Advanced Gaming Consoles

What To Make Of Assassin's Creed Syndicate, One Month Out

Less than a month from release, Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed Syndicate is likely to be judged as much on its own merits as on how well its publisher listened to fan discontent about the flagship series and what it’s been willing to change. Companion apps are out. Platform-exclusive DLC is back. The overall plan for the game and its various add-on components is nearly as complex as it has ever been and shows that Ubisoft is largely moving full steam ahead.

Syndicate will be out soon and is deep into its preview hype cycle. Several reporters and YouTubers recently got a look at two missions from the 19th century London-set game and have been posting written and video impressions. Fan sites, the AC subreddit and YouTube channels are filling up with possible Trophy/Achievement lists and speculation about whether the game will have a substantial section set in the modern day, a series staple all but dropped in Unity to mixed reaction.

The game will finally come out on October 23 for Xbox One, PS4 and PC. The differentiating factors this year appear to be the setting, the GTA-style system for stealing and driving horse-drawn carriages, the swappable twin protagonists, Jacob and Evie, and the Batman-style rope-launcher that is used for grappling up buildings and tightroping between them. It played well at E3, but, really, they always do.It’s impossible to know in advance of release how good the game will be—or if it’s another clunker like Unity—but it is possible to at least look at how Ubisoft is setting it up and where the publisher’s priorities seem to be.The fact that Syndicate is even coming out this year is a signal that Ubisoft remains aggressive about the franchise, though the disappearance of two other planned Assassin’s Creed spin-off games suggests the company might be dialing back a tad. Some fans and critics—including some of us at Kotaku—have suggested that Ubisoft needs to give the AC series a year off, but that’s not happening this year. For any other series, Ubisoft’s 2015 plans forAssassin’s Creed including the release of at least two new games in the series would in fact seem like overdrive; these plans are restrained only in contrast to what has come before.

So far this year Ubisoft has released the AC Unity expansion Dead Kings in January and the sidescroller Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China in April. Both were unremarkable. The latter was supposed to have started a new 2D trilogy and be followed by games set in India and Russia. Both of those games have been slated for 2015 but we haven’t heard anything about either since June and neither has a release date. Presumably Ubisoft wants all AC fans’ eyes onSyndicate for now.

Dead Kings was released for free to all Unity players, as part of Ubisoft’s attempt to recover from an overly ambitious 2014. Ubisoft had begun 2014 with its sails full from the warm response to 2013’s Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flagreleased an incredible four major Assassin’s Creed projects: a remake of the portable Assassin’s Creed Liberation, a well-received ACIV expansion calledFreedom Cry, and two massive fall games, the calamitous Unity for Xbox One, PS4 and PC and the excellent, unsung Assassin’s Creed Rogue for Xbox 360 and PS3. Then they stumbled. Unity slipped from October to November, was slammed by critics (the only AC game to get a “No” from Kotaku) and was such a creative disappointment and glitchy technical mess that an apologetic Ubisoft decided it would offer Dead Kings as a consolation bonus.

Late last year, Ubisoft was loosening up its add-on Assassin’s Creed content as a make-good to disgruntled series fans, but this year they’re back to chopping it up to maximize sales opportunities. Warning: what follows might seem like a maze. Don’t get lost!

Ubisoft has already announced a slew of DLC for Syndicate including a 20-years-later paid expansion involving Jack the Ripper.