14 DAY TRIAL // Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag has just been launched, but the team at Ubisoft in charge of the series is already thinking about the way it will expand the gameplay mechanics of the next experience, which will probably be released in the fall of next year.
Jean-Sebastien Decant, the lead game designer at the studio, tells Gamereactor that, “We managed I think to bring back the stealth in Assassin's Creed, which was something that was a bit put on the side in the previous episodes.”
The first Assassin’s Creed game focused on moving silently from shadow to shadow in order to take out targets quickly and without being noticed.
The sequels have moved more towards an action structure and in Assassin’s Creed III and in the more recent Black Flag, gamers have access to a wide array of weapons and items that they can use to take out groups of enemies.
Any next-gen Assassin’s Creed game will once more have to carefully mix combat and stealth sections.
Decant adds, “I also think we kind of totally exploded the limits of the game by bringing the naval and the ship customisation and the ship battles. So we made progress, thanks actually to the thematics that we chose. Next time we will have to find thematics that will help us also to expand the game once again.”
With land and naval combat covered, the Ubisoft team might have to choose a period when flight is possible in order to introduce more variety to its franchise.
The company also says that a future Assassin’s Creed game will be able to better exploit the computing power of both the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4.
No official info has yet been offered, but expect the release to take place in late 2014.