Ubisoft Annecy
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'Riders Republic' is an extreme sports MMO from the studio behind 'Steep'
You'll be able to play it on current and next-generation consoles next year.
Assassin's Creed competitive killing takes a break
The dense history of Assassin's Creed starts humbly in 2007, with polarizing reviews seeing more potential than anything else in the first game. Still, big sales paved the way for Assassin's Creed 2, which took the franchise into 15th century Italy and along an unbroken streak of bigger, annual releases. The addition of competitive multiplayer for Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood drew extra skepticism around the franchise's expansion, but it endured and grew alongside new assassins - until now.
Assassin's Creed 3 will have new challenges and content every month
While Ubisoft has been quick to introduce Connor and focus on the single-player campaign in Assassin's Creed 3, not much has been said on the multiplayer side, a staple of the series since being introduced in Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood. Multiplayer developer Ubisoft Annecy says there will be a greater focus on multiplayer in Assassin's Creed 3 – both in terms of support from Ubisoft and its impact on the overall Assassin's Creed lore.Abstergo has turned the Animus into a commercial product, and you'll play as one consumer who's looking forward to "reliving the past in HD." Every month, Ubisoft will give players new content to unlock through new challenges. "As you progress in the game and level up your character, you access these files and videos. Every month you'll have new challenges to unlock new content that will continue the storyline throughout the year," Ubisoft Annecy game director Damien Kieken told CVG.The multiplayer environments themselves will now have a greater impact on gameplay – weather effects such as sudden rain storms or blizzards can impact visibility and players can employ special environmental kills using objects like bottles and axes. Back at Gamescom, Ubisoft demoed Wolfpack and Domination, two modes we were able to sample – a new wave-based co-op mode where players hunt down targets in the environment and take them down, and the more traditional four-on-four team-based mode, respectively.
Running through the snow with Assassin's Creed 3 creative lead Alex Hutchinson
Assassin's Creed 3 protagonist Connor introduces more than just unpronounceable names to the AC series. Ubisoft creative lead Alex Hutchinson cheerfully elucidates those additions in the latest gameplay walkthrough, above.
Watch Connor face down a damn bear in Assassin's Creed 3
You'll be doing a lot of things with Assassin's Creed 3 protagonist Ratohnhaké:ton – like chasing down Redcoats and murdering them, running away from murderous Redcoats, sneaking up to silently murder Redcoats, and engaging in open battle with Redcoats. Beyond all that, however, you'll also be fighting terrifying, wild bears, as the trailer above implies. Thankfully for you, we can confirm it: yes, you'll be fighting the bear seen in the above trailer.The gameplay trailer for Assassin's Creed 3 – unlocked by the community this morning – shows the first Connor-on-Bear action we've seen. It also gives a first glimpse at the game's new "chain blade," but the most important part is still dude fights a bear.
Building a Revolution: The four teams behind Assassin's Creed 3
Ubisoft Montreal is kind of a big deal. Since being established in 1997, the company's first North American studio has been home to some of the biggest franchises in Ubisoft's entire portfolio: Splinter Cell, multiple Prince of Persia reboots, and Assassin's Creed.Ever since Ubisoft Montreal's Assassin's Creed 2 introduced Ezio Auditore in 2009, the number of studios working on the franchise alone has increased dramatically. For 2010's Brotherhood, four additional studios signed on for support: Singapore, Bucharest, Québec City, and Annecy. For 2011's Revelations, yet another was added (Ubisoft Massive), putting the total at six.For this year's Assassin's Creed 3, the army of studios has been restructured to four: Montreal, Annecy, Quebéc City, and Singapore."Annecy is still doing an evolution of the multiplayer," Creative director Alex Hutchinson explained to Joystiq. As we already know, Ubisoft Annecy is working on some form of -- potentially co-op -- multiplayer."There're a few things that are being done in the Québec studio. So there's an evolution there," he said. Despite prodding, he wouldn't reveal what specifically that tease meant. "We cannot talk about specifically what they are working on." The Québec studio assisted with level design (among other things) in the past two Assassin's Creed titles.Even though an army is attached to Assassin's Creed 3, it's Montreal that has been focused on the project for the past two and a half years. "80 percent of our team have come through from AC1, AC2. A lot of them didn't do ACB or ACR 'cause they were working on AC3," Hutchinson said. "The turnover has actually been scarily low for a franchise that's been going for seven years. You still have the same lead writer who wrote the first words on AC1, you have the same guy doing the navigation that did AC1.""At its core," Hutchinson said, "it is a Ubisoft Montreal game." He told us, "The thing with other studios is that they have different skill sets. At the end of the day, it's what makes it sometimes harder to manage the game, but it also makes the game richer." It's a formula that, thus far, has worked astonishingly well for Ubisoft. We'll find out if the company strikes gold once more this October when Assassin's Creed 3 launches.
Assassin's Creed 3: Rebuilding a series during the birth of a nation
Back in late 2009, creative director Alex Hutchinson and a handful of others started drawing up plans for what would become Assassin's Creed 3. In those two years, the team rethought core elements of the series: cities, combat, and the franchise's signature "free running" mechanic. Even the engine, Anvil, was examined and updated (now dubbed "AnvilNext").But before all of that, Hutchinson needed a setting and a character. He wouldn't tell us why or how he settled on the American Revolution (nor would he say what other ideas came up), but he did explain why he believes it'll be a success. "We really believe this is the strongest setting so far in an AC game. Why? Because we think it's the most relevant setting," he said during a group presentation. "This is the birth of the nation. But even for other countries, especially in Europe, it's a key historical event."By the way, for all his U.S pride, Hutchinson is an Aussie and he lives in Canada. We assume he's spent a lot of time watching Independence Day.%Gallery-151408%
Assassin's Creed 3 multiplayer comes from old studio, new lead designer
Assassin's Creed 3 is getting the multiplayer treatment from Ubisoft Annecy, the studio responsible for multiplayer modes in Revelations and Brotherhood, an update on veteran designer Tim Browne's Twitter page reads. Browne's profile says "Lead Game Designer on Assassin's Creed III Multiplayer @Ubisoft - Annecy," which leaves little to the imagination (scandalous).The multiplayer aspect of AC3 remains relatively vague, apart from the "Online co-op 2-4" feature removed from the title's XBLM listing, and the "Online multiplayer 2-8" one that is still there. A few of Browne's shipments included local and online co-op modes, including Operation Flashpoint: Red River and Dragon Rising, and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End. He has no previous involvement with Assassin's Creed franchise.An old studio with a fresh face -- Ubisoft is sending us mixed signals about its multiplayer mode, and dang it if we're not falling for the tease all over again.
Assassin's Creed: Revelations launch trailer (it's dubstep free!)
In which we learn that Assassin's Creed has not once offered a tutorial on surrender.
Assassin's Creed Brotherhood: Designing the Considerate Kill
Before playing the upcoming Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Joystiq looks back at the creation of the franchise's first multiplayer installment, Brotherhood. "It was a very difficult game to design, and making it accessible was even harder. We were starting from scratch, with no benchmarks. It's not like a shooter where all you need to know is how to shoot the bad guys." If there's one thing we get, in every way that anything can possibly be gotten, it's the shooting of the bad guys. Games don't even bother to include tutorials for that part anymore, and reviewers treat it as a begrudging axiom when they have to differentiate between the year's big multiplayer offerings. When Damien Kieken, multiplayer game director for Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, says it was difficult to make the game -- and then to make it accessible -- he's speaking to a peculiar and notable absence. If you're shooting the bad guys in Assassin's Creed, you're doing it a bit wrong.
Joystiq Top 10 of 2010: Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood took the single-player mechanics of one of our top games for 2009, Assassin's Creed 2, and sharpened them to a fine point; but that's not why Brotherhood clambered so high on our best of 2010 tower. The sequel is here for blindsiding us with a panic-fueled, engrossing multiplayer component. Like many of you, we've grown cynical watching companies cram unnecessary multiplayer into games with solid single-player experiences. Upon its announcement, that's exactly what Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood's stab-or-be-stabbed multiplayer sounded like: typical padding to a cash-in sequel, still riding high on the last game's wave of success. Wrong. Not only did Brotherhood's single-player campaign offer a focused, distilled romp through Rome, but its multiplayer gave us a unique experience that, refreshingly, didn't have shooting at its heart.
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood patch to correct 'Animus bug'
Ubisoft has announced an upcoming title update for Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood that should spur stalled multiplayer matchmaking, restore PlayStation 3 Trophy acquisition and give the notorious Animus bug the boot. And that one's a detrimental glitch, mind you. If you've played Brotherhood's online component, you'll know that a lot of the bugs, cheats and exploits used by Abstergo employees in Animus simulations are features, first and foremost. Due to arrive "very soon," Title Update 3 aims to free players who get stuck either during the match search process, or in the Animus seat when they visit the 2012 timeline in the single-player campaign. It'll also address a fast travel glitch in Rome and a bug that can prevent PS3 players from unlocking further trophies after a certain point in the game. You can see a more detailed list of fixes after the break. We'll let you know as soon as the update becomes available on Xbox Live and PlayStation Network.
