Assassin's Creed Unity: 4 Years In Stealth Mode

The game Assassin's Creed: Unity has been in development with Ubisoft since the year 2010. That was just 3 years after the first Assassin's Creed was released, and right around the release of Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, and a year after Assassin's Creed II. Unity is the first next-gen Assassin's Creed, and the opening of a new door for the series. It's been a long time coming.

Vincent Pontbriand, Ubisoft Senior Producer for Assassin's Creed: Unity let it be known – in a general sense – what the past four years have been spent doing.

"Our engineers needed to go in and next-gen-ize the game and prepare it to support multiplayer without ever tearing everything down. It's like renovation – but you still live in the house while you're doing it."

Pontbriand went on, "We had our artists, we had our level designers building prototypes, testing stuff within an engine that was undergoing renovations."

The years that it took [to create this game] were both in renewing all the tools, then in building the game itself. So four years involved, maybe half and half.

While you'll have to dive in and pinpoint the individual developers and designers yourself, it should be made clear that this Assassin's Creed has more than a couple team members that've been involved in previous Assassin's Creed project.

"Some of our teams [from previous games] will move from one team to the next," said Pontbriand. "We share resources. There is a bit of overlap. There [are] periods [between Assassin's Creed releases] when a guy will finish one game and the next Monday he'll go on to the next one."

Don't think that this means Assassin's Creed: Unity will be the same old song and dance. On the contrary. According to Creative Director Alex Amancio, the fundamentals have changed, and this is the first in the next wave of Assassin's Creed games.

"Changing the main motivation from narrative to player progression was the key. So everything you do in the city of Paris contributes to your progression. ... That fundamental change in structure, we believe, is what makes Assassin's Creed: Unity a new-gen Assassin's Creed. A basis for what's to come."

Assassin's Creed Unity comes out on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC on the 11th of November, 2014 in North America. Japan release hits December 4th, while the rest of the world will see the game on November 13th.

Be sure to check out our Assassin's Creed: Unity First-Impressions as well!