Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate announced for 23 October

Ubisoft have just wrapped up their advertising stream for the next Assassin’s Creed, which has had a slight name change since the initial leak – to Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate.

It’s still set in Victorian era London (1868, to be precise.) The Syndicate suffix refers to the theme of warring gangs. Rather than, say, cybernetically enhanced corporate agents.

Your protagonist for this particular collect-em-up with be Jacob Frye. He is “brash” and “reckless,” apparently. During some unspecified bits, you’ll be playing as his sister Evie Frye. She’s all about “stealth and control.”

Nine minutes or so of ‘pre alpha’ footage was shown, in which Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate looked very much like an Assassin’s Creed game. I know that’s a trite and snarky thing to write, but in this case it’s also pretty accurate.

There were some new things among the roof-top climbing and ally-rescuing. Jacob has borrowed Batman’s grappling hook, so he can zip up to the tops of buildings faster (or use it as a zip-line between two points.) There was a horse-drawn carriage chase, which looked very silly indeed. Not necessarily in a bad way. And the finale was two gangs lining up like a pair of football hooligan firms and then getting down to some good old fashioned violence.

The combat has supposedly changed a bit, but it looked quite similar to me. At one point the video tries to pass off “using the environment to hurt enemies” as a new Assassin’s Creed feature when it absolutely is not (I’ve killed plenty of guards with exploding barrels,) so who knows.

Oh, also, the rival gang leader was named “Bloody Nora.” I’m looking forward to fighting the other gang bosses, “Gordon Bennett” and “Pip Pip Cheerio.”

Here’s the footage, so you can stop paying attention to me and watch for yourself.

Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate is scheduled for release on 23 October. I’ve seen images floating around with the PC version just listed as “Fall” (which would be true to form for Ubisoft,) but I’m not actually sure where that came from as all the stuff here just says 23 October. Be prepared for a possible delay, I guess.

Edit: Ubisoft’s recent financial disclosures list the PC version as “Fall,” so that’s a fairly clear indication that our version won’t be out on 23 October. Most likely a later date.

Here’s a more “cinematic” reveal trailer too. Plus some images of Victoriana.