Ubisoft are "decommissioning" another slate of games next January, including Assassin's Creed Revelations, R.U.S.E., and Trials Evolution. These games will remain playable, but their online services will be switched off meaning leaderboards, online multiplayer, co-op and other features will stop working.
]]>Here is a pattern:
- Action videogame is successful - Movie rights are optioned by big studio - Big star and/or director is attached - ???? - Humdrum movie fails to make as much profit as hoped.
Assassin's Creed is next to be dragged to the blockbuster movie adaptation stocks, and none other than Michael 'only good thing about Prometheus' Fassbender is going to wilfully endanger all his good work of recent years by co-producing and starring in it. RPS has the first exclusive image of the film, which you can see below.
]]>Aw, bums. That batshit lawsuit against Ubisoft has been dropped. The one where the eccentric author/inventor/dreamer of a Christians-only enclave for the end times, John Beiswenger, accused Ubi of having stolen the silly Animus plot from his classic work of literature, Link. But Joystiq has spotted that he's abandoned his case for $5,250,000. Boo.
]]>Okay, easy question. What's the worst thing about the Assassin's Creed series? Correct! Of course, as everyone knows, it's the ridiculous sci-fi nonsense that constantly interrupts the good fun time you're having leaping about in historytimes. It's dumb, it's a shame it was ever a part of the games, and now someone is suing Ubisoft because he says it's his idea... waitwhat.
]]>There’s some muttering in the audience as Tommy Francois, IP development director at Ubisoft leads us through a sixty minute history of Assassin’s Creed III’s development. From concept work in 2010 to animation tests to proof of concept videos to details on the historical research, we’re being shown everything except the game itself. For a game this size and in this age of wham, bam, now preorder ma’am promotion, this sort of gently passionate round the houses development discussion is highly irregular. ‘Just show us the trailer lol,’ I am entirely prepared to bet at least one of the hundreds of journalists in this crowd has written in their notes.
Much as getting to see how the game evolved from its original concept – ‘social stealth’ set during the American War of Independence – and just how closely it’s stuck to it across nearly three years of development is personally fascinating, there is a part of me that does just want to be shown the trailer lol. Then I get it.
]]>Yup, that Massive: the Ground Control and World in Conflict devs have been disarmingly silent of late. But according to reports from the Ubisoft GDC event, they're helping to create the Far Cry 3 multiplayer. "Huh?", you might think, but hold that back for a moment - I have more. According to Vox Game's Brian Crecente
In working on Far Cry 3's "online universe" Ubisoft Massive is adding elements from the indie scene and social games, they say
Go on let it out now. I'll join you.
]]>Yesterday's Assassin's Creed III firsto-revealo-CGIo-trailero created a spot of inadvertent drama by leaving out a single word in a sentence of text at the end. That word was 'date'. And the sentence it should have been in was 'PC format release to be confirmed.'
]]>The American Revolution is a fascinating setting to have moved AssCreed onto, and not just because it puts me in mind of my beloved Colonization. Proto-technology, a wildly changeable climate, shades of grey on both sides of the conflict and recognisable mythology to apply conspiracy theories to. My major concern is that the English will be cast as one-note boo-hiss baddies, but then again the real-life modern day England is currently being governed by boo-hiss baddies, so I suppose it's apt. Nonetheless, we're told that new and unspellable Assassin hero Ratohnaké:ton is "of Native American and English heritage", so presumably there will be some sympathy for King and country in there after all.
After a week of leaks and rumours, Ubisoft have officially revealed, explained and entrailerised the confusingly-named fifth Assassin's Creed. Snow, tomahawks and George Washington await you below.
]]>The UK Writers' Guild Awards took place at the end of 2011 but the American guild like to time their ceremonies a little closer to the Oscars so that they can fall into Awards Season, which isn't actually a season at all. You may remember that a man named Gillen was nominated for the UK award, along with Ed Stern whose script for Brink received a nod. The winners were the writers of Enslaved though and that doesn't exist on PC so we neglected to mention its victory. A belated round of applause to Alex Garland and Tameem Antoniades. So, who has received a nomination from the American guild? Read on.
]]>Assassin's Creed: Revelations' multiplayer is soon to get a bit bigger. The Mediterranean Traveller Map Pack comes out as DLC on the 24th, and rather pleasingly the PC has it at the same time as the consoles (thus far). This is that almost forgotten breed of DLC, the stuff you pay for. To get the extra six multiplayer maps, featuring Jerusalem, imperial district of Constantinople, and a mercantile district of Dyers, you'll need to fork out £8. You can see some screenshots from the new content below.
]]>Ubisoft have just dolloped out a dose of paid-for DLC for Assassin's Creed: Revelations, and by my grandmothers long dead knees, they've released the PC version at the same time as the 360! The Ancestors Character Pack is out even before the PS3, which gets it tomorrow. This explains those cracks that have been appearing in the streets, and the low, dreadful rumbling of rising beasts. It is indeed, as foretold in the ancient prophecies, the end of days. Enjoy it while it lasts. Or, perhaps, don't.
]]>The fourth Assassin's Creed game is out on PC now, for once merely weeks rather than months behind the console version. I've been dragging old man Ezio across its rooftops and into its underground lairs of conspiracy for the last few days, and as such... well, you know how this goes.
Experimentation, calibration, celebration and now stagnation: that's been the course Assassin's Creed games have taken, and until Revelations it's been a course of sustained improvement. In some ways, and when looked at alone, Revelations is the best of the bunch, but it's also the most unnecessary. Especially on PC, where delays meant we only saw the last game, Brotherhood, a piffling eight months ago. After a half-decade of tinkering, AssCreed has settled on its formula and Revelations presents an impasse - stay the course, do the COD-style franchise thing and hope the fanbase is loyal enough to stump up for iterative updates, or return to the reinvention it once embraced.
]]>Aha! I've just received word that PC review code for Assassin's Creed: Revelations is leaping towards my post box as we speak (WITtery due on Nov 29th, if all goes to plan), which means we can stop worrying that we'll be waiting months for Ezio and Desmond to finally creep this way. So, it seems apt to run this AssCreed: The Story So Far videorama, given the time-hopping backstory of this series is fairly convoluted and not a little silly. Oh, I wish they'd lose the sci-fi stuff entirely, but ultro-lore does seem to be the default way franchises build frighteningly passionate fanbases.
]]>While we may be suffering a delay on Assassin's Creed: Revelations, there's some good news. Ubisoft have just confirmed for me that the game will not be coming with their hideous "always-on" DRM - a sign that perhaps, since it's absent from such a big title, that they're finally recognising it shouldn't be anywhere near any of their products. Instead you'll need to be online the very first time you play the game for an activation, and then it's yours to play offline at your leisure. Goodness gracious, that's bordering on reasonable! Hooray!
]]>The Assassin's Creed: Revelations launch trailer has gone live today, to mark the game's launch on Tuesday next week. Except of course it's only launching on Xbox and PS3 next week, because as usual Ubisoft, after pretending it was going to come out at the same time, announced a delay. This time they were kind enough to make that announcement at the end of September, instead of at the very eleventh hour, but it remained just as depressingly predictable. But hey, we're getting it on 2nd December, "only" two and a half weeks late. Compared to the five months for the first game, four months for the second, and four months for Brotherhood, it's quite the fancy treatment! So, instead of a launch trailer, what with its not launching, below is a time-lapse film of thunderstorms.
]]>There's a bit, 1m40s in, into this new Assassin's Creed Revelations trailer that I feel is a microcosm for how Ubisoft views the PC. A guard stands over a collapsed and bloodied man, who represents the PC gamers excited by the game but who have to wait for them to kick the console beta version out first. The guard then punches the downed man. The fist is Ubisoft's DRM.
]]>It is now par for the course for most big-name videogames to release a special edition designed to enrapture the more passionate/nerdly fans, ensure more pre-orders and make a few bonus groats on each copy sold. It is also now par for the course for many big-name videogames to include bonus DLC, skins and that sort of thing when pre-ordered at certain retailers - designed to ensure the promotional support of those hollow-eyed high-street rotters who so regularly place their hands around the neck of the games industry. For Assassin's Creed: Revelations, both of these steps have been taken. And then some.
There are no less than seven different editions of Ubisoft's latest man-stabber due, each with its own bonus content and tchotchkes, plus assorted pre-order DLC shenanigans on top of that. And that's before you throw in whatever they end up doing with the download version(s) of the game. What fresh madness is this?
]]>Assassins love their dens almost as much as foxes love theirs. It's where they hang out, sharpening their knives and polishing their coins, so it's hardly surprising that when gangs of angry Templars start storming those dens, trying to dull the knives and mar the coins, the assassins are having none of it. Admittedly, it's a little surprising that there appears to be a tower defence minigame simulating those myriad historical moments in Assassin's Creed Revelations. We can now add magically barricading streets and commanding troops to the list of things parkour-killers are capable of. What next? I say fishing and basketball.
]]>Eurogamer are reporting that the PC version of the game will now appear 2nd December 2011, a couple of weeks behind the console versions. This comes as no surprise to anyone who has been following Ubisoft's multiplatform releases over the past couple of years, many of which have been delayed on PC. But let's not lose perspective over this: that's actually an improvement over the many months it usually takes for the AC games to arrive on our humming machines.
]]>The next Assassin's Creed, Revelations, is once again going to have a fulsome multiplayer game for us to sink our concealed weapons into. It's beautiful, too. And stabby. For a taste of quite how stabby it's worth taking a look at the trailer below. Goodness, that's some stylish violence, yes sir. The game is apparently due for release on all formats on November 15th.
]]>If you want to see the demonstration that was shown to journalists at Gamescom over the past couple of days then you need look no further than the crypt in the foundations beneath this post. Nine (count 'em!) minutes of the next Assassin's Creed game in action. There is snow, sneaking, and some stabbing. It looks lovely, but then I always think that about the AC games, and then I play them and oh.
]]>These Assassin's Creed games are pretty popular huh? I've never got on with them particularly well to be honest, and as (to my knowledge) the only games journo out there who actually was an assassin in a past life, I think my opinion counts double. Still, who knows, perhaps Assassin's Creed 4 (if they want me to stop coming up with silly abbreviations they should revert to numbers) could be the one that wins my affections. Certainly this latest trailer has got oodles of nicely choreographed man-stabbing, and what look like a few new ways to get from A to B. Here's Ezio & Altair doing what they do:
]]>It bothers me that I am so uptight about the Assassin's Creed games. They look utterly fabulous, they're all lovely and open and alive, and then that ridiculous memory-world techno-gibberish claptrap drags me right back out of them. Why did they do it? Why not use that amazing tech to make a perfectly good historical action game? I should grit my teeth and get past it, but I just can't. Every time I encounter that nonsense I just want to slap someone.
See if you can spot the point at which I did a big sigh in this (otherwise spectacular) Assassin's Creed: Revelations footage.
]]>There were so many RPS news posts yesterday! What was going on in my absence? This is like coming into work as a mechanic and finding repaired cars not just in the car park, but on the roof, in the basement, balanced on top of lamp posts.
To business. I have lots of great headlines that might benefit this ICE-cool new trailer for Assassin's Creed: Revelations ("Some More Mr. Knife Guy", "Cool Runnings"), but I can't use any of them because the game's title is too long. That's going to be a theme today, isn't it? Ah well.
]]>Assassin's Creed: Revelations has information to spill. As we rejoin Ezio Auditore, running around Constantinople, this November it'll be time to kick some Templar arse. And so far, Ubisoft are saying that includes the PC, although history suggests there's the possibility that could change. What we know so far, some brand new screenshots, and a the first teaser trailer, are below.
]]>Poor old Ubisoft has taken a few money-knocks, admit its latest financial results, which involved a $74.1m / £45.5m loss for the last fiscal year. This has, sadly, led to the cancellation of several unnamed games. Everyone's praying it's not Beyond Good & Evil 2, of course, but it'll probably be a while until we find out what definitely faced the axe. However, a piece of good news for RPS-types is that the reorganisation (which is a word that sounds like it's positive but actually means lay-offs, closures and cancellations) resulting from these bad times has lead to Ubi looking more confidently at the PC as a gaming platform...
]]>Assassin's Creed's trilogy comes to an end this November. The fourth (huh?) installment in the series is to be called Revelations, and completes the three games about Ezio (ah), seeing Ezio heading to Constantinople "at the heart of the Ottoman Empire, where a growing army of Templars threatens to destabilise the region." And that's about it, for now. There's promises of improved multiplayer, and "revolutionary gameplay" (a meaningless phrase for which I'd like to see a £10,000 fine issued each time it appears). It's due in November, and as usual Ubi are implying it'll be on all formats. So we can look forward to the PC version some time in June 2012 then. More information will apparently be appearing at E3. (You can click on that screenshot for a big version.)
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