The next title in Ubisoft’s Assassin‘s Creed series, Syndicate, has a new story trailer that gives the bones of the plot and hints at a much more stylish tone for the historical assassination saga.
Syndicate, taking place in Victorian London, has thus far seemed a strange duck in the series. In all the gameplay footage and cinematics thus far released, Syndicate has stayed away from giving up too many of its narrative cards, and it doesn’t have the easy historical shorthand that the last few games have had with the American Revolution, the Golden Age of Piracy, and the French Revolution to explain itself with. Which has lent Syndicate an atmosphere of nebulousness – what exactly is it going to cover? What tone will the story strike, in its attempts to be an action-adventure story set in a period with not a whole lot of action-adventure?
The answer, it appears, is that Assassin’s Creed Syndicate will be a Guy Ritchie film.
The influence of Ritchie, the director of the recent Robert Downey Jr. Sherlock Holmes films as well as British gangster classics Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels and Snatch, is all over this new story trailer that finally gives Syndicate a premise. Brother and sister Assassin duo Jacob and Evie Frye are gunning for the men and women in London under the command of Templar big bad Crawford Stannick and a group of seven evil doers from all facets of society – doctors to politicians to generals to tycoons to criminal masterminds. Each of the seven are introduced with stylish title cards giving them a brief background and description, slanted camera angles, black and white letters and a real sense of attitude as the Frye twins aim to take back the streets one gang and dead aristocrat at a time.
That attitude translates to the dialogue, which is the most Ritchie thing about Assassin’s Creed Syndicate. Jacob and Evie have a very devil may care sense of humor and out-sized sense of heroism about their Assassin trade. Jacob tells Evie to “have fun” as they ride on top a train, and Evie responds with “Try not to die!” just before their train derails in a very overly-explosion filled affair. Templar antagonist Stannick is introduced with a quiet, piano melody before exploding into violence with an ornate revolver and a comically English mustache against someone who entered his room without permission.
The trailer also looks downright gorgeous – the Unity engine finally put to good use, I imagine. Characters pop and their stylish outfits, which feel taken from our collective memories of Victorian London rather than reality, look amazing.
Unseen in this trailer is any information on Assassin Creed Syndicate’s tie in to the modern day storyline – no strange artifacts, no moments out of time like Unity’s (intentional) system glitches.
Assassin’s Creed Syndicate will release on October 23, for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC.
