Assassin’s Creed Rogue is Ubisoft’s surprise experiment with the contest between last-gen and current-gen consoles. Whilst many other developers just bundle all the consoles together in one game, like Crimes and Punishments by Frogwares, Ubisoft has elected to make two different games. Unity for Xbox One, Playstation 4 and PC and Rogue for Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.
Until now, we haven’t seen much of Assassin’s Creed Rogue, but recently they’ve released official gameplay footage and, thus, we can take a look at what last-gen gamers have to look forward to. In Rogue, players will get to explore three different zones: New York City, “The American River Valley” and the North Atlantic Ocean. First up is the gameplay video of the North Atlantic Zone, which is practically the seas off the coast of Canada.
To start off, let’s get the elephant out of the room. Yes that is Haytham Kenway on the Morrigan (your ship), (MASSIVE SPOILER ALERT AT THIS POINT IF YOU HAVEN’T PLAYED AC3 and AC4:BF YET AND DON’T WANT SPOILERS, BUT SERIOUSLY, IF YOU HAVEN’T, WHY ARE YOU READING THIS?), the only playable character until Shay who was an actual Templar (ol’ Eddy Kenway doesn’t really count since he only worked for them). So more crossovers with previous games can be expected, perhaps even old man Achilles Davenport in his younger years? For those of you who are into Assassin’s Creed lore, Achilles was supposed to be the last Assassin who just happened to be spared by Haytham as he practically massacred all the Assassin’s in colonial America. Perhaps you will be doing the massacring as Shay?
Next you will notice that the gameplay looks really similar to Black Flag. The ship barely looks different and the weapons, although with slight modifications like a puckle gun and flaming oil slicks, instead of exploding barrels tossed out the back, it looks to be the same game, but in a different place. So sort of the treatment we got going from Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood to Revelations, except obviously, different character. Small additions like needing to break through ice with an in-game bought ice breaker, narwhals, penguins and icebergs give it a small touch of uniqueness, but nothing is going to convince anyone that this isn’t just, basically, a re-skinning of Black Flag. Also, the video clearly shows some things that need to be touched up on, I highly doubt Shay was supposed to get stabbed through the neck and live. Next up is the River Valley zone.
With a different accent narrating and much of the same stuff from the previous gameplay video at the beginning with the naval stuff, the video quickly transitions into a gang headquarters capture mission, which is not too dissimilar to the fort captures you had to perform in Assassin’s Creed 3. It is noticeable that, for the first time in Assassin’s Creed, not only are many of your targets Assassins, but they are also able (and do) use Assassin skills against you like smoke bombs and aerial attacks. It’s also interesting that the compass that players will be familiar with from multiplayer, has made its appearance in the single player as a way to find where the Assassin you’re chasing is, which is an interesting new addition. However, the video is also noticeably choppy and hopefully they iron out these problems before release, but potential bugs aside, the game looks like it can be good old Assassin’s Creed fun.
It is interesting the parallels drawn between Unity and Rogue. In Rogue, you are a templar and fighting for the British cause against the French in the Seven Year’s War. In Unity, you are French Assassins and who knows, maybe you’ll kill an English templar or two. What we do know is that this isn’t just drawn up as a fight between consoles. It’s real meta stuff. You can pre-order Assassin’s Creed Rogue now and get an extra mission as a bonus.
Are you a firm member of Team Last-Gen? Rogue over Unity or Unity over Rogue? Why not both? Tell us what you think in the comments below!
