That’s as per Ubisoft-focused content creator j0nathan, who has claimed that the Watch Dogs franchise is “dead and buried”. Upon being asked about the future of the franchise and whether a new instalment is in the work, the content creator suggested that the franchise has been put on the shelf. Allegedly, after the commercial failure of Watch Dogs: Legion, Ubisoft cancelled a number of previously planned Watch Dogs projects, including “a fairly original” battle royale game.

Whether that means Ubisoft has no intention of ever developing a new Watch Dogs game remains to be seen, but it certainly seems like the franchise has fallen down the pecking order where the company’s priorities are concerned.

Interestingly enough, though a new Watch Dogs game may not be coming anytime soon, last month, it was announced that a movie based on the IP has entered development under New Regency. Read more on that through here.

Watch Dogs est normalement mort et enterré. Le bide de Legion a détruit les projets sur la licence (dont un Battle Royale assez original)

— j0nathan (@xj0nathan) April 21, 2024

Unfortunately, there aren’t any details about what changes the update might bring to Watch Dogs Legion. It is quite likely, however, that the update was just a way for Ubisoft to shuffle around the game’s seasonal content, since it’s still playable for anyone that owns the game.

The last time we heard of Watch Dogs: Legion was when Ubisoft had ended its streak of not releasing the PC versions of its titles on Steam earlier this year.

Watch Dogs: Legion was originally released on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S back in 2020. The game came out to better-than-average reviews. Our own review, where we gave the game a score of 9 out of 10, praised the title for its variety of character types and archetypes, and the reactivity of the game. For more details, check out our review.

Unlike previous titles, Watch Dogs: Legion doesn’t have a single protagonist. Players can recruit anyone from the open world and add them to the team. Each NPC has unique traits and skills that can be useful, whether it’s a Professional with exceptional firearms handling or a Drone Operator who can, well, control drones.

In addition to the base game, the Deluxe, Gold and Ultimate Editions are available for 80 percent off on Steam until February 2nd. Steam Achievements aren’t supported, and you’ll still need Ubisoft Connect to run the game, so keep that in mind. Check out our review here for more details on the base game. It’s also available on Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4 and PS5.

Three editions will be available, with Standard Edition including only the base game. Gold Edition includes the base game and Season Pass, with the latter adding four new heroes like Aiden Pearce and Wrench from Watch Dogs 1 and 2. The Ultimate Edition features all of the above and the Ultimate Pack, with three characters with unique masks and outfits, three masks, a currency booster for the campaign, and currency and XP boosts while playing online.

Watch Dogs: Legion is available for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, and PC. In addition to paid content, it’s received several free updates over the years. For more details on the base game, check out our review here.

After the fifth season, Seasons 3 to 5 will be cycled continuously, thus allowing players to earn any rewards that were missed. New rewards coming up include an alternate version of Aiden Pearce’s Jacket along with Jackson’s mask and cloths. Following all of the updates, new characters and the Bloodline expansion, the developer noted that, “We couldn’t be prouder of the game we’ve created, and we appreciate all of you who’ve joined us on this journey in London over the year. We look forward to seeing more of your adventures in Legion!”

Watch Dogs: Legion first launched in October 2020 for PS4, Xbox One, PC and Google Stadia before coming to Xbox Series X/S and PS5 in November. You can check out our official review for the base game here. Where the franchise goes from here remains to be seen especially with Ubisoft Toronto currently focused on supporting Far Cry 6. Stay tuned for more details in the future.

As per Ubisoft, Title Update 5.6 for Watch Dogs: Legion has a size of just 3.2 GB on the PS5- which is significantly smaller than its size on pretty much every other system. Its size is 40.2 GB on Xbox Series X/S, 26.6 GB on PS4, 23.8 GB on Xbox One, and 25.98 GB on PC and Stadia. Of course, there is the chance that different composition of patches on different consoles might result in different sizes- but this is a significant and impressive margin nonetheless.

The title update has now rolled out for Watch Dogs: Legion on all platforms. You can check out the full patch notes below.

UPDATE NOTES:

General: 

• Fixed an issue that caused the Spiderbot Arena minimum player requirement to be 4 players. This fix reduces the minimum player requirement to the intended 2 players. 
• Fixed an issue that could cause the game to crash under certain circumstances. 
• Fixed missing visual effects on some UI highlights when hovering over them with a mouse. 
• Removed the Cargo Drone from Watch Dogs: Legion of the Dead. 

PC: 

• Fixed an issue that could cause players to be unable to recruit Operatives with the requirement of Season Rank 10 while having already unlocked Rank 10. 

Xbox: 

• Fixed an issue that could cause the game to crash when signing out of the active profile while in the main menu of Watch Dogs: Legion. 
• Fixed an issue where controller inputs did not register if a controller was activated after accepting an out-of-game invitation to start Watch Dogs: Legion. 

Xbox One: 

• Fixed an issue that could cause the game to crash. 

Ubisoft announced that starting at the end of this week, on the PlayStation platforms, PC (via the Epic Games Store and the Ubisoft store) and Google Stadia you’ll be able to try the base game out free of charge until the weekend is over. You’ll be able to access the main game as well as all free updates. If you wish to continue, your progress will carry over if you buy the game, and it will be on sale on those platforms. It’s unclear if a free weekend is in the cards for Xbox platforms later.

Watch Dogs: Legion is available now on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PC and Stadia. The free weekend will run from September 3rd to the 5th on the abovementioned platforms.

There are two new story missions that players can take part in, as well as two new side-quests. The Darcy outfit comes with the signature hidden blade, and the character can obviously be used to sneak through the game’s campaign. Of course, the update is free for all owners of Watch Dogs: Legion‘s Season Pass.

In addition to the single-player content, this update adds two new PvP modes titled Extraction and Invasion. There’s also the zombies mode titled Watch Dogs: Legion of the Dead. Ubisoft’s insistence on continuously updating its games with such content is part of its larger push for live-service games – which is transforming its biggest IPs with projects like Assassin’s Creed Infinity.

More specifically, Watch Dogs: Legion is getting Assassin’s Creed content pretty soon. The most significant new addition is Darcy, a member of the Assassins Brotherhood who’s being added as a playable character in the game, complete with her own Hidden Blade and everything, with a greater emphasis on stealth gameplay.

Darcy will be playable in both, the campaign as well as the game’s online component. Meanwhile, two new story missions and more world missions are also being added. Darcy will be available to all Season Pass holders, while the new missions will be available for free for everyone. The update goes live on August 24. Check out the trailer introducer the assassin below.

Watch Dogs: Legion is available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Stadia.

Even so, the idea of a new single player expansion that takes a different approach and offers a story-driven adventure of a more focused nature is still an exciting one, so I jumped into Bloodline with some optimism. Now that I’m done with it, I’m mostly satisfied with what it had on offer- though I also think that it feels a lot more pared down than the base game, and that a few other issues hold it back from true greatness. Fans of the series will certainly enjoy what Bloodline brings to the table, but it could have been so much more.

The elevator pitch for Bloodline is an inherently interesting one, at least for fans of the series- Aiden Pearce, protagonist of the first game, returns as the central character, and is paired up with on an on-and-off basis with Wrench, the goofy and loveable mask-wearing hacker from Watch Dogs 2. The two cross paths early on in Bloodline’s campaign, and their interests don’t necessarily align, but what starts out as a little bit of animosity eventually morphs into an uneasy partnership, as the two work together to take down bigger threats in London.

"Fans of the series will certainly enjoy what Bloodline brings to the table, but it could have been so much more."

I’ve never really liked Aiden Pearce’s character, so I wasn’t ecstatic to see him come back in Bloodline. In Watch Dogs 1, he was all too dour and needlessly gruff, and had all the emotiveness of a sack full of doorknobs. Even so, Bloodline actually does a pretty good job of making you care at least a little bit about him, his personal demons, and his character arc. His arc isn’t a particularly complex one, and focuses mostly on him coming to terms with his past and seeking forgiveness from his nephew, Jackson- but it’s enough to keep you somewhat invested. On top of that, it’s always fun to see Aiden in the sort of over-the-top situations that Watch Dogs has come to be known for after it course-corrected following criticisms for the first game.

Of course, Aiden is only half of the story in Bloodline– the other, far more interesting half is Wrench, a fan-favourite character in Watch Dogs 2, who steals the show in his comeback. Wrench is interesting from top to bottom. On a superficial level, his loud and unique visual design immediately grasps attention, while his boisterous personality and his knack for always cracking jokes and dropping strange quips ensures that he livens up every scene he’s in. Great acting and solid writing make him easy to like – much more than Aiden by far. It’s also great to see the pair work together- given how diametrically different they are from one another, it’s always fun seeing them play off of one another.

Most of all, however, Aiden and Wrench bring the kind of focus and gravity that was lacking in Watch Dogs: Legion. Where the base game sort of gave you no reason whatsoever to care about its story, given its complete lack of a protagonist or any main character to latch on to, Bloodline is much more story-driven, and tells its tale in a much more focused manner. No, that story isn’t outstanding, and the villain in particular is hilariously cartoonish, but it’s enough to keep you going, and Wrench and Aiden in particular (especially the former) make for a great central duo.

"Aiden and Wrench bring the kind of focus and gravity that was lacking in Watch Dogs: Legion. Where the base game sort of gave you no reason whatsoever to care about its story, given its complete lack of a protagonist or any main character to latch on to, Bloodline is much more story-driven, and tells its tale in a much more focused manner."

What about how it plays though? Well, that’s where Bloodline is a bit of a mixed bag. For starters, structurally and in terms of its content offerings, the expansion is far more pared back than the base game. It’s got several main missions and quite a few side quests, all of which can collectively take you 5-10 hours to finish, but outside of that, there’s not a whole lot else on offer. Open world offerings are sparse beyond the aforementioned stuff, which is a little disappointing- though thankfully, you can take Aiden and Wrench into the main game once you’re done with the DLC and mess around in London as them to your heart’s content.

Aiden is the primary playable protagonist here, and about 60-70% of Bloodline puts you in his shoes, if not more, though you do get to play as Wrench in the expansion’s second half as well. Of those two, the latter is definitely the more enjoyable to play as. Aiden’s rather vanilla as playable character goes, with some pretty basic hacking and stealth gameplay, and though upgrades (which are acquired by finishing side missions) do spice things up for him as you progress further, he still feels a bit too grounded and, in turn, somewhat plain. Wrench, on the other hand, can fly about on a modified cargo drone that shoots electrified grenades, can drop ninja balls to stun enemies and re-enter stealth, and has his trusty sledgehammer that he uses in melee combat- all of which is to say that he encourages a different kind of playstyle than “run up to enemies and shoot/stealth your way past them”.

What this also means is that in the early goings, Bloodline is a bit plain. When you start off, you play as Aiden, and in the beginning, Aiden doesn’t have much in his arsenal besides a drone and a couple of weapons and abilities. Missions in the opening couple of hours end up feeling to uninteresting and generic then, and though they do begin to open up as you progress further and unlock more abilities for Aiden – and even more so once you switch gears and begin playing as Wrench –  Bloodline definitely takes a while to really get going. There’s also the fact that you only have two characters who can only be upgraded or customized in a very linear and defined fashion through side missions, which means that the freedom of choice that Legion constantly encouraged, allowing you to play however you saw fit, is almost entirely gone in Bloodline.

"There’s also the fact that you only have two characters who can only be upgraded or customized in a very linear and defined fashion through side missions, which means that the freedom of choice that Legion constantly encouraged, allowing you to play however you saw fit, is almost entirely gone in Bloodline."

I’m also a little disappointed in all the technical issues I ran into while playing Bloodline. The frame rate wasn’t always the most consistent, quite a few times I died and the game refused to read my “hold A to retry” input and forced me to restart, there were a couple of hard crashed that made me boot up the game again, the audio glitched out on more than a few occasions, often to the point of the game going completely mute for a number of seconds, and characters often kept talking over each other during conversations. There were also plenty of animation glitches, a few of them even in cutscenes, which by themselves I would have been more than willing to overlook, but paired with all the other issues, are hard to forgive.

Watch Dogs: Legion – Bloodline is a solid and chunky piece of new content, one that series fans are sure to enjoy, and one that you will definitely like if you were disenchanted with the lack of storytelling focus in the main game. Seeing Wrench and Aiden coming back and working together is certainly a lot of fun, and playing as the former is consistently delightful. But from its open world activities to its limited progression and customization to its pared back open world, it also feels like a bit of a step back from what Legion accomplished. On the whole, Bloodline is worth playing for those who are, for one reason or another, already invested in Watch Dogs– just don’t expect anything spectacular.

This game was reviewed on the Xbox Series X.