Assassin’s Creed 2 won’t be all sunshine, roses, and familiar Italian cities. At gamescom, Ubisoft Montreal revealed more locations — available for viewing in the gallery — as well as several engine improvements that should make Ezio’s wicked knife-plunging escapades more interesting than Altair’s. We hope, at least.
New to Anvil engine is the inclusion of a dynamic day and night cycle. While we can’t say that the narrative won’t dictate the time of day during certain missions, it’ll be interesting to see what effects it has on the way assassination targets, free-roaming soldiers, and the way Ezio interacts with the environment. In addition to the cycle, Ubisoft plans to wow players with enhanced draw distances and rendering stuff.
Of course, the thing we want the most is more places to visit. Back at E3 we saw Florence. Now, we — and by extension, you — can eyeball slivers of Tuscany, the wetlands, the mountains (leading up to Florence), and the ‘Secret Location’ of the Shipyard. (Secret locations are the guts of landmarks that the clever traveler can find and enter.)
The wetlands area has us thinking Swamp Thing, but we’ll hold our e-mails for now. Even if the slushy crusader made the cut, Ubisoft wouldn’t be talking about him quite yet. (Please make this happen.)
Assassin’s Creed 2 hits November 17th.
