The Crossing was set to be a first-person
shooter video game by Arkane Studios, which
attempted to fuse single-player and multiplayer
by threading its single-player campaign through
live multiplayer games.
The game was first announced on 9 January
2007, but put "on hold" on 15 May 2009 after
the company ran into "an unexpected financial
challenge" and decided to focus on smaller
projects.
The Crossing was later officially cancelled
for Arkane Studios to work on LMNO with Electronic
Arts and Steven Spielberg.In October 2016,
ZeniMax Media, which acquired Arkane Studios
in August 2010, filed a new trademark for
"The Crossing".
== Story ==
The game incorporated the idea of parallel
universes, and was to be set across two vastly
different renditions of modern day Paris.
In one universe, which shares many aesthetic
similarities to our own, Paris has descended
into chaos following the collapse of government.
In the other, the timeline diverged in 1307;
where instead of being disbanded, the Knights
Templar seize control of the French crown.
The story takes the player across both universes.
== Gameplay ==
The Crossing was to be a first-person shooter
which supported a narrative-driven single-player
game, but with the player's opponents replaced
by human-controlled agents via a multi-player
system, an approach called "crossplayer" by
Arkane.
In this single-player mode, the single player
would work through a game level amid the conflict
of a team-based deathmatch game, with teams
assigned to either protect or assassinate
the character controlled by the single player.
The game also was to include a team-based
multiplayer mode called skirmish, which is
also incorporated into the single-player campaign,
where the main player might try to avoid the
skirmish.
== Development ==
The idea of The Crossing was to try to find
a way to fuse a narrative-driven single player
game with multiplayer elements, with human-controlled
players to take the place of some of the enemies
in the single-player campaign.
This amalgamation was dubbed "crossplayer"
by Arkane.
Raphaël Colantonio, Arkane's chief executive
officer at the time, said that as a studio
they wanted to try a multiplayer game, but
felt the standard multiplayer approach in
most games was "pointless" and wanted to explore
a different formula.This approach necessitated
level designs that had the single player navigating
through linear sections of levels until they
reached a choke point where they would encounter
the team-based multiplayer battles.
During the player traversing linear sections,
the game would have brought the multiplayer
teams to spawn into or near the upcoming choke
point, so that these players would always
feel close to the core action of the game.
According to Colantonio, this approach required
them to rethink how they designed levels;
they recognized that they needed to continue
to drive the single player forward through
the level, unable to have them stop to solve
puzzles or analyze enemy movements, while
also making some of the choke point areas
interesting for the other players.For the
game's story and setting, Arkane wanted to
create a new intellectual property (IP) for
them to build on.
Colantonio brought in Viktor Antonov, an artist
that had been working for Valve Corporation
and had helped Arkane with the Source engine
during their development of Dark Messiah of
Might and Magic (2006).
As both Colantonio and Antonov had lived in
Paris for some time in their lives, they came
upon the idea of a "dystopia-utopia" setting
in Paris, where part of the city was a "royal
upotia" while the other half had fallen into
squalor; this reflected on the different experiences
that Colantonio and Antonov had from how they
came to live in Paris, and recognizing that
Paris itself is a "city of contrasts".
As a backstory, they envisioned a world where
scientists had developed time travel through
various portals, and used it to change the
past and create alternate dimensions in the
present, then taking the best of technology
advancements from that to improve the original
reality.
The Crossing would have started where an incident
involving the time travel portal in the center
of Paris have been misused to create the cacophony
of different parts of Paris.
The player discovers that Knights Templar
with high-tech weapons have invaded Paris,
and would be forced to find the portal to
try to set things right.With some of the gameplay
and the narrative down, Arkane began talking
about the game with the gaming press, including
a cover story on Games for Windows, generating
interest in the title, but had not yet secured
a publisher.
Colantonio pitched the idea to the core 20
publishers at that time, but none of them
expressed interest in the idea as a whole,
instead talking about focusing only on parts
of The Crossing such as using the narrative
in another gameplay setting, or having only
focus on the single-player.
Colantonio stated that these publishers were
also concerned about Arkane seeking to focus
on the personal computer release over consoles,
and the lack of plans for a PlayStation 3
port, at the time, a limitation of the Source
engine having yet to be ported to that console.
The publishers also expressed concern about
the matchmaking capabilities of the game;
Arkane brought in Max Hoberman, who developed
the Halo 2 matchmaking system, to try to alleviate
publisher fears.
A further challenge from publishers according
to Colantonio was the high development costs
they wanted, looking for between US$15 million
and US$20 million, which was an expensive
budget for a game at that time particularly
from a studio that had yet to establish its
own identity.Eventually, Arkane found one
unnamed publisher that was interested in the
entire concept of The Crossing.
They spent about six months negotiating with
this publisher, but Colantonio said as time
progressed, the negotiations worsened, with
a smaller proposed budget and requiring them
to do a PlayStation 3 version.
Colantonio decided after six months that they
were not going to be able to achieve the vision
they wanted with The Crossing, and ceased
negotiations with the publisher and effectively
shelving game.
Arkane switched over to continue contract
work with Valve, and started work with Electronic
Arts on a Steven Spielberg-backed game, LMNO,
itself which was ultimately cancelled.While
The Crossing never came to fruition, Colantonio
said that it was an important foundation of
Arkane Studio as it helped with team-building,
establishing a vision for their own IP, and
the processes needed to carry that out, which
they used in building the Dishonored series.
During the 2018 QuakeCon, Arkane's lead designer
Ricardo Bare stated that their future projects
were looking at multiplayer functionality
that they had been envisioning in The Crossing
as to provide seamless multiplayer functionality
alongside single-player content
