AC Community Questions:
Mohamed Abdelkader (Duskblade)
Community Interview
For this round of Assassin's Creed Community Questions, we invited Mohamed Abdelkader (Duskblade), admin for Facebook Page The Jackdaw Tales and Member of the Assassin’s Creed Arab Community.
Col: Hi Mohamed. Thank you for joining us today. Please could you tell us a bit about yourself, and your time within the Assassin's Creed Community.
Mohamed: My name is Mohamed Abdelkader, I'm 21 years old and I'm from Egypt. I have been playing video games since my childhood, but when I started playing Assassin's Creed in 2010 my view of video games changed completely. It became much deeper, as I was able to complete all parts of the series in addition to the novels and the comics. In 2020, I started creating content for the Assassin's Creed series and I continue to do so to this day.
Col: When did you first start playing Assassin's Creed games, and which one is your favourite?
Mohamed: I started playing the Assassin's Creed series in 2010, and my favourite game for sure is AC III.
Col: In regards to social media management, how much work have you put in behind the scenes to make things happen?
Mohamed: Preparing the posts from 3 to 4 hours per day, every post on the page needs a lot of effort to become like this, in terms of summarizing or translating videos.
Col: Do you have a favourite Assassin's Creed community moment/ story you would like to share?
Mohamed: Definitely the best moment for me was when I was posting AC content on my page and members of other assassins creed community groups were viewing and engaging with my content and showing their support for the work i was doing. This really made me want to continue on the road to building my platform.
Col: Have you had many opportunities such as event invitations / early access from Ubisoft or other companies due to your social media channels?
Mohamed: Unfortunately, no, The Arab community is Limited, and only very few people are invited, you can almost count them on your fingers, but I do hope one day I will be lucky enough to get an opportunity.
Col: How big is the Assassin’s Creed Community in your area?
Mohamed: The Arab community is very large, even bigger than you think, but we do not have a big involvement directly with Ubisoft just yet. We hope that this will grow and develop in the future.
Col: What are the challenges you have found in managing a community?
Mohamed: The most difficult thing in managing a community is the desire to please all of the people who support my page. You never want to let people down, so its important to produce content that will appeal to different people. everyone has very unique views on the different topics we cover., so its interesting to see how peoples opinions differ so widely on certain topics and how their passion for the games, particularly their favourites, show through in their interactions. For example, every person has a certain game or a character they love, so if I say that Haytham Kenway is the best character in the series, someone with a passion for another game in the franchise could argue the opposite.
Col: Do you have any plans for the future?
Mohamed: Yes, in the future, I would like to start posting content on Twitter, Instagram and YouTube, but it takes some time. Patience is a good thing as this next step needs a lot of work and support from many followers.
Col: What are some of your most recent Assassin's Creed projects, and are you working on anything currently?
Mohamed: I am currently working on translating the summary of Assassin's Creed novels and comics into Arabic, as you know that these novels and comics are not yet translated into Arabic, so I wanted to help my community by translating them.
Col: What advice do you have for people who want to create an Assassin’s Creed Community?
Mohamed: I advise them, as I always advise my community, that they all be as one family. The games were made to bring us together, not divide us. They should also consider studying digital marketing because it is very important in our world, especially anything involving social media. They also should set goals for their own community, and support each other, as these are the foundations that must exist in any society.
Col: Do you have much Assassin's Creed merchandise? If so, what is your favourite item?
Mohamed: Having all the novels and comics in my library is a very wonderful thing, and when I look at them every day I become very happy. This is my goal, to collect all the novels and comics of the series.
Col: Where would be your dream setting for an AC game?
Mohamed: In Iraq, Baghdad is a great country with an ancient civilization. For example we would love to see more content referencing character such as Basim, as Arabs are eager to see more and more Arab content in Assassin's Creed.
Col: Where do you personally think the series is heading to next, and are you excited for the future of Assassin's Creed?
Mohamed: No new AC game was released last year (2021) and this made me very happy, when the series stopped after AC Syndicate, Ubisoft came to us with an even greater next instalment, Origins, with a vast world and huge content. So I am happy for the developers to take some time with the next game in the series and I believe that this will mean Ubisoft will have more and more in store for us in the future which will fascinates their players with all their unique games.
Col: What is your favourite part of being a community member?
Mohamed: The best thing about community management is that you always have the opportunity to solve problems between everyone, and if we talk about the Arab Assassin's Creed branch, the community manager always has the opportunity to show the beauty and greatness of the Assassin's Creed series to the rest of the fans, and to show the secrets hidden in the game, and guide them in the game as well.
Col: Do you have any personal AC goals you would like to achieve?
Mohamed: Yes of course, I hope one day to be a Ubisoft Star player, or participate in one of their projects and events that are held by the communities.
We would like to say a huge thank you to Mohamed for joining us for this round of AC Community Questions!
You can find him on:
About the Author
Col is one of the UK's leading Assassin's Creed Community members, and is best known for establishing both 'The Ones Who Came Before' fan community and 'Isu_Network' content creation program.
As Team Leader for The Ones Who Came Before, Col was officially recognised by Ubisoft, becoming one the UK Assassin's Creed community ambassadors in 2016. He has attended many events after spending a decade in the AC Community, and has worked on countless projects, all of which you can find here on TOWCB website.
He is also a former Ubisoft Star Player and member of The Mentors Guild, two recognisable community programs which opened doors and took his status within the AC Community to the next level.
Colum Blackett (Col_96)