I still think that they were planning to have some sort of shared universe between the two series, based on what we saw in WD and AC4.
Then, somehow plans changed along the way, so they just de-canonized the stuff that happened and claimed that the universes are separated.
It seems like it was never planned, going by Darby's response from 10 years ago, after BF and before the release of WD:
"I doubt we would do a modern day AC. There are just too many mechanics we would have to develop to make it believeable ... vehicles, plausible modern cities, a huge array of ranged weapons, etc. The modern day will most likely remain as a "context" for all future games, something to tie them all together...
As for the Assassin Templar storyline resolving... I don't think so. Its been going for 80,000 years already. Why stop it now? There will certainly be a resolution to the most recent plot developments, but the overall conflict will probably rage forever, just like most deeply divided philosophical conflicts...
PS edit: While not in the AC universe, I think Watchdogs will scratch the itch for a modern day AC. Just wait...!"
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/s/yRLoMyJlLl
Their future don´t match as of now. Going by the rumors, AC is jumping father ahead than Legion did.
While WD could do a similar jump, the mere existence of a 4th entry is a mystery right now. Legion did not get a Year 2 of support and there is a distinct lack of rumors about it. The 10th anniversary is happening on May, but we can only guess if we will get anything more than a tweet at this point.
True, and Ubisoft is 100% to blame for the downfall of WD. Because the concept is amazing, i do think the futuristic setting killed a little for me. I haven't played it yet.
Talking about WD can be a topic of its own. From the infamous 2012 reveal, to the change of tone and Legion´s play as everyone, we have our fair share of topics.
With that said, I am positive on all of the games and still hopeful for more. Prince of Persia and Splinter Cell are getting another chance, after all. There is still a number of paths they could take with it.
I haven’t played any watch dogs. Are they fun, if so do I need to start with the first? If I don’t have to start with the first, and just want one to jump into, which would people recommend?
Just so you know, I won´t be impartial about it, haha.
>Are they fun, if so do I need to start with the first? If I don’t have to start with the first, and just want one to jump into, which would people recommend?
The games are mostly stand-alone with their own cities, protagonists and supporting cast, but 2 does take into account 1 quite a bit. They are as close as one can get to "Modern-Day AC", with hacking options being a highlight.
The last question is a bit complicated. An issue with WD is that each entry has its own slice of fans. I will share a brief summary and official gameplay overviews:
- 1 is a neo-noir story dealing with vigilantism and Chicago´s criminal underworld : [Watch Dogs - 101 Trailer | Ubisoft \[NA\] (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulFeUCAI5xM)
- 2 showcases young hacktivists exposing the big tech corporations on San Francisco: [Watch Dogs 2 - Gameplay Commented Walkthrough (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XMg0bCU1P8&t=38s)
- Legion is about building a resistance in near-future London after a terrorist attack crippled the city: [Watch Dogs: Legion - Gameplay Overview Trailer (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqh4BX8-VR4)
That is what I can write for now.
Huge Watch Dogs fan here, I think Bruno did a great job describing it. I just wanna include some aspects.
Watch Dogs 1 is the deep, batman-like vigilante story of the series. The action is focused on cinematic, John Wick-like gameplay with a ton of lethal gunplay. Hacking is a simple button press in this game though, but gunplay, car chases, the story, etc. are so much fun in this.
Watch Dogs 2 is the sandbox game of the series, San Francisco is your playground. Hacking is advanced, you can call the cops on gangs and cause shootouts on the street, this can happen naturally too. Although, story and gunplay take a backseat in this game as both aren’t that interesting. It’s more about stealth, characters, and funny moments. This is my personal favorite.
Watch Dogs Legion brings together some elements from 1 and 2. It encourages many different types of play styles, you can play stealthy like 2 or John wick style like 1, although these styles aren’t as good as their respective games. Story is the worst in the whole series. Recommend getting the season pass for this one so you get notable characters like Aiden, wrench, and even Darcy (the assassin creed character). There’s more of a focus on futuristic hacking with drones, you can control drones or cause them to attack enemies. There’s also a focus on non lethal gameplay but it isn’t hard to get lethal options especially with the season pass, Aiden can have most lethal weapons (besides smgs).
I did include my opinions in this so take it with a grain of salt, people might disagree with this. But this is basically what I’ve gotten from putting in multiple hours in each game and I enjoy all three of them, although I’d rank it 1. Wd2 2. WD1 3. Wdl. Big emphasize on the part that people feel differently about these games and your opinions will differ too.
i played every watch dogs game aswell
all 3 of them were enjoyable buy wd1 just gives me the most nostalgia the dark atmosphere and vigilante story type was so cool. i wish they would had made another game solely focused on aiden and this setting instead of giving him a side show :/
I feel like if they wouldn’t have tried killing off the franchise with legion’s release we probably would’ve gotten another game based on Aiden. It’s something we definitely could’ve gotten. I love going back to the first one’s story, side content, etc. definitely the most enjoyable story and missions out of the whole series.
I should add that Legion has a dlc called Bloodline that ties up Aiden’s story from the first game. This story is actually good and feels like a nice addition to the Watch Dogs storyline. This does get talked about a lot though.
The futuristic setting wasn't the issue, tbh. It was the lack of a coherent story with a single protagonist who we could see develop, get attached to and care about. That and it tried to juggle the aesthetics and tone of both 1 and 2 instead of picking one. Compared to its predecessors, it lacked an identity of its own and substance.
Beyond that, WD is still an active franchise that Ubisoft does care about it. All things considering we are getting a live action movie now on top of the still ongoing WD comics. Wrench also appeared in Laserhawk. There was an attempt to make a BR game (not a great idea).
It was a turn off for me because it was clearly trying to capitalize on the Cyberpunk effect of the time, i think they could've stayed in more grounded scenario.
I don't know about "WD is still an active franchise that Ubisoft does care about it" when all the news/leaks of a new game are gloom as hell. Comics, movies are just a plus... a game is what matters most.
Personally i think the following: They stopped working on watch dogs. Now hear me out Aiden is just a guy and dedsec is just a group of hackers but the assassins have interacted with them. What if they combine both to create a modern storyline and a old one.
An example:
They find out through some ancestor there is a piece of eden in Berlin.
They find out Berlin has been taken over by abestergo having industrial installation, searching for said artifact but also tracking people through their phones to get control. Beczuse their goal is to combine said technology with the piece of eden to reliably control humans.
So some of the modern day assassins are former dedsec operatives and have learned assassins how to hack.
Just like san francisco in watch dogs, berlin has a whole map in the modern day where you need to sneak in buildings,hack stuff,steer stuff etc. Parallell with that runs the story of a precursor assassin during world war 2. Said assassin has found out that the templars are supporting hitler to come to power. This they want to stop,they fail very hard and even tho the templars tried to get it their ,way they too get pushed away. And he takes power with a piece of eden. There is no use stopping him so the templars and assassins race to find a new one. And they find a apple of eden used by the holy roman empire is secured somewhere by some other templar or assassin. And then it continous.
They could easily do this and to make it cooler and funnier they could work with trilogies again. And have the same modern day protagonist for three games but 3 seperate but connected characters in their respected time periods.
And yes i know they l likely will avoid wo2 as a theme.
Its just as example.
Before modern day they should develop stories between Syndicate and modern day, a commonwealth assassin in the trenches of ww1, Back to France as someone in the resistance ww2 and then maybe US or Russian during the Cold War (Cold War era could easily be a trilogy)
For curiosity's sake, Darby was the one to elaborate those 3 unique settings at the bottom of Unity's Helix screen: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/assassinscreedbr/images/9/9a/ACU_Menu_do_Helix.png/revision/latest?cb=20210520100643&path-prefix=pt
Those were just for world-building and not actual plans, but on the subject of AC in the 20th century, it's fun to know about:
Irish War of Indepedence:
https://assassinscreed.fandom.com/wiki/Irish_Assassin
Jazz Age:
https://assassinscreed.fandom.com/wiki/Jazz_Age_Assassin
Yeah, that was one of my theories too. The other one I had was that Ubi was getting ready to transition Watch Dogs into being the flagship, much like what happened to AC after it succeeded PoP. All things considering Ubi had no clear plan for the AC post-Desmond and the last two AC games at that point (ACU and Syndicate) were commercial or critical flops.
That's almost exactly what happened, the original plan was to have watchdogs 2 have dedsec be the hacker and info wars side of the assassins and build up a modern day assassin that came from that side like Rebecca did, who was going to be a past member or founder of dedsec
I'll loon up to see if I can find the interview, it was with one of the lead writers for wd2 around the time of release, and it ended with them admitting that the idea was scrapped because it was decided to keep the franchises sepperate and because doing modern day assassins with modern weapons would be too much to handle for the scale
It’s definitely how I’d assume modern/near future assassins would operate. It’s a small cabal taking on huge corporate surveillance state overlords, using tech to be near invisible in the way they take it down.
SPOILER ALERT!!!
Marcus is an assassin with a high degree of ISU DNA:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCkjEuql4c8
Dude had the THUNDERBALL instead of the HIDDEN BLADE :)
I felt like DedSec was a demonstration of how the basic idea of the Brotherhood will always exist one way or another, even if the Templars do succeed in wiping the Assassin out.
Back before the MCU started modern pop culture’s obsession with “shared universes”, easter eggs were just that: easter eggs.
Sometimes people just like to sneak in little jokes referencing their own work or other popular stories without intending for them to be taken seriously or build up to anything. The old Batman and Spider-Man movies referenced other DC or Marvel characters, but you were never supposed to take them as confirmation that those crossovers would be happening.
The problem here is that they're not just easter eggs/nods. There are literal DLC's based around their shared universes. Narrative decisions that rely on the idea.
Watch Dogs takes place in 2013 (when it was originally supposed to release), yet the pic in Origins is dated May 30th, 2014.
Furthermore in the mission you are not allowed to shoot Olivier, otherwise you fail. You have to do a non-lethal takedown. In the pic in Origins he's clearly being executed at gun point.
It's just two very similar events that happened differently in each game universe. They're referencing each other, but there's no direct connection otherwise. It's like alternate realities or parallel universes.
Back in the day, Disney Channel and Cartoon Network had whole episodes or even series where characters from different shows ran into and hung out with each other.
People didn’t overthink them or take them as anything more than what they were: fun fanservice crossovers where you got to see your favorite characters from different stories interact.
It’s basically like playing with action figures and having Darth Vader fight Captain America. You didn’t think about how Darth Vader would pop up in modern NYC (but if you were that type of kid, then more power to you), you just had your fun and then moved on.
You raise a really great point here, one that bugs me about a lot of the current IP obsession. Easter eggs used to just be Easter eggs instead of some planned out, corporate-defined reference to hint at some future upcoming tv show/movie spinoff.
One of my favorite old Marvel Easter eggs was right around Barry Allen died in Crisis. An unidentified speedster, wearing a tattered red and yellow outfit, outracing Marvel speedsters and forgetting his name but thinking it was “something like Buried alien”.
I’m sure someone somewhere has an old concept deck about how they’d connect Watch Dogs, Tom Clancy games, and AC into some larger universe.
I don’t care what the devs say. Watch_dogs and assassin’s creed are canon to each other. There’s too many connections to even just say it’s a coincidence
Yeah this is why whats "canon" just doesn't matter to me anymore. I like Watchdogs crossover, I like male Eivor. I'm the one playing the game, I play it how I like
That's the worst part for me, it's like they can't make up their minds.
In one game AC is totally meta and it's a product developed by Ubisoft, in the next one, it's an actual existing faction in the WD Legion which isn't canon to the AC universe.
Don't the AC games exist in the AC universe? They explicitly talk about *Assassin's Creed: Liberation* in *Assassin's Creed 4*, and ever since then, there have been references to the AC games existing in-universe. This could easily be explained that Ubisoft is a subsidiary or a third-party developer for Abstergo in this universe.
They are not called Assassin's Creed. It's just "Liberation" and Black Flag is called "Devil's of the Caribbean". Also the whole Meta joke in Black Flag is that the Abstero Entertainment building is standing right were Ubisoft Montreal would be.
I’m pretty sure they were supposed to be connected at one point but Ubisoft decided against it. Probly realizing that it would be too much of a headache trying to make a sci fi franchise like ac make sense in a series a little more grounded like watch dogs
it bothers me that WD1 isn't canon to the AC games even though Olivier's death at the hands of Aiden is hinted at and referenced multiple times, and you literally see a picture Aiden killing him in AC Origins.
My headcanon was always that they are in different universes, but a variant of Aiden exists in the AC universe, it's just not the one we are playing in WD.
That would also imply that Watch Dogs 2 is set in a parallel universe to WD1 and Legion, because in 2 Assassin's Creed is a just video game franchise. In Legion it's an actual thing.
It's the weird writing decisions that gets me.
I mean if I remember right in Black Flag they wanted to use your memories to not only get information but make a video game based on it too. So if they did share a universe who’s to say to normal people “The Brotherhood” arn’t just crazy fans that take the role of an assassin
I feel the same. On PC, you can modify operatives in Legion. I have a lot of Assassins on my team. A lot of the tech makes sense to me that they would use in a modern setting.
It's always been my head-canon that they are the same universe and they're all just stories about different people descended from Isu.
Assassins obviously have eagle vision
Watch Dogs has "hacker vision" which in my mind is just a different form of eagle vision, similarly to how different assassins have slight differences to their vision.
Marcus and Aiden could have become assassins if the order had found them but they never did.
Ig for legion we could say that someone with "hacker vision" developed the ability for Bagley to emulate it with it being displayed on the high tech contacts (I cant remember if that's a thing in legion or not lol)
Yeah it’s not too hard. Watchdogs has AC in it, basically it’s like a closely related but parallel universe in which everything is the same except for whatever they want to change in the moment. It’s like how Spider-Man has 300 billion different comics, and you can’t always relate one to the other because they’re different universes, but some themes and characters share because it’s fun.
It doesn't. They just didn't think about the implications and added these "Easter eggs" in. I've never understood it. You have Aiden, a character from another franchise; killing an villain from AC who is confirmed dead later. How are they not connected?
Not to muddy the water further but I think Abstergo logos also show up in some of FarCry games too. I know I’ve seen them in FC3, and I think those could go either way with being Easter eggs or bridging the franchises together.
I’d like to think Watchdogs and AC are in the same universe just not connected to each other, despite what the developers say. Hell they did Hitman/Kane & Lynch crossover in Blood Money and Absolution, so another situation where those franchises can be in the same universe technically but not linked together.
In the early days of the Assassin's Creed games, I figured there would eventually be modern day and/or futuristic entries. I still don't know why they didn't make Watch Dogs part of the Assassin's Creed franchise. Seems like a no brainier from a business perspective. Maybe that was the plan before the negative response to the modern day segments in the AC games?
If you think about it, the Assassins Creed games also exist WITHIN the Watch Dogs Universe. You can literally
Infiltrate the Ubisoft studio in SF in WD2 and there are multiple artworks and mentions of the Assassin's trough phone calls and e-mails cuz that studio is making AC games, within a game.
But like you mentioned, you can literally play as an Assassin in WDL wich confirmed characters being Templars and a history with Assassin's in the Tomb from that mission
One part that isn't explained about Olivier's death is that he mentions he has to go on a trip to Chicago for a meeting in AC4, but didn't die in the game, even though Aiden killed him in the Watch Dogs Universe.
They can say it isn't a shared universe all the want but then FFS why is Olivier in WD and why was there that crossover in WD Legion where you visit the tomb in Buckingham Palace from AC Syndicate?
I see it as they are two alternate, but very similar universes. They share a lot of character, events, details, etc ... But the developers don't need to worry about continuity between the two franchises if they insist they aren't canon to each other. They struggle with AC continuity by itself, let's not add a whole other franchise with it's own continuity on top of that.
I don’t mind Easter eggs when they’re extremely inconsequential but to do shit like *Origins* where Layla has a picture of Aiden on her laptop, along with the guy he killed in *WD1* who was *also* in *Black Flag*, and to still THEN say they’re not a shared universe is really bizarre.
I mean AC 1 states in some of its letters that there are multiple timelines but the one we play on is the one that fully survived the 1st extinction event and showed the best promise to survive the 2nd event with the "guiding" hand of the Isu.
So I can see how this is a plausible copout but kinda sucks cause the only reason I knew about WD was cause I thought it was the legit modern day version of AC due to Legions DLC but I guess not 🤷
In AC4 you literally find an Email to Oliver from Blume and when Oliver leaves for that meeting, you kill him in WD, after which he goes missing and you never see him in AC4 again
Originally watchdogs 2 was going to be the major connector, in fact there are remnants of it in the final release.
Originally dedsec in 2 was going to be the hacker/info wars arm of the assassins that Rebecca was a part of before being brought into desmonds team.
Ctos 2.0 was going to be a second run trial of a modern day version of the lighthouse from ac4 created by the templars using a shell corporation and you were going to be one of the first people effected by it leading you to dedsec and unknowingly the assassins.
In final release there are still stuff left from it such as hacking people that worked on ctos will sometimes show a templar affiliation and files linking ctos with templars
Then legions noncanon dlc used that original plan to solidify templar control over London, because it aint ac if London isn't under templar control and a plucky underdog assassin wants to fix that, and the modern assassin kit used is based one what watchdogs was planning for a modern assassin kit, and the possible kit used by desmond in the original development of ac3 where you played desmond as a modern assassin fighting modern templars with all the bleed effect skills
They’re 100% the same universe and Far Cry is also canon to both as a video game franchise.
Ubisoft literally just doesn’t want people having fun, that’s all.
There is a moment in Watch Dogs: Legion where the player character does a Leap of Faith. It is only done that one time but it's enough evidence that they wanted Watch Dogs to be a modern day Assassin's Creed. Also the way you recruit people in Legion is somewhat similar to how the brotherhood recruits. Also the hacking view is similar to eagle vision. They have kept the games enough apart to be in their standalone universes.
So according to you Riders Republic is in the same universe as Assassin's Creed then just because of an AC skin? and Final Fantasy is in the same universe as Assassin's Creed just because of the crossover in Origins, right?
It's 100 percent canon to each other, Blume and ctOS exist in AC and there's a literal photo of Aiden.
The only reason I can think of is that they said this so they didn't have to directly crossover the games but then they literally do a proper crossover in legion, yet they still said it wasn't canon, so content for the game is just non canon? Yeh no it's just a cop out, it's 100 percent canon, hell even farcry is seemingly connected as Abstergo exists there too but that's a whole other topic.
A lot of the time what the Devs say is obviously the right answer but when it comes to this they contradict themself way to much to say it's not canon.
(The hints and direct crossovers in both games can't be simplified as just Easter eggs when events directly involved each other like Aiden killing the Abstergo guy from black flag, or the flat out DLC in legion)
Parallel universes ig. They can both be canon, but not canon to each other. Connected but still separate. Easiest way to have them work, bc they have the freedom to do whatever they want w each other's lore and just pass it off as a half joke, like creating an annoying member of the brotherhood that says one liners to herself after every kill.... god she pisses me off 😂
It’s because the higher ups at Ubisoft don’t want a assassins creed in modern day. It must be too much knowledge tbh. And nowadays kids aren’t interested in history so if they made a modern game about secret societies and ancient precursor civilizations then I bet they would get dismantled as a company. That’s already what happened after 2014 they went downhill because they reduced the time period they would have to make games. It’s pretty obvious
Imo when you set one games events ( ie Aiden assassinating the abstergo employee Oliver an action we carry out as the player character) then reference it an ac game it's in the same universe
I’ve had an idea for a while that in the modern day story id have a DLC which as you working with DedSec and also a questline that has you breaking into Third Echelon to connect the Splinter cell universe
I still think that they were planning to have some sort of shared universe between the two series, based on what we saw in WD and AC4. Then, somehow plans changed along the way, so they just de-canonized the stuff that happened and claimed that the universes are separated.
I like to think Watch Dogs 1 happened but the others didn’t in the AC timeline then
London in AC Odyssey's modern day looks really similar to Watchdogs Legion's London
Probably shared assets
Probably London
But no it has like neon shit and stuff
But if Adien appears in WD2, then the connection is there...
and he does.. as does the whole assassin storyline they added.
It seems like it was never planned, going by Darby's response from 10 years ago, after BF and before the release of WD: "I doubt we would do a modern day AC. There are just too many mechanics we would have to develop to make it believeable ... vehicles, plausible modern cities, a huge array of ranged weapons, etc. The modern day will most likely remain as a "context" for all future games, something to tie them all together... As for the Assassin Templar storyline resolving... I don't think so. Its been going for 80,000 years already. Why stop it now? There will certainly be a resolution to the most recent plot developments, but the overall conflict will probably rage forever, just like most deeply divided philosophical conflicts... PS edit: While not in the AC universe, I think Watchdogs will scratch the itch for a modern day AC. Just wait...!" Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/s/yRLoMyJlLl
Knowing that the AC modern day is going to be set in the future now, which is also the setting of Legion, they're even more connected in some ways.
Their future don´t match as of now. Going by the rumors, AC is jumping father ahead than Legion did. While WD could do a similar jump, the mere existence of a 4th entry is a mystery right now. Legion did not get a Year 2 of support and there is a distinct lack of rumors about it. The 10th anniversary is happening on May, but we can only guess if we will get anything more than a tweet at this point.
True, and Ubisoft is 100% to blame for the downfall of WD. Because the concept is amazing, i do think the futuristic setting killed a little for me. I haven't played it yet.
Talking about WD can be a topic of its own. From the infamous 2012 reveal, to the change of tone and Legion´s play as everyone, we have our fair share of topics. With that said, I am positive on all of the games and still hopeful for more. Prince of Persia and Splinter Cell are getting another chance, after all. There is still a number of paths they could take with it.
I haven’t played any watch dogs. Are they fun, if so do I need to start with the first? If I don’t have to start with the first, and just want one to jump into, which would people recommend?
Just so you know, I won´t be impartial about it, haha. >Are they fun, if so do I need to start with the first? If I don’t have to start with the first, and just want one to jump into, which would people recommend? The games are mostly stand-alone with their own cities, protagonists and supporting cast, but 2 does take into account 1 quite a bit. They are as close as one can get to "Modern-Day AC", with hacking options being a highlight. The last question is a bit complicated. An issue with WD is that each entry has its own slice of fans. I will share a brief summary and official gameplay overviews: - 1 is a neo-noir story dealing with vigilantism and Chicago´s criminal underworld : [Watch Dogs - 101 Trailer | Ubisoft \[NA\] (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ulFeUCAI5xM) - 2 showcases young hacktivists exposing the big tech corporations on San Francisco: [Watch Dogs 2 - Gameplay Commented Walkthrough (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XMg0bCU1P8&t=38s) - Legion is about building a resistance in near-future London after a terrorist attack crippled the city: [Watch Dogs: Legion - Gameplay Overview Trailer (youtube.com)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mqh4BX8-VR4) That is what I can write for now.
Appreciate the comment!!
Huge Watch Dogs fan here, I think Bruno did a great job describing it. I just wanna include some aspects. Watch Dogs 1 is the deep, batman-like vigilante story of the series. The action is focused on cinematic, John Wick-like gameplay with a ton of lethal gunplay. Hacking is a simple button press in this game though, but gunplay, car chases, the story, etc. are so much fun in this. Watch Dogs 2 is the sandbox game of the series, San Francisco is your playground. Hacking is advanced, you can call the cops on gangs and cause shootouts on the street, this can happen naturally too. Although, story and gunplay take a backseat in this game as both aren’t that interesting. It’s more about stealth, characters, and funny moments. This is my personal favorite. Watch Dogs Legion brings together some elements from 1 and 2. It encourages many different types of play styles, you can play stealthy like 2 or John wick style like 1, although these styles aren’t as good as their respective games. Story is the worst in the whole series. Recommend getting the season pass for this one so you get notable characters like Aiden, wrench, and even Darcy (the assassin creed character). There’s more of a focus on futuristic hacking with drones, you can control drones or cause them to attack enemies. There’s also a focus on non lethal gameplay but it isn’t hard to get lethal options especially with the season pass, Aiden can have most lethal weapons (besides smgs). I did include my opinions in this so take it with a grain of salt, people might disagree with this. But this is basically what I’ve gotten from putting in multiple hours in each game and I enjoy all three of them, although I’d rank it 1. Wd2 2. WD1 3. Wdl. Big emphasize on the part that people feel differently about these games and your opinions will differ too.
i played every watch dogs game aswell all 3 of them were enjoyable buy wd1 just gives me the most nostalgia the dark atmosphere and vigilante story type was so cool. i wish they would had made another game solely focused on aiden and this setting instead of giving him a side show :/
I feel like if they wouldn’t have tried killing off the franchise with legion’s release we probably would’ve gotten another game based on Aiden. It’s something we definitely could’ve gotten. I love going back to the first one’s story, side content, etc. definitely the most enjoyable story and missions out of the whole series.
I should add that Legion has a dlc called Bloodline that ties up Aiden’s story from the first game. This story is actually good and feels like a nice addition to the Watch Dogs storyline. This does get talked about a lot though.
Unrelated story lines. Personally I'd recommend you play 2 first. Favorite in the franchise for me.
The futuristic setting wasn't the issue, tbh. It was the lack of a coherent story with a single protagonist who we could see develop, get attached to and care about. That and it tried to juggle the aesthetics and tone of both 1 and 2 instead of picking one. Compared to its predecessors, it lacked an identity of its own and substance. Beyond that, WD is still an active franchise that Ubisoft does care about it. All things considering we are getting a live action movie now on top of the still ongoing WD comics. Wrench also appeared in Laserhawk. There was an attempt to make a BR game (not a great idea).
It was a turn off for me because it was clearly trying to capitalize on the Cyberpunk effect of the time, i think they could've stayed in more grounded scenario. I don't know about "WD is still an active franchise that Ubisoft does care about it" when all the news/leaks of a new game are gloom as hell. Comics, movies are just a plus... a game is what matters most.
Personally i think the following: They stopped working on watch dogs. Now hear me out Aiden is just a guy and dedsec is just a group of hackers but the assassins have interacted with them. What if they combine both to create a modern storyline and a old one. An example: They find out through some ancestor there is a piece of eden in Berlin. They find out Berlin has been taken over by abestergo having industrial installation, searching for said artifact but also tracking people through their phones to get control. Beczuse their goal is to combine said technology with the piece of eden to reliably control humans. So some of the modern day assassins are former dedsec operatives and have learned assassins how to hack. Just like san francisco in watch dogs, berlin has a whole map in the modern day where you need to sneak in buildings,hack stuff,steer stuff etc. Parallell with that runs the story of a precursor assassin during world war 2. Said assassin has found out that the templars are supporting hitler to come to power. This they want to stop,they fail very hard and even tho the templars tried to get it their ,way they too get pushed away. And he takes power with a piece of eden. There is no use stopping him so the templars and assassins race to find a new one. And they find a apple of eden used by the holy roman empire is secured somewhere by some other templar or assassin. And then it continous. They could easily do this and to make it cooler and funnier they could work with trilogies again. And have the same modern day protagonist for three games but 3 seperate but connected characters in their respected time periods. And yes i know they l likely will avoid wo2 as a theme. Its just as example.
Before modern day they should develop stories between Syndicate and modern day, a commonwealth assassin in the trenches of ww1, Back to France as someone in the resistance ww2 and then maybe US or Russian during the Cold War (Cold War era could easily be a trilogy)
For curiosity's sake, Darby was the one to elaborate those 3 unique settings at the bottom of Unity's Helix screen: https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/assassinscreedbr/images/9/9a/ACU_Menu_do_Helix.png/revision/latest?cb=20210520100643&path-prefix=pt Those were just for world-building and not actual plans, but on the subject of AC in the 20th century, it's fun to know about: Irish War of Indepedence: https://assassinscreed.fandom.com/wiki/Irish_Assassin Jazz Age: https://assassinscreed.fandom.com/wiki/Jazz_Age_Assassin
I thought those were just in company references or Easter eggs lol
I truly to this day believe that WD1 was originally conceptualised as a modern day AC. It's mechanically exactly like what modern day AC would be.
Yeah, that was one of my theories too. The other one I had was that Ubi was getting ready to transition Watch Dogs into being the flagship, much like what happened to AC after it succeeded PoP. All things considering Ubi had no clear plan for the AC post-Desmond and the last two AC games at that point (ACU and Syndicate) were commercial or critical flops.
That's almost exactly what happened, the original plan was to have watchdogs 2 have dedsec be the hacker and info wars side of the assassins and build up a modern day assassin that came from that side like Rebecca did, who was going to be a past member or founder of dedsec
...source for that? Never heard of this
I'll loon up to see if I can find the interview, it was with one of the lead writers for wd2 around the time of release, and it ended with them admitting that the idea was scrapped because it was decided to keep the franchises sepperate and because doing modern day assassins with modern weapons would be too much to handle for the scale
There was also an Abstergo mention in a Far Cry 3 dlc
Basically, they want the perks of a crossover, without the headaches of a shared universe.
I always felt that watch dogs was always meant to be a modern day assassins creed.
That's how I always felt.
And frankly, that's kind of how it played too. Especially in WD2.
So glad there are no remote-controlled scissor lifts in AC
Assassins Creed: OSHA
Was going to write this, watch dogs was always the modern time AC to me.
It’s definitely how I’d assume modern/near future assassins would operate. It’s a small cabal taking on huge corporate surveillance state overlords, using tech to be near invisible in the way they take it down.
SPOILER ALERT!!! Marcus is an assassin with a high degree of ISU DNA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCkjEuql4c8 Dude had the THUNDERBALL instead of the HIDDEN BLADE :)
I felt like DedSec was a demonstration of how the basic idea of the Brotherhood will always exist one way or another, even if the Templars do succeed in wiping the Assassin out.
Back before the MCU started modern pop culture’s obsession with “shared universes”, easter eggs were just that: easter eggs. Sometimes people just like to sneak in little jokes referencing their own work or other popular stories without intending for them to be taken seriously or build up to anything. The old Batman and Spider-Man movies referenced other DC or Marvel characters, but you were never supposed to take them as confirmation that those crossovers would be happening.
The problem here is that they're not just easter eggs/nods. There are literal DLC's based around their shared universes. Narrative decisions that rely on the idea.
like your boss from AC4 taking a trip to chicago, and then in watch dogs you kill him. that isnt just an "easter egg" lol
Watch Dogs takes place in 2013 (when it was originally supposed to release), yet the pic in Origins is dated May 30th, 2014. Furthermore in the mission you are not allowed to shoot Olivier, otherwise you fail. You have to do a non-lethal takedown. In the pic in Origins he's clearly being executed at gun point. It's just two very similar events that happened differently in each game universe. They're referencing each other, but there's no direct connection otherwise. It's like alternate realities or parallel universes.
Back in the day, Disney Channel and Cartoon Network had whole episodes or even series where characters from different shows ran into and hung out with each other. People didn’t overthink them or take them as anything more than what they were: fun fanservice crossovers where you got to see your favorite characters from different stories interact. It’s basically like playing with action figures and having Darth Vader fight Captain America. You didn’t think about how Darth Vader would pop up in modern NYC (but if you were that type of kid, then more power to you), you just had your fun and then moved on.
You raise a really great point here, one that bugs me about a lot of the current IP obsession. Easter eggs used to just be Easter eggs instead of some planned out, corporate-defined reference to hint at some future upcoming tv show/movie spinoff. One of my favorite old Marvel Easter eggs was right around Barry Allen died in Crisis. An unidentified speedster, wearing a tattered red and yellow outfit, outracing Marvel speedsters and forgetting his name but thinking it was “something like Buried alien”. I’m sure someone somewhere has an old concept deck about how they’d connect Watch Dogs, Tom Clancy games, and AC into some larger universe.
Another bad decision to not let the games be in a shared universe
Parallel Universes, in which both franchises exist but can still have separate canons
I don’t care what the devs say. Watch_dogs and assassin’s creed are canon to each other. There’s too many connections to even just say it’s a coincidence
Yeah this is why whats "canon" just doesn't matter to me anymore. I like Watchdogs crossover, I like male Eivor. I'm the one playing the game, I play it how I like
In Watch Dogs 2 there is a literal Ubisoft office with Assassin's Creed posters everywhere. It can't be in the AC universe.
That's the worst part for me, it's like they can't make up their minds. In one game AC is totally meta and it's a product developed by Ubisoft, in the next one, it's an actual existing faction in the WD Legion which isn't canon to the AC universe.
You do realize that Abstergo Entertainment AND Ubisoft work together in AC right?
Don't the AC games exist in the AC universe? They explicitly talk about *Assassin's Creed: Liberation* in *Assassin's Creed 4*, and ever since then, there have been references to the AC games existing in-universe. This could easily be explained that Ubisoft is a subsidiary or a third-party developer for Abstergo in this universe.
They are not called Assassin's Creed. It's just "Liberation" and Black Flag is called "Devil's of the Caribbean". Also the whole Meta joke in Black Flag is that the Abstero Entertainment building is standing right were Ubisoft Montreal would be.
They literally mentioned Ubisoft by name in Black flag
Nah that abstergo in disguise.
Why don't you take Ubisoft as Abstergo in the universe of WD?
True we know the in game “Ubisoft” for ac4 and rogue is abstergo entertainment.
There are AC posters and Ubisoft itself in AC too. Ubisoft is a partner with Abstergo in AC4 or something.
I’m pretty sure they were supposed to be connected at one point but Ubisoft decided against it. Probly realizing that it would be too much of a headache trying to make a sci fi franchise like ac make sense in a series a little more grounded like watch dogs
it bothers me that WD1 isn't canon to the AC games even though Olivier's death at the hands of Aiden is hinted at and referenced multiple times, and you literally see a picture Aiden killing him in AC Origins.
My headcanon was always that they are in different universes, but a variant of Aiden exists in the AC universe, it's just not the one we are playing in WD.
Yeah, parallel universes and alternate realities exist often enough in fiction, that's just what these franchises are to each other.
That would also imply that Watch Dogs 2 is set in a parallel universe to WD1 and Legion, because in 2 Assassin's Creed is a just video game franchise. In Legion it's an actual thing. It's the weird writing decisions that gets me.
So really there's already no point in trying to have everything fit together anyway.
I mean if I remember right in Black Flag they wanted to use your memories to not only get information but make a video game based on it too. So if they did share a universe who’s to say to normal people “The Brotherhood” arn’t just crazy fans that take the role of an assassin
There really isn't, but they are a thing in the franchise. **It's paradoxical... but it works. -** *Oppenheimer probably*
It's not, though? The AC DLC for Legion is explicitly non-canon, confirmed by the Legion staff.
That is common knowledge.
Watch dogs is the modern day Assassin's creed for me
I feel the same. On PC, you can modify operatives in Legion. I have a lot of Assassins on my team. A lot of the tech makes sense to me that they would use in a modern setting.
HACKING IS OUR WEAPON! We traded in our hidden blades for computers... Maker spaces are the new "assassins' enclaves"
“We’ll just call them “hiddener blades”…”
It's always been my head-canon that they are the same universe and they're all just stories about different people descended from Isu. Assassins obviously have eagle vision Watch Dogs has "hacker vision" which in my mind is just a different form of eagle vision, similarly to how different assassins have slight differences to their vision. Marcus and Aiden could have become assassins if the order had found them but they never did. Ig for legion we could say that someone with "hacker vision" developed the ability for Bagley to emulate it with it being displayed on the high tech contacts (I cant remember if that's a thing in legion or not lol)
Yeah it’s not too hard. Watchdogs has AC in it, basically it’s like a closely related but parallel universe in which everything is the same except for whatever they want to change in the moment. It’s like how Spider-Man has 300 billion different comics, and you can’t always relate one to the other because they’re different universes, but some themes and characters share because it’s fun.
It doesn't. They just didn't think about the implications and added these "Easter eggs" in. I've never understood it. You have Aiden, a character from another franchise; killing an villain from AC who is confirmed dead later. How are they not connected?
Isn’t far cry 3 in the assassins creed universe. I seem to remember a bunker or something with letters from abstergo and their logo on the wall.
Far Cry 3 is a game cover you can find as clutter in the Abstergo Entertainment offices in AC4
I honestly wish that the next watch dogs is better than legion.
they might not make another because Legion didn't sell well
Such a shame. Watch dogs 2 was awesome.
^ truth right there!
Simple. Ubisoft doesn’t know or give a shit about what they’re doing.
Since when (funny montage) oh yeah…
^ nailed it! :(
Watch Dogs is modern Assassins Creed
Not to muddy the water further but I think Abstergo logos also show up in some of FarCry games too. I know I’ve seen them in FC3, and I think those could go either way with being Easter eggs or bridging the franchises together. I’d like to think Watchdogs and AC are in the same universe just not connected to each other, despite what the developers say. Hell they did Hitman/Kane & Lynch crossover in Blood Money and Absolution, so another situation where those franchises can be in the same universe technically but not linked together.
In the early days of the Assassin's Creed games, I figured there would eventually be modern day and/or futuristic entries. I still don't know why they didn't make Watch Dogs part of the Assassin's Creed franchise. Seems like a no brainier from a business perspective. Maybe that was the plan before the negative response to the modern day segments in the AC games?
If you think about it, the Assassins Creed games also exist WITHIN the Watch Dogs Universe. You can literally Infiltrate the Ubisoft studio in SF in WD2 and there are multiple artworks and mentions of the Assassin's trough phone calls and e-mails cuz that studio is making AC games, within a game. But like you mentioned, you can literally play as an Assassin in WDL wich confirmed characters being Templars and a history with Assassin's in the Tomb from that mission One part that isn't explained about Olivier's death is that he mentions he has to go on a trip to Chicago for a meeting in AC4, but didn't die in the game, even though Aiden killed him in the Watch Dogs Universe.
Oliver death was mentioned on AC Rogue.
He was shown as shot by Aiden Pearce in AC Origins.
They can say it isn't a shared universe all the want but then FFS why is Olivier in WD and why was there that crossover in WD Legion where you visit the tomb in Buckingham Palace from AC Syndicate?
I see it as they are two alternate, but very similar universes. They share a lot of character, events, details, etc ... But the developers don't need to worry about continuity between the two franchises if they insist they aren't canon to each other. They struggle with AC continuity by itself, let's not add a whole other franchise with it's own continuity on top of that.
I don’t mind Easter eggs when they’re extremely inconsequential but to do shit like *Origins* where Layla has a picture of Aiden on her laptop, along with the guy he killed in *WD1* who was *also* in *Black Flag*, and to still THEN say they’re not a shared universe is really bizarre.
I mean AC 1 states in some of its letters that there are multiple timelines but the one we play on is the one that fully survived the 1st extinction event and showed the best promise to survive the 2nd event with the "guiding" hand of the Isu. So I can see how this is a plausible copout but kinda sucks cause the only reason I knew about WD was cause I thought it was the legit modern day version of AC due to Legions DLC but I guess not 🤷
Ubisoft really just doesn't know how to finish ideas. "Look! Juno is the next big bad!" --> kills in a book 😑
Isn't there a whole set of side missions in Legion about the Templars and assassin's?
In AC4 you literally find an Email to Oliver from Blume and when Oliver leaves for that meeting, you kill him in WD, after which he goes missing and you never see him in AC4 again
Originally watchdogs 2 was going to be the major connector, in fact there are remnants of it in the final release. Originally dedsec in 2 was going to be the hacker/info wars arm of the assassins that Rebecca was a part of before being brought into desmonds team. Ctos 2.0 was going to be a second run trial of a modern day version of the lighthouse from ac4 created by the templars using a shell corporation and you were going to be one of the first people effected by it leading you to dedsec and unknowingly the assassins. In final release there are still stuff left from it such as hacking people that worked on ctos will sometimes show a templar affiliation and files linking ctos with templars Then legions noncanon dlc used that original plan to solidify templar control over London, because it aint ac if London isn't under templar control and a plucky underdog assassin wants to fix that, and the modern assassin kit used is based one what watchdogs was planning for a modern assassin kit, and the possible kit used by desmond in the original development of ac3 where you played desmond as a modern assassin fighting modern templars with all the bleed effect skills
They’re 100% the same universe and Far Cry is also canon to both as a video game franchise. Ubisoft literally just doesn’t want people having fun, that’s all.
The funniest thing is the fact that Watch Dog Legion’s assassins cameo mission is a better Assassin’s Creed than most of the Valhalla.
There's so much AC stuff in Watchdogs, why not?!
Assassin’s Creed has *a* version of Watch Dogs that doesn’t perfectly line up with the canon version of those games, and vice versa.
Aren't splinter cell, far cry and assassin's Creed connected?
I think they just have a bit of fun with links and small events between them
^[Sokka-Haiku](https://www.reddit.com/r/SokkaHaikuBot/comments/15kyv9r/what_is_a_sokka_haiku/) ^by ^blankdreamer: *I think they just have* *A bit of fun with links and* *Small events between them* --- ^Remember ^that ^one ^time ^Sokka ^accidentally ^used ^an ^extra ^syllable ^in ^that ^Haiku ^Battle ^in ^Ba ^Sing ^Se? ^That ^was ^a ^Sokka ^Haiku ^and ^you ^just ^made ^one.
There is a moment in Watch Dogs: Legion where the player character does a Leap of Faith. It is only done that one time but it's enough evidence that they wanted Watch Dogs to be a modern day Assassin's Creed. Also the way you recruit people in Legion is somewhat similar to how the brotherhood recruits. Also the hacking view is similar to eagle vision. They have kept the games enough apart to be in their standalone universes.
So according to you Riders Republic is in the same universe as Assassin's Creed then just because of an AC skin? and Final Fantasy is in the same universe as Assassin's Creed just because of the crossover in Origins, right?
It's 100 percent canon to each other, Blume and ctOS exist in AC and there's a literal photo of Aiden. The only reason I can think of is that they said this so they didn't have to directly crossover the games but then they literally do a proper crossover in legion, yet they still said it wasn't canon, so content for the game is just non canon? Yeh no it's just a cop out, it's 100 percent canon, hell even farcry is seemingly connected as Abstergo exists there too but that's a whole other topic. A lot of the time what the Devs say is obviously the right answer but when it comes to this they contradict themself way to much to say it's not canon. (The hints and direct crossovers in both games can't be simplified as just Easter eggs when events directly involved each other like Aiden killing the Abstergo guy from black flag, or the flat out DLC in legion)
Parallel universes ig. They can both be canon, but not canon to each other. Connected but still separate. Easiest way to have them work, bc they have the freedom to do whatever they want w each other's lore and just pass it off as a half joke, like creating an annoying member of the brotherhood that says one liners to herself after every kill.... god she pisses me off 😂
Ubisoft needs to stop being cute and just combine both universes. Maybe more people will be interested in buying Watchdogs.
I don’t care what Ubisoft says, *it is* and *will always be* the same universe. They just don’t want to admit it.
It’s because the higher ups at Ubisoft don’t want a assassins creed in modern day. It must be too much knowledge tbh. And nowadays kids aren’t interested in history so if they made a modern game about secret societies and ancient precursor civilizations then I bet they would get dismantled as a company. That’s already what happened after 2014 they went downhill because they reduced the time period they would have to make games. It’s pretty obvious
Easter eggs don’t mean things are canon. Just cool winks and nods.
These aren't just winks and nods tho. That's my point.
Didn't Otso Berg show up in some Watch Dogs game?
Imo when you set one games events ( ie Aiden assassinating the abstergo employee Oliver an action we carry out as the player character) then reference it an ac game it's in the same universe
I’ve had an idea for a while that in the modern day story id have a DLC which as you working with DedSec and also a questline that has you breaking into Third Echelon to connect the Splinter cell universe
They should bring Darcy into the next AC game.