AusGamers was given a chance to check an in-depth 10-minute developer video walkthrough for the upcoming Assassin's Creed 3. Read on for our full preview...
When Ubisoft Sydney fired up the 10-minute plus video walkthrough for Assassin’s Creed III for AusGamers, the immediate stand-out was that events unfolding before us were being narrated by a familiar accent. Alex Hutchinson, Assassin’s Creed III’s creative director, is an Aussie, you see, and his cool and calculating pitch on the changes and advances in Ubisoft Montreal’s latest Assassin’s entry were perfectly in line with the sleek, equally calculating movements of new series protagonist, Connor, as he scaled a snow-covered tree before dropping into waist-deep snow to investigate the bloody remains of a soldier below.
No detective work was needed here though, as a giant bear appeared seemingly out of nowhere, forcing Connor, a half-Native American, half English member of the Assassins Guild, to thrust a dagger deep into its heart, dropping the hulking grizzly into the thick snow. Apparently animals and ecology will play a large role in Assassin’s Creed III, though whether or not it’s as robust as the likes of Red Dead Redemption or Skyrim, will remain to be seen.
Moving on, another stand-out feature came in the form of Connor fighting to walk through the waist-deep snow mentioned earlier. It shifted and moved around him in what looked like a procedural physics system that will hopefully play a larger part in the game. There are awesome ideas being floated about given the snowy period in which the game is set whereby walking Connor across tree-branches nestled above unsuspecting enemies could alert them to your presence, if you’re not too careful and let snow or dew drop from your perch to hit them below.
There’s also the idea that Connor will obviously be less nimble in thicker snow, or that he could hide beneath the surface of snow, or even hide bodies or traps. The options are certainly varied and exciting. We’re also hoping weather will play a bigger part in the game, and not just be a case of snow, or no snow. One section of the game we saw a bit later in the demo featured a skyline at dusk. Clouds scattered the horizon in an overcast weather pattern, giving canvas to the red setting sun to not only create a dramatic backdrop to the scene playing out in the foreground (an actual Revolution skirmish with some 2000 characters on-screen at once - more on this shortly), but to also give credence to the idea the game might actually come with a dynamic weather system, hopefully in the same vein as the two benchmark open-world games mentioned earlier - Red Dead Redemption and Skyrim.
Obviously being set during the American Revolution, the game’s environments are vastly different to those of the previous games. Still, the team have done a bang-up job inventing natural climbing parkour opportunities in the way of trees and cliff faces, and we’re told there are barely any animations pulled over from the previous games, and it shows. Bridging between animation trees at certain points still looked a little bit jerky, so we’re hoping it’s a lot smoother when the game is finally released, but by and large, it’s looking a lot better on a visual level than any of the previous efforts.
You won’t just be climbing trees and cliff faces though, and our demo took the young Connor into the bustling and emerging city of Boston, Massachusetts. Even getting here was performed by a neat trick where Connor stowed away on a horse-drawn cart full of hay (an obvious Assassin’s Creed staple), that was part of a larger convoy of soldiers and supplies heading to what we can only assume is going to be the game’s main city hub.
Boston itself is stunningly recreated with Boston harbour full of NPC life. According to Hutchinson, AI has been much improved and each and every one of them has their own objectives they need to perform, lending a greater sense of organic life as opposed to the mindless peds of the previous games. Just how robust this new system is will remain to be seen, but again, in this short demo it did look a lot more promising.
The main purpose of our Boston city visit was to show off some of the pursuit changes to the game, which now sees Connor being able to cut through buildings, instead of over them. This seems dynamically generated during triggered chase sequences, as we saw a lady open her window most likely for some fresh air as Connor approached her place of residence. It was a much more engaging change to the system though, and more easily broke the enemy line-of-sight than we’ve seen in the past.
Moving from bustling Boston, the video demo took us to the Battle of Bunker Hill, a famous moment in the American Revolution where Connor spoke with General Israel Putnam, a man history tells us was born from a farming family famous for the Salem witch trials. He also allegedly killed the last wolf in Connecticut by going into its den as a youth armed only with a musket and torch. He was a member of the Freemasons and one of the founding members of the Connecticut Sons of Liberty. In the Battle of Bunker Hill, which he volunteered for and was named Major General, it’s alleged the famous quote “don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes†came from him (though this is highly debated, apparently). Suffice to say, it’s a good guess he’ll play a major role in the game.
Despite not supporting either side of the war, according to Hutchinson, it’s likely much of the Revolution and Putnam’s success will come at the hands of Connor, and so directly from you, the player. We had a chance to see our protagonist ascending upon the Bunker Hill battlefield, moving from cover position to cover position, and even demonstrating a new slide move to quickly and safely traverse beyond less protected parts of the environment.
The battle itself was a great demonstration of the new game-engine’s strengths, with the aforementioned ability to no longer be limited to only hundreds of characters on-screen at once, but 2000-odd. As Connor made his way down the hill, the collected musket troops were firing under orders and you could hear the shots ring out with the smoke from their weapons appearing slightly delayed. It looked incredible, and added more drama to a single quest objective than anything else that’s ever happened in the previous games before.
The demo also showed a touch of combat, that saw Connor taking swift action against a group of soldiers. Without the controller in your own hands, it’s hard to say how combat will fair against previous entries, but my hopes are that the team have been playing plenty of
Batman: Arkham City, while hanging on to some of the dramatic takedowns and kills we’ve all come to love from the assassin protagonists of the series. Obviously as a Native American, Connor has a whole new arsenal of weapons such as a trusty tomahawk and a bow, all of which looked to be very useful in combat. But we’re going to hold judgement on this component until we can get our hands on the game ourselves.
One final cool piece of information we were privy to, was the addition of the new running assassination feature. Essentially you find your target and sprint towards him while holding down X (the demo video appeared to be PS3), and doing so meant that contextually, Connor would take care of anyone who got in his way, in glorious dramatic fashion. And in typical Ubisoft and Assassin’s Creed style, the demo ended with the classic assassins leap, knees up with tomahawk in-hand, to despatch Connor’s horse-mounted target. End demo.
All in all, the visual overhaul and stand-out changes such as weather, ecology, AI and varied gameplay rekindled a love of this series for us. Ubisoft may have overdosed their fanbase on Ezio-driven stories, but with an all-new setting, an equally new protagonist and more questions than answers for one of the most complex videogame narratives around, we’re definitely hooked to know more.
Stay tuned to AusGamers for more information, media and features in the coming weeks and months.
