A Ubisoft executive claimed future entries for its long-running Assassin's Creed franchise will offer a wider array of genres than ever before.
Vice President Executive Producer of the Assassin's Creed series Marc-Alexis Côté commented on Ubisoft's plans for the franchise, beginning with its creative vision for the upcoming Assassin's Creed Mirage. "What's interesting about Mirage is that it's in between that RPG style and the gameplay that made Assassin's Creed famous in the beginning," Côté said. He explained how Mirage would be the start of a new period for the Assassin's Creed franchise, with Côté further revealing the developers intended to focus on extending the duration of their support for titles, specifically for their RPG products.
Côté promised Ubisoft would also change its attitude regarding gameplay design, which he believed would provide players with a unique experience with every released title. He continued, "I think there are very valuable benefits to building games that are very different from one another in our two studios because it helps us collaborate, as we're not both building RPGs on top of one another. So each studio has a vision for the game it wants to implement and collaborates on all the core technology that is necessary to make those two games successful."
While Côté didn't specify Ubisoft's exact plans for diversifying the gameplay of the Assassin's Creed franchise, the company previously hosted the Ubisoft Forward showcase, which gave fans a rudimentary peek into its designs for several future entries into the series. The tentatively titled Codename: Hexe project, which will be released as part of Assassin's Creed Infinity, will reportedly focus on witch hunts in 16th-century Europe and incorporate horror elements into its campaign. Ubisoft additionally confirmed the upcoming flagship title of the franchise, Codename RED, will take Assassin's Creed to one of the most fan-requested eras and locales for the series, feudal Japan.
Assassin's Creed Mirage, which is expected to be the next entry into the franchise, stumbled into some controversy when various store pages listed it under the Adults Only ESRB rating due to alleged gambling mechanics. Ubisoft claimed the listing was mistaken, as Mirage had still not been examined by the ESRB at the time. The French-based developer further remarked that Mirage did not include any gambling mechanics at all, and it specifically denied the game contained any form of loot boxes.
Assassin's Creed Mirage is scheduled for release in 2023. At the time of writing, no official release date has been confirmed for Codename Hexe and Codename RED.
Source: Ubisoft