14 DAY TRIAL // Watch Dogs developer Ubisoft Montreal has talked a bit more about the new open world action adventure title and emphasized that, while the reputation system has been kept deliberately simple, without any numbers or anything like that, the AI reactions will be complex and have a ripple effect locally.
Watch Dogs puts players in the shoes of reformed hacker and tough guy Aiden Pearce, who's on a quest for vengeance against people that did him wrong. Pearce's behavior, however, is dictated by players, as he can use his smarts or his gun and hand-to-hand combat skills in order to take out foes in violent or non-violent ways.
Depending on the player's reactions, the game will employ a reputation system that’s quite Spartan, without resorting to numbers pinned on certain actions.
"We have a reputation system, but we don’t score anything," the studio said, while talking to Edge. "You’ll see a plus, a minus, but you’ll never see the game say 'This is worth 100, this is 50, this is whatever'."
"We had that at the beginning and we cut it, because how can we say how much worse it is to kneecap a cop rather than kill him? They’re both bad! So we ended up removing the numbers. We shouldn’t be the ones dictating how the player feels about those dilemmas. That’s up to them."
What's more, the AI-controlled non-playable characters will also have different reactions to certain situations, like when Aiden pulls out a gun and starts aiming in a crowded area.
"If Aiden aims or runs, people will notice," the studio explained. "[One person] sees the gun and there’s a chance they have the balls to call the cops. But multiplied by the amount of people around you? There’s a really, really high chance someone’s going to call the cops. Other people react differently and start fleeing."
In order to stop the cops from showing up, Aiden can resort to different solutions that are violent or non-violent, depending on the way players want him to behave.
"Aiden can do all sorts of things. He can break their phone with a melee attack or just shoot [the caller] in the head, but if you do that, other people will see you shooting and it’ll create a ripple effect. Now there might be two people calling the cops," the studio added.
"How do you deal with that? You can kill both, but that’s going to escalate. Or you can hack all their phones at once and shut them down. Just pulling a gun can create a ripple effect in Watch Dogs."
Watch Dogs will be released on May 27 globally for the PC, PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, and Xbox One platforms.