Only a "vocal minority" are upset with back-to-back Assassin's Creed games
The producer for Assassin's Creed Rogue has dismissed detractors over two games in the series releasing back-to-back, as some fans of the franchise have yet to upgrade to a PS4 or Xbox One.
Speaking with Eurogamer at gamescom, Karl von der Luhe said only a "vocal minority" of players are complaining over two Assassin's Creed games launching on console's this year.
"There are the hardcore Assassin's Creed fans that are happy to play two games and there are of course many fans who have not yet made that financial move to go to next-gen," Luhe said. "These are the guys that we're really catering for - they're thankful for the fact that they will have a compelling Assassin's Creed game to play on either their Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3."
The decision to release both games around the time timeframe was make "a long time ago", and while Unity has been in the works since 2010, production on Rogue didn't start until more recently.
"The idea of being a Templar has been around for years - ever since AC1," Luhe said. "Locking down the actual idea and story, that was around two years ago. I won't go into the exact details of when we started and all that, but we're very confident with the amount of time we've had this."
Luhe also said despite New York being featured already in assassin's Creed 3, Rogue is set 20 years prior to those events and the city will reflect the differences between the two maps.
"A quarter of the AC3 map was completely burnt out because there had been a fire in New York at that time," he explained. "Rogue being a few decades earlier, that whole quarter still existed meaning there's a whole new part of the city that the player will be able to explore.
"Politically speaking it's also very different. We're now set during the Seven Years War and the gangs are now rampant. We have a new feature called the Gang HQ - there are many of those around New York with an assassin camped inside who will be very tough and a badass to take down."
Luhe also said the game world will be larger than that of Black Flag and will contain "more than 20 hours" of gameplay.
Assassin's Creed: Unity is out on PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in October, while Rogue lands on PS3 and Xbox 360 in November.