Assassin’s Creed Infinity is said to be a live service platform that will host all Assassin’s Creed adventures moving forward from around 2024. It’s a big departure from the regular releases, and that’s not such a great thing for a number of reasons. In this article, I want to go through those, but that doesn’t mean that I’m totally against the idea. In fact, I think it could be pretty great, but there are downsides to everything.
First, all the Assassin’s Creed collector’s editions will be gone. I love buying these with every release, they’re the only collectibles I regularly buy, and they make me very happy. Without a regular release schedule, these will end. It’ll just be the collectible tatt that doesn’t contain the game, and I hate buying that. If Ubisoft follows what Bethesda does, releasing a collectors edition with a code for every expansion, then that would correct the problem. I’m not holding out much hope though.
Next, I suspect that Ubisoft will monetize the crap out of this service. We’ll have to pay for everything, and probably have a paid membership on top of it all. This is how all the company’s games have been going for a while. Unfortunately, companies like to make money, and Ubisoft sees this as a good way to make a lot of it. I don’t think it’s wrong, because I’m not going to avoid playing it just because I know I’m being screwed. This is my favourite franchise, I’ll play it whatever, and Ubisoft knows that.
Finally, Ubisoft is leaning into NFTs and live services with everything it does. The more it does this, the less personality all of its games have. Before too long, Assassin’s Creed will be a subscription service that we have to pay for instead of a set of incredibly distinct games. I don’t like that future, because it ruins the efforts that all the developers put into them. If all you see is an Assassin’s Creed label every now and then, how are you supposed to know when a new game is coming out? This isn’t a good future for the franchise, but there’s nothing we can do about it.
