Assassin's Creed Unity: everything we know so far
Everything we know about Assassin's Creed: Unity, from the characters, story, setting and weapons, to the new four player co-op mode.
As you might expect, a few new details of the upcoming next-gen Assassin's Creed game have been revealed at Gamescom. We've updated our comprehensive guide to everything that's known about the game to reflect these latest announcements.
Leaked a little early and then officially fanfared at E3 earlier this year, Assassin's Creed: Unity is the next proper Assassin's Creed game to be developed by Ubisoft Montreal before development duties for the franchises are handed over baton-like to the Quebec office.
For the next Assassin's game, Montreal has opted to eschew the likes of Renaissance Italy and the seven seas in favour of a Paris poised for revolution. Think of earlier Assassin's titles, then, but with bad make-up, big hair and heads on sticks - that sort of thing - and you've got a pretty fair measure of the game.
The assassin and the setting
Evidence for this new setting has actually been around for a little while now. Close observers capable of sitting through the sprawling credits of a typical Ubisoft game might have spotted subtle references to both the French and US revolutions peppered across the closing background of 2010's Brotherhood. (If nothing else, it shows just how many games you can work on concurrently when you employ 2500 people for every one person making, say, No Man's Sky.)
Into this pre-revolution night steps Arno Dorian, Unity's protagonist. A Versailles peasant of mixed French-Austrian descent, Arno sets out to unravel and expose the true source of power behind the revolution while steadily working his way through the union ranks as he does so. For the world itself, Ubisoft's promising a gameplay area of unprecedented scale and scope, which means it will be pretty big considering what's come before in the series, with seamless transitions between the world itself and the opulent interiors that house the endangered aristocracy.
The structure of the single-player content is getting a significant makeover as well. Rather than failing a mission outright, forcing a rather blunt restart, there'll be a little more malleability in the system. Rather than adopting the standard amnesia in the face of your failure, your mission contact might just vanish and reappear at another time, in another place.
In addition to the main campaign, there'll also be plenty of contextual side quests that might require you to hunt down treasure or solve a murder mystery. More traditional item-hunting will feature in the form of a huge swathe of collectible sets.
Four-player co-op
In addition to the single-player story, up to four musketeers can be controlled in a co-op campaign - a first for the series, and a mission system that's accessed via tavern-like social hubs within the game. Inside these taverns you will spy ghostly versions of your online friends and approaching them instigates a co-op play request. Should you find yourself all alone in the tavern, you can still work through the missions by yourself.
Ubisoft expects this co-op content to represent approximately one third of the game's overall content, and a video shown off at the publisher's E3 showcase earlier this month demonstrates just how co-op play works in practice. In the example shown, a pack of assassins silently weaves its way through the shadows of a palace, before sending the target toff tumbling down towards a sticky end.
As for the breadth of these co-op missions, we have very few details beyond some rough mission categories: simple assassinations, special protection directives, and Heist content with tiered rewards based on how quickly you complete them. The actual details may be thin on the ground, but the developers have stated their intention to draw from a wide roster of famous - not to mention infamous - characters of the era to populate their story, and King Louis XVI and the Marquis de Sade are two names that have been floated publicly.
Digital Foundry's first impressions
If you're wondering how much of a technical toll Unity's going to take on your PC, PlayStation 4 or Xbox One, Digital Foundry took a strictly hands-off look at the PC version of the game at the end of last month. Early impressions are positive, with a new cloth physics engine that allows Arno's cloak to billow around him impressively, and a host of new fleet-footed animations that allow him to dart between building ledges much more fluidly. There'll be plenty to do with these new systems too - Ubisoft reckons there'll be hundreds of different buildings, monuments and catacombs to explore.
As for the non-playable characters of Paris, we've seen a boost to both the numbers on screen and their individual intelligence. While previous games in the series have accommodated hundreds of AI participants on screen at any one time, Unity introduces thousands of them, all of whom behave just a little more realistically. Whether the target render of 1080p can be achieved, and the 20-50fps locked down to something a little more stable while all this activity is going on, is something we'll have to wait to find out.
Parkour navigation
We know that the established stealth mechanics of the previous games are being retained for Unity, but Arno does have a few new tricks up his presumably frilly sleeve. As well as a more robust navigation system, new parkour-like moves - presumably provided by Ubisoft's new hire - will become available as you make progress through the game. There will be less dependency on haystacks, in other words, and much more freedom to reach your objective in a manner of your own choosing.
For the game's combat systems, the developers are taking fencing as an inspiration, although it's safe to assume they're thinking of something a little ickier than the points-based to-and-fro most of us conjure up when we think about the sport. The stated intention for Unity is to make you think and work harder for your kills than in previous games, dodging and parrying your way to a more satisfying victory.
Unity's new weapons
As for the familiar Hidden Blade, it returns with new functionality in the form of the Phantom Blade, a weapon capable of firing a deadly shot over considerable range with barely a whisper. There'll be some 85 different weapons in total, with in-game and real currency purchase options available - although Ubisoft is remaining tight-lipped for now on the exact nature of those latter micro-transactions.
With the introduction of skill trees for the first time, Arno will also have access to the Eagle Pulse ability, allowing him to detect the number of guards present at any given infiltration site. There'll be new HUD elements to help you track those guards and environmental elements too.
It's likely Ubisoft wants the four-player co-op feature to enjoy its time in the spotlight for now, and so we're left with a lot of unanswered questions about Unity. We know the Abstergo Entertainment system is gone, but how exactly will the modern-day section of the story play out? How much overlap will there be with earlier games and familiar faces? How will the developers resolve the series' outstanding cliffhangers?
Release date
We'll no doubt learn the answers to at least some of these questions - not to mention more details of the upcoming last-gen Assassin's Creed: Rogue - between now and Unity's 28th October release date. We'll update this article as and when those announcements are made.
