Banner by Thea Marie Rivedal (Moonchildgecko) from TOWCB Art Team.

Welcome to the first part in a new series breaking down all of the Assassin's Creed content presented at Ubisoft Forward 2023.

In part one, we take a look at the pre-show and Assassin's Creed Nexus reveal!

Related articles

• The Future of Assassin’s Creed at UbiForward 2023 Part 2 - Assassin's Creed Codename Jade

• The Future of Assassin’s Creed at UbiForward 2023 Part 3 - Assassin's Creed Mirage Story Trailer

• The Future of Assassin’s Creed at UbiForward 2023 Part 4 - Assassin's Creed Mirage Gameplay Trailer

  
  

Pre-show

We kick things off by joining a team of architects researching Assassin's Creed Unity, and video game architecture! In an effort to understand not only the creation of the games, but the architecture used in the games. Assassin’s Creed Unity is used for teaching classes taught by You+Pea. The full video (which was released in May, 2023) can be found on YouTube here and is part of Ubisoft’s Carte Blanche series.

Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix

In the preview for Adi Shankar’s Captain Laserhawk: A Blood Dragon Remix one of the “rebel outcasts” that Super-soldier Dolph Laserhawk will be working with to break out of the Supermax prison, is a frog Assassin that reminds me of the Assassin’s Creed series’ Ezio Auditore. This animation is coming to Netflix in Autumn, 2023.

Adi Shankar was once slated to produce an animated Assassin's Creed series, but no clear update has been given on this project since 2017

Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR (Red Storm Entertainment)

The trailer for Assassin’s Creed Nexus opens with a player donning their Meta Quest headset and taking control of Assassin’s Creed III protagonist, Ratonhnhaké:ton/Connor Kenway. Jumping from the rooftops of what looks to be Boston, Massachusetts, Connor sneaks up behind a British soldier and with his tomahawk, dispatches him with a strike to the chest from behind.

From here he runs up crates that are being used for barricades in the alleyway and launches himself into the air where he draws his longbow to attack a group of soldiers from behind as one of them turns to see him.

The action transitions from Connor, to the player holding the posing simulated control of the bow before transitioning again to Kassandra from Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. She releases the arrow into a Spartan soldier and then turns in first person view to clash swords with another.

The sword she is using at first made me think of Nikolaos's Sword but at second glance seems to be a generic blade. Her parry allows her to bring the blade down on the soldier as the video transitions again to the player kneeling post-strike, and switching once more to Ezio Auditore in a crouch on the rooftops of Venice with the Basilica S.Maria Gloriosa dei Frari behind his right shoulder.

Ezio stands and parkours over a short section of the canals until he is standing above a group of four soldiers.

He releases his dual-hidden blades and performs an assassination on the soldier closest to him, with the video transitioning again as he makes his kill.

The video ends with the player performing various actions with a sword and then shows the title card with the three Assassins that you will be able to play with. The English Audio Described VOD from the Ubisoft YouTube channel does not provide any additional information as it does not have the EAD like other trailers in the showcase.

From the website and supplemental interview with Creative Director David Votypka for the game provides the following information:

• Climb & parkour anywhere

• The levels will be in open map areas

• Blend into crowds

• Interact with civilians

• Perform assassinations and the Leap of Faith

• Choose how you play, fast or stealth

All-New Assassin’s Creed Story

This is an All-new Assassin’s Creed story, where Abstergo Industries has retrieved Isu Artifacts and you must sabotage their plan in all new missions as the legendary Assassins. The game will provide 360-degree navigation around historically-accurate open maps where you can traverse and choose how to achieve your objective. This sounds similar to Black Box Missions which are also known to be coming to Assassin’s Creed Mirage.

It was also confirmed in the interview with David Votypka, that the Modern-Day story will tie all of the historical periods together. Players will be trying to solve a mystery that requires them accessing the Assassin’s pasts to accomplish.

Explore and Parkour Freely

In the interview with CD David Votypka, he describes the open world style of the game as “tactical sandboxes” where the maps are not big (such as Odyssey or Valhalla), but if you can interact with anything you can see and climb and parkour both horizontally and vertically. 360-degrees of how they choose to play, stealth of fighting, rooftops or streets.

The first few missions will be linear to teach players how the controls in VR work, but the remainder of the campaign will be up to the player to decide how to play. The game can be played room-scale, stationary, standing, or seated, but standing in room-scale is the most immersive way to play.

Intuitive Combat

Players will be able to block, parry, counterattack, and duel with reactive enemies using real-world motions. There will be a large arsenal of weapons including:

• Hidden Blades (All)

• Swords (Ezio & Kassandra)

• Tomahawk (Connor)

• Bows (Connor & Cassandra)

• Crossbow (Ezio)

• Throwing knives (All)

• Smoke bombs (Connor & Ezio)*

David Votypka describes which Assassins will use which weapons (*not confirmed) in his interview and describes the actions used to deploy your Hidden Blade. Players will perform the same action as the characters they will embody, flicking your wrist (while holding the top trigger). The team really wanted to have a tactile motion to this weapon. Ezio and Connor will have dual-blades, but Kassandra will only have one.

Stealth

Players will be able to use traditional stealth as well as social stealth. While controls have not been released yet, it is assumed that you will be able to crouch physically to sneak up on enemies, or hold a button to perform the same action (a way to provide Accessibility controls). You will also be able to perform air assassinations, but there has been no indication of other types such as bench, haystack, or ledge assassinations yet.

Interactive World

Players will be able to explore in the open maps, interact with historical figures, and see the reactions of civilians and enemies when they perform actions using cinematics that will provide a unique immersive experience.

Innovative Comfort Settings

Accessability does appear to be kept in mind as various settings will be included to combat nausea, vertigo, and fear of heights. These are:

• Peripheral vision blocking

• Teleportation

• Additional settings not listed

In the interview listed above, David Votypka states that players can use the stick on the controller to move around, which has to be done regardless of how you play. There is also a focus on sitting to play as not everyone can stand for multiple hours. He also informed that there is a dedicated team that worked exclusively on comfort features. Some of the things they worked on was allowing players to teleport without breaking the stealth experience, but an awareness warning where enemies would see the path you are taking if you were crossing a street for instance. You can also use the teleport feature for parkour, avoiding free locomotion.

Having played the Assassin’s Creed Escape Games’ AC Odyssey: Medusa’s Gate, AC Origins: Escape the Lost Pyramid, and Prince of Persia: The Dagger of Time on the HTC Vive, I am very confident that the teleportation will remain an immersive experience.

The peripheral vision can be adjusted with dynamic vignetting (blacking out the edges of the screen which was first shown in Eagle Flight (a 2016 VR release from Ubisoft). This feature is used when you are near objects and only in needed areas. Additionally on the subject of fear of heights, a subliminal grid can be used to give you a sense of the ground beneath your feet while standing above the maps you are exploring.

The Assassins

The site also provides small Codex entries on the three Assassins. This includes their name, when and where they were born, and what they have done previously to the Nexus game. It also provides information on what has happened recently in ties with the new title. When explaining the choices made to uses these characters, the decision was based on fan-favorites, poster-characters, and the interesting environments of their historical settings.

Ezio Auditore da Firenze

Born: 24 June, 1549 CE

Active during the Italian Renaissance and a Master Assassin.

Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR will follow Ezio in 1509, two years after his time in Rome during Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood. He will reunite with the Auditore Family (his sister Claudia and his mother Maria) as well as friends such as Leonardo Da Vinci. The story is noted to contain harrowing conflict, stolen treasures, and revenge.

Kassandra

Born: 458 BCE

A Greek misthios (mercenary) active during the Peloponnesian War.

Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR will reunite players with Kassandra 20 years after the Battle of Amphipolis (where Brasidas and Kleon were killed). The historical event of this mission set will be during the “Reign of the Thirty Tyrants” rule of Athens.

Connor

Born: 4 April, 1756

A British American Mohawk active during the American Revolution

Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR will have Connor working a contract for Achilles to rescue an imprisoned Son of Liberty in Boston. It is described as a story of espionage, intrigue, and betrayal. 

The Sons of Liberty were active between 1765 and 1766 and had a major role in fighting back against The Stamp Act of 1765. In Boston, where these missions are based (or at least start) The Sons of Liberty burned an effigy of Andrew Oliver, who could have a role in this story. The missions take place between 1776 and 177; between Sequence 7 & 8 of Assassin's Creed III.

Assassin’s Creed Nexus VR is set to release Holiday 2023 on the Meta Quest 2, Meta Quest Pro, and Meta Quest 3. It can be Wishlisted on the Oculus website, here.

Our coverage for UbiForward 2023 will continue over this weekend, so please make sure to follow us on Twitter & Facebook to stay notified of the next article.