game Studios after a year and a half with the company, but he stayed quiet on his reasons. Now he's announced that he's rejoining Ubisoft, a company he last worked for in 2010.
"After a number of discussions, the opportunity I was most excited about was to return to Ubisoft - but this time in Toronto. I know most of the people who were involved in founding the studio personally, and almost all of them are still here," he said in his personal blog.
He also gave his reasons for leaving Amazon Game Studios, citing frustrations over output and immigration issues.
"I realized I had not shipped a game in seven years, I started to become anxious and depressed"
"I realized I had not shipped a game in seven years, I started to become anxious and depressed. I am not a patient person, by nature. I was on my third visa, and had still not managed to secure a greencard. It turns out that being an ex-pat is not as glamourous as Hemingway would have you believe - and I was definitely following his prescribed dosage of mojitos - so that was not the issue. In the end, for me at least, five years is just too long to be rootless. As a result, I decided at the beginning of the summer to return to Canada."
During his first stint with Ubisoft Montreal from June 2001 to May 2010 Hocking was creative director, working on Splinter Cell, Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Far Cry 2. In his new role he'll be working on "unannounced projects." In another interview with the Ubisoft Blog he did confirm that he wasn't working on a Splinter Cell game.
"Maybe one day, 5 or even 10 years from now, it will be the right time and the right place for me to make another Splinter Cell game, but that time is not now," he said.
"I can't say specifically what I'm working on yet, but I'm working with a great team on some things that I think are interesting, challenging and innovative. They are going in the direction that I think games need to go in, for both players and for Ubisoft in the future. It's great that Ubisoft is so forward-looking and so interested in developing the medium and the industry and the community of players."