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ABOUT BACKSTAB:

Backstab is a third-person open-world action-adventure game for mobile, set in a Caribbean-inspired city and focused on free exploration, assassination, and cinematic storytelling. Built on Gameloft’s proprietary engine, it aimed to deliver console-like narrative ambition packed with combat, stealth, and parkour, with mechanics heavily compared to the Assassin's Creed series.

As a Game Designer, my role was to create three story-driven missions along with the city layout and several side missions and activities.

FEATURES:

  • Third-person Action Adventure
  • Single-player Campaign
  • Melee Combat
  • Parkour
  • Open World Caribbean-inspired city

TRAILER

MY CONTRIBUTIONS

  • Blocked out the layout of the Puerto Imperio City, keeping in mind the metrics for movement and parkour and made sure to populate it with side missions and activities.
  • Designed and implemented three story missions tailored around the core gameplay pillars: parkour, stealth and swash-buckling combat.
  • Implemented sounds, cinematics and scripted narrative moments during key gameplay moments.

My work consisted of:

  • the block-out for the city of Puerto Imperio, a Spanish city held hostage by the guards of the Inquisition
  • this was done keeping in mind the metrics for basic movement, camera position, parkour actions available
  • designed and implemented various side missions within the city limits
  • created and populated a series of random contextual events: courtesans offering their services or trying to lure you to dark isolated corners where bandits can attack you, beggars that ask for money or follow you for some distance or until you give them money, gangs that will threaten you if you don’t provide protection tax, and the possibility to buy a house.


Samples:

"The Enemy Of My Enemy"  was the second Story Mission of the game and it was introducing the player to the plot.

It's a linear hack and slash mission sprinkled with platforming elements. This mission also hosted some of the tutorial parkour mechanics.

 

Samples:

"A Pirate's Life" is another Story Mission featuring a mix of platforming and combat.

The hack and slash action is combined with a lot of platforming elements, but also puzzles that require good coordination skills

 

Samples:

Three side missions are taking place on the Island of Santa Alodia.

These missions are a mix of:

  • horse riding during an attempt to flee from the Spanish army
  • freeing a local village from the oppression of Inquisition forces
  • defending a fortress from an attack with cannons.

 

Samples:

Project's completion

The project development started in 2010 and it was released in June 2011 as a premium exclusive title for Sony Xperia and one month later for iOS. 


The game was generally well received at that time, due to its overall similarities to the Assassin's Creed franchise and as a unique experience in the mobile phones environment.


Unfortunately, the game is no longer supported on modern devices because it was not updated for 64-bit operating systems, which caused it to become incompatible with newer devices. However fan ports and third-party APKs can still be found on specific sites on the internet.