Is Assassin’s Creed really headed to Ancient Egypt?

Rumours suggest the next Assassin’s Creed will be set in Ancient Egypt, while Watch Dogs 2 will apparently move to San Francisco.

Considering Ubisoft has upwards of 1,000 people working on each game it’s no wonder there are always so many leaks about Assassin’s Creed. But this time the rumours seem to reveal not just the setting but that the series is finally taking time out from its yearly release schedule.

Ancient Egypt has, along with other obvious choices such as Japan and India, been rumoured for years, with the image above coming from one of the official comic book spin-offs. These new rumours started off on 4Chan, which you’d think would be all you need to know to ignore them. But the comments by the alleged Ubisoft developer were then repeated by separate sources speaking to website Kotaku.



All sources agree that there will be no Assassin’s Creed game in 2016, due to a major series overhaul, and that when one does arrive in 2017 it will be set in Ancient Egypt. The game is currently codenamed Empire (Syndicate was originally codenamed Victory so that probably won’t stick).


The comics seem to be medieval rather Ancient Egypt.

According to the original 4Chan source the game is being developed by the team responsible for Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag and is being designed to have ‘a Witcher feel’.

The game world will allegedly be three times the size of Black Flag, but with no naval combat and little of the series’ signature parkour action – which makes sense because there would’ve been few tall buildings in that time period.

The source also claims there’s no co-op and that the game will be trying not to use any recycled content from existing games.

Is there really no return for naval combat?

In short it sounds like exactly the sort of overhaul the series has been in dire need of for years. Although it’s interesting that the catalyst for the change was not the poor critical response to 2014’s Assassin’s Creed Unity but instead the lower-than-usual sales of last year’s Assassin’s Creed Syndicate.

To plug the gap in their schedules, Kotaku alleges that Ubisoft will be unveiling Watch Dogs 2 later this year – presumably to fill Assassin’s Creed’s usual pre-Christmas release slot.

The first Watch Dogs was released in May 2014 and at the time was Ubisoft’s fastest selling game ever. The only rumour about the new game though is that it will be set in San Francisco rather than Chicago.

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