Assassin’s Creed will continue to see yearly releases

Since the release of Assassin’s Creed II, we’ve seen Ubisoft release at least one Assassin’s Creed game every year.  Overkill?  Perhaps, it depends on who you ask.  According to Ubisoft, the company is just fulfilling demand for the franchise, which they say is still growing.  Ubisoft’s Yannis Mallat explained in an interview from GDC that the company has no intentions on breaking this cycle.

Mallat thinks that if fans didn’t want more Assassin’s Creed each year, they’d stop buying it.  “The players will tell us.  Right now there are more and more coming into the franchise…When you have quality content, the frequency of coming out with the game is not an issue.”

When you have quality content, frequency is not an issue

Ubisoft does have an interesting development cycle for the Assassin’s Creed franchise, and they’ve done a good job of introducing new gameplay elements as the series has grown.  Ubisoft has numerous studios across the globe constantly working on the franchise.  This year’s release of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag looks to be one of the most different games in the series, taking to the high seas for a greater part of the adventure.  While this new game will have features from Assassin’s Creed III, Mallat explains that this an entirely different team working on this game.

“The team that has delivered Assassin’s Creed 3, they’re not working on Black Flag. They’re resting. They are refreshing their minds and then working on something else that is not announced.”  That unannounced game could very well be the title that Jade Raymond confirmed in a separate interview, which we’ll likely see in 2014.  But a year without an Assassin’s Creed release?  It’s not likely.  The franchise is too important to Ubisoft’s yearly financials, and if people are buying them, why not.