After getting a little sample last week of what the general concept is for Assassin’s Creed III, now we have a much better understanding on how that concept will be realized. Press release mumbo-jumbo aside, the trailer and screens for AC3 really show off some interesting new ideas about the game.
Our new hero is Connor Ratohnaké:ton. He’s a half-Native American, half-English roguish-looking assassin who doesn’t look entirely out of place, even if his get-up looks a little out of style at times. He definitely has a hunter look to him evidenced by his old-school bow and quiver, I imagine that has a lot to do with his Native American heritage and I wouldn’t be entirely surprised by an early scene with an elderly shaman who talks about spirits.
Being in the New World, the game will have far less to do with city roaming. In fact, this has been greatly tightened up. Lets face it, cities back in 18th century America wouldn’t be much larger than some rural townships of today. Not the sort of thing I imagine you could run across the roof-tops like you could in previous games. Instead, the game will focus much more on the open world terrain, out in the wilderness. You’ll be jumping through trees instead of balconies, hunting animals instead of guards. It should be a huge difference not only aesthetically, but in actual gameplay. On top of this though, because of the vast wilderness you’ll be navigating, fast travel has been implemented to get you places much faster.
But other than how you’ll travel around the world, the core combat gameplay also looks like it will be changing to the new landscape. I’m already liking that tomahawk in Connor’s left hand, but the abundance of gunpowder rifles means that combat will need to revolve more around gunplay than swordplay. The trailer shows a little with how that might work up-close, but not so much how it will work when guards are chasing you down or how you might snipe people down. Guns are far more accurate than bows ever were, so how this will play in is up to speculation.
That’s really just the tip of the iceberg though and I’m sure that more details will trickle in (and I’m sure there will be a much cooler trailer at E3), but for now that’s mostly all we know about the game. Let’s hope we can avoid as much use of the word ‘revolutionary’ when it comes to the reviews in the winter.