What does the success of Assassin's Creed mean?

Assassin's Creed Ubisoft has revised its financial targets upwards in response to the success of Assassin's Creed. According to the clearly delighted publisher, the game has recorded worldwide sales of more than two and a half million in its first four weeks on the shelves - apparently making it the fastest-selling new video game intellectual property in the US ever (more info here). Having previously predicted sales of around three million copies in 2007/8, excited accountants have now upped expectations to five million.

Why is this happening? What does the success of this fascinating yet flawed title say about the videogame industry? I think it says one of the following:

Hype works Ubisoft has spent millions on marketing Assassin's Creed. There have been TV ads, of course, but also major print campaigns, including a huge four-page supplement surrounding the Friday Guardian's Film and Music supplement a week before launch. But the company's budget is actually modest compared to big-hitters like Microsoft.

No, with this game it's been about slowly building buzz. Developer interviews, official behind-the-scenes video blogs, expo appearances - a year of gradually disseminating information. Or lack of information. It could be that the company's masterstroke was to hint from the very beginning that the game's apparent Holy Land setting did not tell the whole story. Through teaser trailers at E3 and X06, we saw glimpses of futuristic scenes, there were rumours of time travel, genetic memory, all well stage-managed and artfully perpetuated by Ubisoft's marketing machine.

I travelled to Montreal twice to see the game. The last time I went over, I spoke to producer Jade Raymond about the campaign - she said it was all tightly controlled by marketing; the development team would have given everything away much earlier. Somehow Ubisoft learned something vital, something quite alien to the in-yer-face, blast-'em-with-USPs games industry: teasing works. Speaking of Jade, she actually became an object of hype in her own right. A young woman becoming the face of a major project - the internet grappled with it, a misogynistic fringe group belittled it, but they were more than happy to write about it.

Scores don't matter Creed has done okay. It has a Metacritic score of 82, which means mostly favourable reviews. But amid the praise lavished on the title for its stunning visuals, amazing recreation of a historical environment, sense of freedom and involving story, there have been numerous references to its repetitive central gameplay motive, the befuddled combat system, the arduously long cut-scenes. In other words, this isn't a game that's piling on sales simply because of overwhelming critical acclaim - some key sources have marked Creed in the seventies. It could be argued, in fact, that this title is an important exhibit in the 'do reviews really matter?' debate. Alternatively, it might mean that review readers are a sophisticated bunch who've taken both the plaudits and the criticisms into account and decided to give it a try - en masse.

Original titles can sell If you look at the Christmas videogame charts for the last five years you'll find that less than 10 percent of top ten titles are originals. The festive release lists are stuffed with sequels, annual updates and movie tie-ins. This is all about security - videogame publishers stand to make as much over Christmas as they do in the rest of the year combined. Very few companies are willing to take a risk on an unknown quantity.

The success of Assassin's Creed suggests that this timidity may have cost the industry millions. It seems that, fed an interesting concept, the public will take a gamble on a new franchise. Of course, not every original game will be backed up by such an extensive marketing campaign. Not all original titles will have the imaginative scope of Ubisoft's project. But then, most titles won't need to sell anywhere near five million copies to make a handsome revenue.

Graphics are as important as publishing think they are The one thing no-one argues about is that Assassin's Creed looks stunning. The evocations of Damascus, Acre and Jerusalem are minutely detailed, writhing with character and cleverly constructed to offer a paradise of acrobatic free-running possibilities. The crowd system, too, is a sometimes awe-inspiring success, with hundreds of seemingly unique characters lining the streets, shoving, chatting, reacting... For PS3 owners it has provided the first real 'wow' moments of the high-def era. And it has been suitably rewarded.

I'm hoping, though, that the key lesson taken from the success of Assassin's Creed isn't that style really does win out over substance. It is a lesson that could shape the videogame industry in the high-def era, where visual clarity has transformed into a mainstream cultural concern. Now perhaps more than ever, it is very easy for the medium to become the message.