The map in Assassin’s Creed: Mirage will be much less sprawling than the enormous Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla.
An Ubisoft spokesperson has confirmed to Easy Allies that the map in the upcoming Assassin’s Creed: Mirage will be much smaller than in recent games. Thank goodness.
The past three mainline Assassin’s Creed games – Valhalla, Odyssey and Origins – have all featured absolutely huge maps that were riddled with quest markers. By contrast, Mirage appears to offer a more tightly focused experience, with a map that’s roughly the size of Constantinople in Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, or Paris in Assassin’s Creed: Unity.
We’ve known for a while now that Assassin’s Creed: Mirage will provide a move away from its more sprawling, RPG-like immediate predecessors. Back in January, creative director Stéphane Boudon told GamesRadar: “…amongst our fans, we started hearing the desire for a character driven story, focused on the core pillars of the first ACs in a more intimate scale. It resonates with us as well as developers and this was the starting point of the project.”
Mirage will seemingly provide a more intimate tale, focused more on stealth than all-out attack, and harking back to the very first Assassin’s Creed title back in 2007 and its immediate successors. This time around, the setting is 9th century Baghdad, and the game will follow the tale of Basim Ibn Ishaq, who was first introduced in Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla.
I can’t be the only one to feel a faint sense of relief that the next Assassin’s Creed game will be smaller, and no doubt there are many other time-poor adults who are cheering Ubisoft’s decision to scale back the size of this latest game. There’s a sense that something has been lost in the race to make every game bigger than the last one – why make a game so massive that only a tiny percentage of the audience will ever finish it?
Ubisoft is betting big on Assassin’s Creed right now, following some fairly dire financial results earlier in the year. Assassin’s Creed: Mirage is due out on 12th October on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and PC, and the recent Ubisoft Forward showcase highlighted some of its gameplay, along with footage of upcoming titles like Star Wars Outlaws.
Read more: Assassin’s Creed’s killer history
