STACK New Zealand October Issue 67

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“While modern guns might sound
overpowered in Assassin’s Creed, in reality
guns are very loud and thus always carry the
possibility of alerting reinforcements or nearby
police, which can overwhelm the player – so
they must be used selectively.”
There is a feature introduced in Syndicate
that we’ve had reservations about since it was
announced: the rope launcher. The desperate
scramble up the face of a building following an
assassination, with an angry group of guards in
pursuit, is a unique aspect of the game. With
every panicked lunge comes the possibility of
being hit with an arrow or musket ball, sending
players tumbling down into the armed mob
below. It’s an intrinsic part of AC gameplay –
and something the rope launcher is surely set
to change.
“The rope launcher is a tool that is required
by our near modern setting with the tallest
buildings and the widest streets ever seen
in an Assassin’s Creed game,” responds
Phillips to our question. “Far from reducing
the enjoyment of parkour, we find that players
seamlessly integrate the rope launcher into
their movement capabilities – along with the
systemic carriages – and are quickly able to mix
and match between all of the navigation tools
as the situation calls for short, medium, and
long distance travel.
“Players find a balance of where they want
to use each type of navigation in order to get
where they want to go, and they continue to
look and feel like a true assassin no matter how
they travel.”
While this is the first full Assassin’s Creed
title that Ubisoft Quebec have produced,
the studio has a proliferation of franchise
experience, having developed the Wii U
versions of Assassin’s Creed III and Assassin’s
Creed: Black Flag , and assisted on Unity
and Rogue. Assassin's Creed remains a
strong IP for Ubisoft and popular amongst
fans. Creative director Marc Alexis Côté
believes the key to its success comes
down to a combination of three core
factors.
“At the core of the Assassin’s Creed
fantasy is the ability of the animus
to make us relive an important era of
humanity’s history,” he says. “This 'time
machine' aspect of the franchise is
really unique to it, but also appeals to
something fundamental inside each of us,
which is to learn more about our past.
“The opportunity to relive someone else’s
memory – especially that of an assassin that
plays a pivotal role in an important part of our
history – is also an appealing power fantasy.
“And finally, it’s the ability to discover a new
city depicted in a very realistic manner, and
being able to explore every corner of it.”
London is calling indeed.
Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate is set in a period late into the Industrial Revolution, an era widely accepted as beginning around 1760 and culminating
between 1840-60. During this time, Britain, and then subsequently areas of Europe and North America, experienced unprecedented advancements in
manufacturing technology and vast economic expansion. Here are five facts you may, or may not, know about the Industrial Revolution.
The Industrial Revolution
The term revolution is a
misnomer. It implies
that the Industrial Revolution
was a movement in history that
progressed rapidly from ideas
to fruition almost overnight.
However, the opposite was
true. Progression was slow and
unfolded over a period of about
100 years.
Coal and steel were
driving forces behind
the Industrial Revolution.
Steel to build the new
mechanised technology, and
coal to power it. The new
machines and factories
enabled more profitable
production at a greatly
reduced labour cost.
During the
middle of the
18th century, society
was predominately
centred in rural areas.
The introduction of
factories in Britain’s
largest cities caused an
exponential increase in
urban population.
Britain, an emerging
colonial powerhouse,
tapped into its vast global
resources to supply materials
for emerging markets such as
the burgeoning textile industry.
The colonies themselves
provided the perfect
marketplace to sell and trade
these goods.
The Industrial Revolution is
synonymous with appalling living
and working conditions for the poor and
worker-class. The Combination Act passed
in 1799 by British Parliament was designed
to stop workers joining together to demand
more money, better working conditions and
shorter working hours; thus the trade unions
were effectively disabled. It was a quarter
of a century before the act was repealed.
GAMES FEATURE
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