Patrice Désilets hasn't been to work for awhile. A long time Ubisoft employee, Désilets served as the creative director of the Assassin's Creed franchise (and on Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time) up until last October. Shortly before the release of Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Désilets announced that he was leaving his longtime employer… but he wasn't going very far.
Désilets revealed that he would be leaving Ubisoft Montreal to join THQ in their new Montreal studio. Once again serving as the studio's Creative Director, Désilets' was be tasked with building up a development team inside the Montreal Studio and developing a brand new game IP for the studio.
Unfortunately, Désilets wasn't actually able to begin his new job and new project at the time the announcement came out. Thanks to Ubisoft's non-compete clause, Désilets couldn't actually begin working for THQ for the past nine months.
But now he can. THQ has formally announced that Désilets' non-compete clause is finally over, and he has finally joined the Montreal studio in earnest. Said Désilets in a quote in the announcement release today:
"The creative freedom that THQ gives its artists and developers--and their willingness to make games that truly reflect an artistic vision--really drew me to THQ," said Désilets. "I plan to build an incredibly talented team at THQ, and am very anxious to get started on creating a new project."
What that new project ends up developing into, it's too early to say. It was originally rumored that Désilets would be working with famed film director Guillermo Del Toro on his game project with THQ. However, Del Toro's game--eventually titled inSANE--was in the hands of Red Faction/Saints Row developer Volition. Currently, THQ Montreal is taking over the development of the Homefront franchise from the soon-to-be-shuttered Kaos Studios. THQ Montreal is aiming to be large enough to support development of two games, so Désilets is bound to split his time between the next iteration of the mostly-succesful Homefront and his new project.
To be honest, however, I think I'm more interested in in seeing Désilets make his new game than try and improve/fix Homefront.
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