14 DAY TRIAL // Ubisoft recently unveiled the next installment in the long-running Assassin’s Creed series, and it’s probably the first announcement in recent years to get me excited about the actual game.
Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate is set in Victorian London, in the year 1868, and the devs opted to show actual gameplay instead of a fancy CG trailer, which I think was a pretty smart move.
Sure, I still remember how atmospheric the E3 trailer for Assassin’s Creed: Unity was, but after watching it over and over again, I kept thinking about it, and not the game. I eventually ended up skipping Assassin’s Creed Unity altogether.
Whenever I do conjure it into my mind, I just watch the great trailer, and then think of all the drama associated with it and how little cinematic sequences matter when talking about games, and I get over it.
This time around, with no fancy trailer to distract me, I’m actually thinking about the game, which will drastically increase the odds of it actually landing on my computer come October.
There were many problems with Assassin’s Creed Unity, and it seems that Ubisoft is now trying to solve them all, or at least placate the user base with a more down-to-earth approach to the whole thing.
Trying to represent their product in a more sincere and transparent manner is one of the things the company is doing right. Not building up insane expectations based on nothing but hype is yet another good decision. I’m actually willing to give Syndicate a chance.
A possible waste of a good setting
That being said, I still think that the company would have been better served by having the game take place in New York, considering how the gameplay looks just like scenes taken out of the Gangs of New York movie.
It’s all about brawling in the daylight, fighting for influence over the city’s districts, roughing people up, shaking them down and intimidating them, something that I don’t really classify as an assassin’s main job.
Victorian London is a setting that I would much readily associate with stalking targets in the shadows, sneaking through the smog, and doing most of the work under the cover of darkness.
I’m not saying that the action isn’t accurate, as the consensus on the era is that it was a time of squalor, poverty and inhuman working conditions, where violence was as commonplace as internet drama is today.
But that doesn’t mean that you have to take the action to the streets in such a direct manner. From what I’ve seen so far, things look pretty focused on actual turf wars, instead of behind the scenes incursions and more meaningful interactions with prolific figures of the era.
I don’t think that meshes very well with the Assassin’s Creed theme, where you return to pivotal moments in history in order to play a high-stakes game that goes well beyond mere racketeering.
That being said, the developers also mentioned that they plan to take a page out of Unity’s book and keep things very light as far as modern-day action is concerned, which is a bit of a letdown, since I always thought it was one of the series’ strong points.
Back to the future with Assassins
I love ancient astronauts fiction, and the foreboding future where mankind is enslaved by the Templars, forced by peer pressure to agree to absurd, abusive and dehumanizing Terms of Use and End User License Agreements, that nobody actually bothers to read.
The struggle against such an abhorrent future offers a lot of weight to your actions, while also conveniently solving some of the problems stemming from the video game-y nature of your exploits, which I thought was a great gimmick that could also add more depth to the story.
Seeing the action focus on shaking down ruffians for spare change, with which to buy drinks down at the pub while singing shanties, seems like a turn towards a more proletariat-friendly take on the franchise. This would spoil some of the mystique surrounding the overtly exaggerated but exciting exploits of the Assassins.
Hopefully, Ubisoft won’t simply have us find Oliver Twist an adoptive family and help the miners earn an extra shilling per week, and it is still keeping its cards close to its chest as far as the story is concerned.