Activision has revealed that Assassin’s Creed Mirage isn’t going to have any modern-day segments, and why they made the change.
For the first three games, players shifted in between playing as Desmond in the real world, and the memories of his ancestor Assassins, Altair in Syria, Ezio in Renaissance Italy, Haytham Kenway, and Connor. With each game, fans of the games became more interested in playing the Assassins in their different historical eras and less interested in the events in the modern day. To fit these fan expectations, Ubisoft wrote Desmond off in Assassins Creed III, who sacrificed himself to save humanity by touching the Vault pedestal, activating it to use his DNA.
While later Assassin’s Creed games still fit in some modern segments, Ubisoft has decided to let go of that convention completely for Assassin’s Creed Mirage. Creative Director Stephane Boudon explained.
“No, we decided to not put in any present-day or future playable missions in Assassin’s Creed Mirage because we wanted to really focus on the story of Basim when he was in Baghdad in the Ninth Century. So, you are still in the Animus obviously. It’s core to the Assassin’s Creed franchise, so you will start with Animus and there’s also an ending, but we won’t have any gameplay for present-day during the whole game.”
However, this change goes beyond Assassin’s Creed Mirage itself. Marc-Alexis Côté, the vice president and executive producer for Assassin’s Creed, explained that Ubisoft’s plans moving forward were actually to tell the modern-day story of the Assassins and Templars in the new hub platform Assassin’s Creed Infinity.
Assassin’s Creed Infinity is not a game itself, at least not like the other Assassin’s Creed games. The premise for Infinity is that it is like your personal Animus machine. Based on how Animus works in the in-game universe, instead of living through these adventures vicariously twice over with Desmond and one of his ancestors, you are directly playing the role that Desmond once did indirectly.
Côté did not share too many details beyond that, but he did say that the way they will be telling the story will change as time progresses. This at least suggests that they will use different media to tell this story. It would make sense to have esoteric details explained via text fiction, such as a fictional journal or Assassin reference, and then more dramatic moments are retold as audio drama. Major events could be retold using animated or live-action features. On the other hand, Ubisoft may be thinking outside the box, with ideas like ARGs or mobile companion apps. There may be no actual limit to the potential for Assassin’s Creed Infinity.
In the meantime, Assassin’s Creed Mirage will be released on 2023 on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and Windows via Ubisoft Connect, Amazon Luna, and Epic Games Store.
You can read our other coverage of Assassin’s Creed Mirage below.
Reported Assassin’s Creed Mirage Description Leaks
Assassin’s Creed Mirage Officially Revealed With Epic Trailer
