We have some new rumors regarding Assassins’ Creed Hexe.
According to Insider Gaming, the title is still in the early stages of development, and is projected for a 2026 release, on Ubisoft’s new Infinity platform. As promised by Ubisoft, this one won’t be a sprawling open world. The game will be mostly linear, retaining some open world exploration but not much more.
The lead character is named Elsa, but her powers are more mysterious and supernatural than Disney’s most popular princess of the same name. Insider Gaming claims to have seen footage of Elsa distracting a group of soldiers looking for her by using a cat. She uses a spell to possess the cat, and then has the cat break a bottle, so that the soldiers are distracted by the noise.
Insider Gaming also claims that the title will use the Fear system, as implemented in the Jack the Ripper DLC for Assassin’s Creed Syndicate. The Fear system was present in the original Assassin’s Creed games, but the Jack the Ripper version is particularly nasty.
It is an alternate attack system, but instead of allowing you to take on multiple foes at the same time, it creates a situation where after you kill one or two foes, the rest will run away, in fear of you.
Again, the original Assassins demonstrated this ability, but the way Jack the Ripper uses it isn’t very pleasant. He will take out a knife and gut an opponent in full public view, to make NPCs scamper away from him. He could also take out a stake and literally nail an opponent to the ground, for the purpose of making other opponents run away.
If Elsa had a similar system in her employ, perhaps by using other animals, or inanimate objects, that could get as nasty as if you were playing a serial killer. Or, perhaps Ubisoft has set up this system to emphasize the fear creating part, and not so much the bloodthirsty violence part.
Ubisoft is no stranger to making violent Assassin’s Creed games. In fact, they are pretty famous for deliberately stoking controversy by depicting beheadings, not just in the Assassin’s Creed Unity game itself, but even in its promotional trailers.
So Ubisoft could up the ante on the violence, but would they? If they’re thinking they can make Elsa and her sisters sympathetic characters, they are going to have to put some work in to accomplish that while making them particularly bloodthirsty.
But then, a lot of recent fiction has made ‘witches’, Wiccans, or people with beliefs and faiths confused as witchcraft, to be sympathetic characters. There’s an even richer history of making witchhunters clear and easy villains. So there’s seed for a great story with Assassins’ Creed Hexe, and if Ubisoft balances out their ambitions and polish right, this could be a particular gem in the franchise. We are all looking forward for when Ubisoft finally uncloaks this little title for us when it’s ready.
