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Gaming News: The End Is Nigh For ASSASSIN’S CREED’s Desmond Miles…

Written by Animal Johns Saturday, 21 July 2012

Gaming News

Assassin's Creed

Anybody who has been playing Ubisoft’s ASSASSIN’S CREED franchise should be well versed by now in the Animus facilitated ‘DNA memory’ hopping adventures of Desmond Miles.

Well according to ASSASSIN’S CREED 3 creative lead Alex Hutchinson at a Ubisoft press event recently (via theverge.com) it would appear that Desmond’s time may soon be up.

Describing Desmond’s story as a “wrapper” Hutchinson went on to say:

"It's more like THE TWILIGHT ZONE. There's always a guy introducing it and he's there every episode, but each game completes its own story. ASSASSIN’S CREED 1 was Altair's story. Ezio has been and gone. You can engage with these historical stories individually without having to necessarily understand Desmond's story. But yes, we eventually do have to wrap it up… It's not the only conceit you can use. There's other ways you can frame the experience. I always pitched it to the guys on this game to think of it almost like Star Trek. Each game is a season [...] each big number is a sub-title. We're not changing the universe, but we're being given the reins to the equivalent of [STAR TREK:] THE NEXT GENERATION. Yes, it's the Star Trek universe, and that has certain immutable laws and there's a base kind of tone to it, but within that you can do whatever you want… I think Desmond needs to end. At some point. You know what I mean? Things that go on too long lack resonance. We're asking people to remember seven years' worth of story. Which is like saying you were in junior high and now you're finishing college. And you need to remember what you were doing in junior high."

Well it would seem that his number’s definitely up. Given that many people were hoping to end up playing as Desmond in a game totally set in modern times, this news could come as something of a disappointment. Ubisoft are of course releasing ASSASSIN’S CREED: LIBERATION on the PS Vita, a Desmond free adventure where you play as Aveline “an Assassin of mixed African and French heritage” during the build-up to the American Revolution, so are clearly pretty well prepared to move on.

ASSASSIN’S CREED 3 (PS3, XBOX 360, PC) and ASSASSIN’S CREED: LIBERATION (PS Vita only) are both released on October 30th (North America), October 31st (everywhere else).

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