Clint Hocking

Lore & Background

Hocking started his career at Ubisoft, where he first designed and wrote scripts for 2002's Splinter Cell. He rose to prominence when he moved up to direct 2005's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, which was both a critical and commercial success. He went on to direct 2008's Far Cry 2, which was positively received by critics. In 2010, he left Ubisoft Montreal due to him being 'too comfortable' at the studio.

Between 2010 and 2015, Hocking joined LucasArts, Valve, and Amazon Game Studios in various senior roles. Throughout this period, he did not release any new games and in August 2015 returned to Ubisoft, this time at their Toronto studio. At this studio, he directed Watch Dogs: Legion (2020) which received mixed reception from critics. By July 2021, he returned to Montreal studio and was due to direct Assassin's Creed: Codename Hexe and co-direct the Assassin's Creed Infinity game platform with Jonathan Dumont, but left in 2026.

Across his career, Hocking has written monthly columns for the video game magazine Edge. He coined the term ludonarrative dissonance in 2007.

Reader's Guide

Hocking started his career as a writer for website companies whilst completing his Master of Fine Arts in creative writing at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. During this time, he was experimenting with the level editor UnreadlEd, which he used to make a mod and complete a game level. With this experience, he sent his résumé in as 'a lark' to Ubisoft Montreal and was subsequently hired as a level designer on 2002's Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell.

During development, both the scriptwriter and game designer left the project and Hocking took on both roles, in addition to being a level designer. Upon release, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell was well-received by critics, receiving 'universal acclaim' according to review aggregator Metacritic. After the release of Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell, Ubisoft Montreal began development for 2005's Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory and Hocking continued as the scriptwriter as well as the lead level designer.

In the alpha stage of development, Hocking initially declined the creative director role due to having two positions already, but he changed his mind a week later. During the game's two-year development, Hocking was working 80 hours a week. This large workload caused him to have gaps in his recent memory, such as completely forgetting a week he spent socialising with a former colleague due to brain damage. Upon release, Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory was universally acclaimed by critics and was a commercial success.

Soon after, development of 2008's Far Cry 2, a first-person shooter featuring an open world environment set in a fictional African country, started with Hocking as the creative director and scriptwriter. Upon release, Far Cry 2 was positively received by critics. Hocking and critics noted some of its reception was polarizing, which he attributed to the game breaking many conventions of the shooter and open world genre. Some gameplay elements, which immersed the player, critics found polarizing.

This included when the player's firearm would jam, a map being a crumpled piece of paper in the player character's hands as opposed to one found within a menu, and malaria which the player character can get throughout the game and needs to be treated by medicine from civilians otherwise the player character will die.