Assassin’s Creed 4: Black Flag details unearthed

The announcement of Assassin’s Creed 4 may have seemed pretty sudden, but Ubisoft is already rolling out a lot of the details for the upcoming sequel.

The game has been in development for nearly two years, and is spearheaded by Ubisoft Montreal, the veteran AC studio. Ubisoft has pulled out all the stops and has support from other Ubisoft studios in 6 locations across the world.

Ubisoft has confirmed that the game will feature a new hero to the AC univserse – Edward Kenway, father of Haytham Kenway, and grandfather of Connor from Assassin’s Creed 3. Edward is a young British man who falls from the Royale Navy and into piracy, leading himself into the war between the Assassins and Templars.

The game takes place at the dawn of the 18^th Century during the Golden Age of Pirates, and features famous sea-dwellers, such as Blackbeard and Charles Vane.

Assassin’s Creed 4 Black Flag

The game features more than 50 navigable locations (3 main locations – Kingston, Nassau and Havana), including underwater exploration, and new weaponry from the game’s era.

Ashraf Ismail, game director at Ubisoft Montreal, emphasised the fact that, despite its appearance, AC4 will have a focus on assassinations.

“We have this really solid foundation that is the core and the heart of the experience,” said Ismail. The story is about a guy who is an assassin and the conflict he goes through to become this guy.” We actually have more assassinations than AC1 had.”

A more “varied” multiplayer will also return, however, details are slim on that front.

Ubisoft also confirmed that the game will be released on Xbox 360, PS3, PS4, Wii U, PC and “other next generation systems,” which is obviously an allusion to Microsoft’s soon-to-be-unveiled console.

Collector’s Editions will be available, and Ubisoft will detail those towards the end of March.

The game is set to launch on current-gen platforms on 1 November 2013.