Last July, Ubisoft officially confirmed that it was working on the next big Assassin’s Creed project, currently codenamed Assassin’s Creed Infinity and planned as an ever-evolving live service project. With that game still not out for while though – perhaps not for a few more years yet – Ubisoft has other Assassin’s Creed content planned as well- such as Dawn of Ragnarok, the upcoming large-scale Assassin’s Creed Valhalla expansion.
Another similar expansion, however, seems to have taken a different shape. In a recently published report, Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier has stated that according to people familiar with Ubisoft’s plans, the company is planning on releasing a new Assassin’s Creed game either later this year or in 2022. Interestingly, the game started development as another Assassin’s Creed Valhalla expansion, but was morphed into a standalone project late last year, with Ubisoft intending to use it to fill out what’s looking like an increasingly unpopulated release schedule for the coming year.
According to the report, the game, currently codenamed Rift, will revolve around Basim, a character that Valhalla fans will remember well. Interestingly, this standalone project is not going to be a massive open world RPG, which is what Assassin’s Creed has turned into in recent years, and will instead by a smaller, more focused experience that will put a greater emphasis on stealth.
There’s no denying that Ubisoft’s upcoming release schedule does look a little light, especially with so many of their announced games either having no release dates or having attracted a fair bit of backlash from fans following their announcements. A smaller stealth-focused Assassin’s Creed game might work out rather well for several reasons.