Always Playable: Recombining Routines for Creative Efficiency at Ubisoft Montreal’s Video Game Studio

Abstract

This study examines how an organization can redefine its core process when faced with a major crisis of creative efficiency. We analyze the case of the experimentation of the “Always Playable” project at Ubisoft Montreal, a leading video game development studio, where a crisis of creativity triggered an active reconfiguration of routines and their artifacts. To address this crisis, the organization attempted to restore a balance between efficiency and flexibility by modifying the generative relationship among the ostensive aspect, the performative aspect, and artifacts of routines. Our study shows that one way to reach this balance is by deliberately breaking, partitioning, and recombining aspects from different routines.